Jingle Bells, X-mas Farewells, Long Weekend — Hooray!

It’s almost that time, and before you ship yourself off to family functions to stuff your bellies full of the kind of food that instigates gym memberships, we wanted to fill you up with some holiday merriment — the type that doesn’t have any calories.

The first low-cal treat we have for you is in the form of Matt Cutts, Matt McGee and Danny Sullivan, among others, singing the “12 Days of Googlemas.” Some of them look as though they may have been bribed to do it.

Speaking of Google, why hasn’t it holidified its logo yet? (Yes, I just made up a new word. That’s my gift to you.) These are the types of things that we SEMs count on to put us in the holiday mood.  [Update: Jess wrote this yesterday. You now can has Googley Cheer. In a complicated way. –Susan] Well, you can always go to Yahoo!, Bing or Search Engine Roundtable to get your winter 2010 holiday logo fix. I actually happen to be partial to one logo in particular:

In even more Google holiday news, the Webmaster Central Blog shared tips for holiday source code housekeeping for beginners. This blog post is centered around Meta data from nonprofits, but the practices it highlights can be applied to sites across the Web.

Remember when the perfect holiday gift was a carton of smokes and a bottle of Scotch? No? Well, the days of future presidents endorsing good ol’ fashion holiday fun are over, but we can still reminisce. (Click on photo for enlarged version of magical ad.)

[I kind of like the new holiday traditions, myself. The ones that are less cancer causing and more heartwarming. Over at the Bloggess, ordinary humans demonstrate how to make an extraordinary difference. Jenny’s heart grew three sizes, yours will too. –Susan]

Search Engine Land has some holiday marketing strategies for online retailers that include tips to automate the campaign, optimize generic keywords for the holidays and more. While you’re at it, check out my interview with paid search pro here at BCI, Javier Ruesga, to learn more about PPC for the holidays.

Wanna win a Sony Bloggie camera for the holiday? Two lucky contestants will take home this camera by entering into the CrunchGear 12 Days of Christmas contest. All you have to do is leave a comment on the post linking to or describing your most memorable holiday photo. But here’s the thing: You don’t even have to be clever. It says the winners are chosen randomly.

Of course, we wouldn’t send you off on the holiday break before you got a good dose of Chris Hart, director of Eastern region operations here at BCI, having a holiday fiesta with his pals Bacon the dog and J-Station the cat. [If you’re asking why we’re linking this again, blame Lisa Barone. She asked for it. Happy Christmas, Lisa! –Susan]

Jessica Lee is the founder and chief creative for bizbuzzcontent Inc., a marketing boutique that focuses on digital content strategy and professional writing services for businesses.

See Jessica's author page for links to connect on social media.