Rand Fishkin gives an overview of his SMX presentation in this interview by WebProNews. HE discusses H1 Tags being less important than people think, as opposed to the Title tag that is still very important.
Rand points out keyword usage on the page has a low relevance correlation and low importance in the overall Google algorithm. The number of unique domains and anchor text used to link to your site are still the most important elements in ranking for the term or phrases you are targeting. He points out W3c compliant pages aren’t really important, but can’t hurt.
The best part of the video comes when Rand starts talking about the growing importance of social media and reputation in search relevance.