InterAct - The online marketing blog

End of a hard time

2007-02-25T18:11:00.000+01:00

Jep, it is time to revive my blog. Definitely. Two reasons for that. At IAB Europe we are launching THE IAB Event and it might be called "Interact". How future seeing of me, ha? Second reason, we have gone through a very tough time in our agency launching a media buying business. And hopefully this maddens will cool down just a little bit. Please... :-)

Interactive agencies and the future challenges

2006-07-26T23:44:00.000+02:00

Amy Auerbach wrote a day or two ago about how our industry might face a problem in lacking industry professionals for a fast pace of development in our industry. I have to say that I share her thoughts in expressing concern about this issue given the fact that our industry is reinventing itself often and that we work in a environment that is multidisciplined as it can get. Clearly we are developing things that have a marketing soul on one hand and a strong technology base on the other, not to mentions the ever expanding list of the strategies, tactics and tools that are being invented on a daily basis. Interactive agencies are getting in so many different fields of work (marketing, PR, CRM, process organization, and so on..) that it takes a very wide array of experts to cover them.

The problem is that what we need is not a ready made expert. We need people that are able to reinvent themselves often. That want to grow with the industry and be a creative part of it. And those are hard to find...

What is you opinion on that? Are you starting to lack these kinds of people also?

http://publications.mediapost.com/

Tag: interactive agency, interactive agencies, online advertising

Mercedes microsite

2006-07-24T11:13:00.000+02:00

Today there is a great pack of online creative available. And of course, some are good and some are not. But this one has really got to me. No great technology leap but good ideas and good execution. http://www.a-to-s.co.uk/

Tag: online creative, online advertising

Things to discuss...

2005-12-21T17:52:00.000+01:00

Hmmm, haven't posted for a long time now. Time is money and I think that in our industry this term is pushed very far. Even too far I think.

Customers are demanding everything and now, but we are not a graphical studio. Not everybody knows that there are some extreme technological issues to be solved in order for to things to work properly. Cos' technology is good when you do not notice it, and this it the issue... Perhaps education is once again the key here.. Any thoughts on that?

Tag: technology, web technology, online advertising

Will WWW beat the 30-second spot?

2005-10-03T19:52:00.000+02:00

People who visited Advertising Week pointed out that one of the recurring topics was the future of the 30-second TV spot. Brian McAndrews, president and CEO of aQuantive stated: "Our belief is that the Web site is going to replace the 30-second commercial over time as the central expression of the brand."

Interesting thought. Although a little bit futuristic. My opinion is that this can certainly happen, but not so fast. On the other hand, branding is closely related to the web site even now. You have to bear in mind that there is a good chance that a customer will interact with your brand only on the web. Talking about the 20-30 age group this will most probably happen. Change in media consumption has done that, so the wisest thing would definitely be to follow it.

The other thing is related to the amount of information that you can get from a web site. While on the 30-second spot you are constrained by the time issue, a website can offer timeless experience and a very structured one. Everything from the logo to the most complex information is linked and easy to use (well, this is not the case for every website).

Tags: Branding, TV spot, online advertising, web site

I-Com - Day two

2005-10-02T17:04:00.000+02:00

The best thing about today's program has absolutely been the "interactive parts" of the conference. They were called interactive sessions and were actually a pretty two-way method of discussing the issues. The interesting thing is that we have localized some pretty important issues on witch our industry should be moving.

All I-com participants

Among them I would emphasize the different ways to tackle the issue of bringing more investments in to the online advertising (and things relating to this issue: standardization, talking in a language that would be easily understood by media planers, and so on..) and the cookie deletion issue.

Tags: i-com conference, Online Media Measurement, Online audience Measurement, online advertising

Nielsen/Netratings hands the Italian research to Spring

2005-09-27T15:20:00.000+02:00

One of the things that we've learned in Berin is that the Italian IAB has chosen a new company to do their technical part of the online audience measurement project. They have chosen Spring. Actually, Italy commisioned TNS and Spring with the implementation of a new IAM System, that will cover a signifcant share of the italian market. The system will measure the usage of more than 80 portals in Italy and provide information on reach of websites and their units as well as sociodemographical data.

Tags: i-com conference, Online Media Measurement, Online audience Measurement, online advertising

I-Com - Part one

2005-09-27T12:41:00.000+02:00

Mr. Vončina and me at the I-com lobby

So, that's it. I am reporting directly from the I-Com conference one day later from what my plans were. It's been a hard day, but somehow me managed to get to sleep at 4 o'clock. And in the mean time there was absolutely an enormous amount of talks, discussions and arguing. Which turned out to be very good (like always)?

If I was to describe the first day of the I-Com I would say that everything has been moving about "Consensus". Although not everybody is sincere about it, I think that one of the greatest thing about our industry is that we're are able to talk and discuss about things that can be very tough to agree upon.

What we have seen also is that there are many different methodologies across the different countries, but when it comes to sum it up, the differences are very small. So there's definitely a chance to get together and set a common set of standards for the online audience measurement. Of course there will always be differences, for there are many different realities, especially in Europe. But this is not necessary a bad thing.

First of all it keep innovation and research going and then it's enabling the different countries to have a response for different need. And by that developing further the market and research.

Tags: i-com conference, Online Media Measurement, Online audience Measurement, online advertising

I-Com - International Conference on Online Media

2005-09-24T20:35:00.000+02:00

Tommorow I am leaving for the I-Com conference. You can expect day by day reports and insigths of a conference that aims to:

deliver an International Overview Study (IOS) of Online Site & User centric measurement status around the world
presenting & discussing major site and user centric measurement systems
creating an international network amongst professionals in Online Media Measurement
facilitating forums on key issues including international cooperation

Tags: i-com conference, Online Media Measurement, Online audience Measurement, online advertising

The local online marketing future

2005-09-23T14:41:00.000+02:00

According to the latest Research and Markets report, the online local advertising is fastly gaining ground manking it the hottest thing on the market. Some sites are registering 50 to 100 percent increases in ad revenue over 2004.

So, the expectations of Yahoo, Google and others, who have joined the "local search movement" could very well be fulfilled (spending by local businesses on paid search is expected to rise 161 percent next year). Local online marketing is getting stronger day by day and this is good news for the local media and site owners, for serving this kind of information really needs local business insights.

And, BTW, JupiterResearch reports that online local advertising will reach $3.2 billion this year, a 26 percent increase from 2004. In the next five years, the local market will continue double-digit growth, with 11 percent gains, compounded annually, to take the market to $5.3 billion in 2010.
Read the article...

Tags: online marketing, local search, local online marketing

Will MSN UK be blacked out?

2005-09-23T12:55:00.000+02:00

Yes, the msn.co.uk has agreed that it will serve an page takeover ad from Optician Specsavers. The ad will cause MSN UK users to see a completely blacked out screen with a single light switch that illuminates to reveal the Specsavers marketing message.

Congratulations to I-level agency who closed the deal, but I am wondering about the impact on the users. We will see (and read) about it. If you came across the ad, leave your comment.

Tag: i-level, online advertising

Banner advertising in France

2005-09-21T15:23:00.000+02:00

I have came across this data about online advertising in France. Interesting trends of banner usage.

Parts de marché des formats e-pub
Type de format	1er semestre 2004	1er semestre 2005	Evolution
Banner (468x60)	37,1 %	27,8 %	- 9,3 points
Banner (120x600)	8,4 %	10,0 %	+ 1,6 point
Large (728x90)	3,6 %	9,0 %	+ 5,4 points
Carre (250x250)	4,5 %	8,3 %	+ 3,8 points
Bouton (28x30)	5,1 %	6,9 %	+ 1,8 point
Rectangle (300x250)	2,8 %	6,5 %	+ 3,7 points
Skycraper (160x600)	3,1 %	2,5 %	- 0,6 points

Source: journaldunet

Tag: online advertising

Ebay as a marketing channel

2005-09-21T10:54:00.000+02:00

In an emerging media environment there are plenty possibilities for alternative ways of doing marketing and Internet probably offers the largest number of them. There are virtually unlimited possibilities of making things in a different way, and this is probably the best thing about working in the interactive business.

EBay, for example is now being used by marketers to spread the word about new products and build buzz for their brands. Some examples include Coca-Cola that opened an eBay auction for a set of six 8-ounce custom Coke Zero bottles and Zero-inspired jewelry designed by Chris Aire, Oprah, that has used eBay for charity fundraising since 2003 and 20th Century Fox that promoted the movie I, Robot with sale of movie merchandise on eBay. BTW, an autographed Will Smith leather jacket was sold for $4,600.

But eBay is not the only way of course, there are many other possibilities. If you keep your mind open and tend not to be closed in standard procedures, you will certainly find your own way of doing things different. This is what I call creative Internet marketing.

Tag: internet marketing, eBay

Lexus RX400h

2005-09-20T11:47:00.000+02:00

I must say that the last Lexus TV ad for the RX400h is one of the best automobile TV ads I have ever seen. And although I must congratulate the people who stand behind it, I can not say so for the people who are behind the various web presentations of the product. I have gone through various web presentations of the RX400h and found out that either are not implementing the "file rouge" of the campaign or they are implementing it badly.

Most of them are either not into the campaign (lexus.com) or are implementing the different images in various ways (lexsus uk, lexus.de). But the bottom line is that they are not implementing the idea behind the product. Putting the TV spot ideas (as is) on the web is like playing TV ads on the radio (or vice-versa). I think that a good web presentation should follow the whole campaign but at the same time seize the advantages of the web.

So, I think that the question that should be posed is not how to implement the "ideas energy lines" from the TV spot to the web, but how to implement the innovation and energy combination to the web. And if this is to be creatively near to the TV ad "look and feel" even better. So starting from this point of view it should be easy to find creative ideas about energy combination, energy spreading and innovation (ideas) on the web.

Tag: Lexus, internet advertising

What do Mobile users look for?

2005-09-17T23:18:00.000+02:00

As recent study by Telephia shows the interests of the mobile users are not different from those of the web users. They are looking for weather, news and sports information, checking mail and doing searches. And this is especially true for those users who use their mobile devices to access to the websites and web services.

Source: www.emarketer.com
Tag: mobile, mobile users, emarketer

If you were Google...

2005-09-16T11:39:00.000+02:00

A week ago I was reading an article by Gord Hotchkiss, where he was asking: If you were Google, you had access to $4 billion in cash, and you were taking on Microsoft on their home turf, what would you do?

My firts idea was: I would build up a new operating system. And it seem to be the idea of many responders. But there are other ideas. Which one seem logical to you?

1) new operating system
2) a suite of online apps with a ultra simple OS
3) mobile computing
4) super MP3 players
5) low-cost wireless broadband service
6) Paperclick technology
7) Cash it in and go home...

Tag: Google, Microsoft

Google the blogs

2005-09-15T21:17:00.000+02:00

Google blog search is born. At last.

Google defines blogs as sites that use RSS and other structured feeds and update content on a regular basis. And check out the bottom of the search results page. You can subscribe to Atom and RSS feeds.

Tag: Google blog search

SEO is better than paid search

2005-09-14T22:50:00.000+02:00

iProspect and JupiterResearch conducted a study about the ROI on SEO and paid search among those companies that used one or both the past month. They have found out that 35% of 138 respondents are more satisfied (in terms of ROI) with optimization that with paid search (11%). 9 percent said the results were similar.

But the data that should really make us think is hidden in the answers to another question. For a lot of respondents don’t measure ROI (21 percent), could not measure it (10 percent), or were unable to distinguish between ROI for paid links and optimization (14 percent).

Tag: SEO, ROI, paid search

Jack Myers on future of interactive marketing

2005-09-14T20:21:00.000+02:00

Predicting the future in interactive marketing is like playing lotto. In an environment that is changing on daily basis predicting future for a next few years can be a risky business. But somehow we can not resist the temptation.

The media guru Jack Myers, for example, forecasts the fall of broadcast television. In his opinion video games will experience the largest growth. In his 2006 Marketing and Advertising Spending Forecast his states that in-game advertising will grow by 40 percent in 2006, though it will still represent less than one percent of total ad spend. Online advertising, on the other hand, will grow by 27 percent to reach a 6.4 percent market share.

Other predictions for 2006 include movie screen advertising grow by 25 percent and branded entertainment, local and regional cable, and custom publishing less than 20 percent each.

Of course, first of all, these figures can be very different country by country, but if we look at a overall forecast I mostly agree that the online advertising will gain a higher market share. But the figures of course can be very different. In Europe, for example...

There some countries that are looking forward to brake the 2% mark and obviously can not expect a 6% adspend share in the year 2006. Although this means that in terms of growth the figures can be much higher. But when we are looking at the video game advertising there is a difference in approach, for video games can be widely distributed and so they can have a good market penetration in different countries. I think that big advertisers, who see the advantage in this approach, will go for it.

But the biggest issue in my opinion is Mobile advertising. This is an adspend bomb that is ticking and nobody knows when it will explode. But when the time will come it will grab a big adspend share.

What is your opinion on the issues?

Tag: interactive marketing, mobile advertising, video games, online advertising

Algorithm SEO vs Content SEO

2005-09-13T14:10:00.000+02:00

There is an interesting debate going on about the SEO opportunities on the Lee Odden's blog.

...."But the question remains in my opinion. Do we need irrelevant people visiting our site? I think that we are trying to go in the direction of mass media as they were, when instead we should have a targeted amount of quality audience."....

Tag: Search engine optimization

Skype for 2.6 billion

2005-09-13T09:19:00.000+02:00

A few days ago I was in Luxemburg not knowing that I was in the city of Skype. Yes, Skype is a European based company that is reportedly not so very know in

America

, but I can tell you that here in Europe quite a good amount of people are using their services.

Now Skype in being bought by Ebay and the future seem bright for them even though not everybody is enthusiastic about Skype (like for example the Chinese Telecom).

And what is the fuss about Skype?

Very simple. It's Internet telephony with one big advantage. It works. Although their service is not so exemplary these days (I suppose that a big user base comes with some problems), in the days when we were starting to use it, it was a hell of a service. So, I many ways their story is relevant to all of us. A good service is the base of a successful company. Nothing more (or maybe something), and absolutely nothing less.

Skype in numbers

Tag: Skype

Weekend in review

2005-09-11T11:16:00.000+02:00

Skype is getting hotter everyday. There a bunch of companies that are trying to lay hands on it, but it is playing hard to get. But not everybody likes Skype. The China's Telecom has started to block access to Skype because of the clear threat to it's revenues.

IP-based TV is also getting hotter day by day. It's expected that 32 million subscribers will be watching TV provided by telecommunications providers in 2009. At the end of 2004 the number was 1.6 million.

And Nielsen//NetRatings has unveiled his new audience counting method, that relies in combining information about cookie deletions from Nielsen//NetRatings' consumer research panel with Web sites' raw visitor numbers, as determined by SiteCensus, Nielsen//NetRatings' analytics tool.

The blog searching future

2005-09-11T00:34:00.000+02:00

The Wall street journal has pointed out a few blog search services, that should have the brightest future:

Tehnorati, IceRocket, Feedster, DayPop, Bloglines

What do you think? Are those the ones?

IAB Europe's new site

2005-09-11T00:01:00.000+02:00

IAB Europe has a new website (actually a revised one) with more content and information about members and programs, especially about events and standards programs.

Given the fact that, that all of us working at IAB have “day jobs” too, I must congratulate everybody for this new goal. Resources are always tight in trade associations, but we all try to give the most…. ;-)

http://www.iabeurope.ws/

Epsilon e-mail marketing

2005-09-10T16:02:00.000+02:00

Epsilon, the U.S. data management subsidiary of financial and marketing services firm Alliance Data Systems, bought Bigfoot Interactive. The purchase price is approximately $120 million and has a clear goal. Building a multi-channel marketing services giant.

Apple - the mobile pioneer?

2005-09-10T13:27:00.000+02:00

It's easy to say that Mobile is the next big thing in Interactive marketing. But just a few of the biggest players seem to believe it. If we don't count the obvious search engine, one of these few companies is certainly Apple.

You have already heard of the I-tunes phone, that was build by Motorola Inc, but for Apple this is probably only the first step. Other mobile oriented companies are tying to move the music business to mobile. Obviously, everybody is expecting the most of that, but Apple seems to be ahead for now. The company is so entusiastic about this, that is apparently not asking any revenues from the phone selling.

Many big mobile provides are already taking huge steps in that direction. Vodafone for example has a music downloading service for their UMTS users. So, we can expect huge steps in this direction very soon...

Rupert Murdoch moving ahead

2005-09-09T22:35:00.000+02:00

Mr. Murdoch means business. Yesterday he just bought IGM Entertainment. The Internet game and entertainment site was a close call, for Viacom was reportedly closing a deal on IGM, but Murdoch got in their way.

So there's obviusly a very big plan behind his words at the American Society of Newspaper Editors. His News corporation spent nearly $1.5 billion on three Internet companies in just the last seven weeks.

The search - Google's critical edge

2005-09-09T22:27:00.000+02:00

Journalist John Battelle just published a book titled "The search". It is a result of three years of backstage information haunting on how Google got so big

"Increasingly search is our mechanism for how we understand ourselves, our world and our place in it. It's how we navigate the one infinite resource that drives human culture: knowledge."

The saddest thing

2005-09-09T11:15:00.000+02:00

"I feel about airplanes the way I feel about diets. It seems to me they are wonderful things for other people to go on."

- Jean Kerr

I saw this quote today and it reminded me of a typical thinking of quite a good portion of people who are thinking about going "on the web". "The web is super cool and all that, but I would prefer not to invest at this time, thank you"

If you have followed the speech form Rupert Murdoch the other day you have probably noticed that even the big ones are changing their attitude to the online presence and marketing, and it is really amazing when you here words like "I suspect many of you in this room did the same, quietly hoping that this thing called the digital revolution would just limp along. " And the saddest thing is that they really thought that it will eventually limp along.

In many ways I think that his speech has moved a good amount of people to really think again about the Internet. Although I can not understand what has taken them so long... The fear of not knowing the net and its properties has certainly played a big role in these decisions, but hey, why do you think that the bravest always win!

On the other hand the fear of investing on the net is really a thing of the past. All the international and national organizations that are involved in online marketing have produced so much proof of the fact that online advertising is working and that produces great results, that this fear is more of an excuse to me...

Read Murdoch's speech...

And you wonder why blogs are so important?

2005-09-08T07:33:00.000+02:00

Crazy idea using blogs for marketing. In fact, how many of you were very much surprised when businesses went towards the corporate blogs. Well, the simple logic of these investments is now getting clearer day by day.

Of course blogs are very much like the traditional »mouth to mouth marketing«, only they are faster and easier to reach. But the most important thing is that they are written, so they can be reached 24 hours per day. In that way opinion leaders have gotten even more power to influence people all over the world.

But this is not all. As comScore Networks just reported this week, the blogers have got themselves a wonderful audience. There is about 50 million of them in

America

representing about 30 percent of the total U.S. Internet population. And they are, compared to the average Internet user, significantly more likely to live in wealthier households, be younger and connect to the Web on high-speed connections. Pretty impressive. Blog readers also visit nearly twice as many web pages as the Internet average, and they are much more likely to shop online. So, do not wonder why any more, use them in your favor.