ad:techNYC06

November 7, 2006

Search Marketing: Bid Management

My next ad:Tech session touched on the subject of bid management for PPC, and included famed panelists Jon Ostler (First Rate), Martin Fleischmann (MostChoice) and David Berkowitch (360i).

Pay per click has become increasingly popular as site owners realize the potential to earn, controllable rankings. Of course, as the number of players in the game increase, so does the competition. As a result, it’s becoming critical to achieve the right balance between cost and positioning. This is where bid management tools come into play.

Jon Ostler started the session by identifying several types of PPC big management strategies.

Obviously, there is the basic settings, which allows you budget, use phrase matching, target positioning, day parting, etc. Most PPC campaigns will start here.

The next option highlighted was position bidding. This is when you decide that you want your ad to remain at a specific bid position. It’s particularly helpful for branding purposes, but could get very expense, very fast if you forget to specify a max bid. If you are going to use it for branding purposes, the panel recommended keeping your site in the top three listed. Position Bidding works best for terms with a high conversion rate.

Next on Jon’s list was return bidding. Return bidding adjusts bids based on cost per acquisition, cost per sale and ROI. The panel recommended using this option for phrases with lower conversion rates.

Another method mention by Jon was time-based bidding. Time-based bidding allows you to lower or raise bids based on the time of day or the day of week. A lot of advertisers find this very useful, especially when they want to sync their cross-media advertising.

For example, say you have a television commercial that runs during prime time on Monday nights. You may want your ad to only run during those times when users are more likely to be thinking about your brand. Or another option, maybe you want to have your ad appear when you know competitor ISN’T running theirs. Get the exposure for lower the cost!

Those were the main bid management strategies focused on by the panel, but that is no means an exhaustive list. Whichever bid management method (or methods!) you decide to go with, make sure you’re not flying blind. Understand what your model is about before you go with it.

Here are some factors to take into consideration before deciding:

Where do you want to be?
How many leads do you want to generate? What is the cost per lead?
What is your budget?
What management tools are your competitors using?
How will variables affect your campaign?
Pick your battles.

That last one struck me. It’s important to pick your battles on your Web. If a competitor jumps higher than you for one of your keywords, ask yourself if it’s worth the battle. If it is and that term is important to you, pressure them for the spot – outbid them, try and push them to go higher or penny them down. But if it’s not worth it and fighting will only generate ill will, let someone else go after them. The people you anger today, will anger you back tomorrow. Break the cycle.

JupiterMedia reports that paid search is one of the fastest growing categories online, and with good reason. Studies show that if you appear in both the organic and paid search results, you’ll do better on both listings. The double exposure makes you appear more credible and increase your expertness, so bid wisely.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 7/06 at 3:00 PM | TrackBack (0)
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Running a successful viral campaign

We’ve written about the power of word-of-mouth marketing campaigns before, so today’s Intricacies of a Great Viral or WOM Marketing Program session was especially interesting to me. I also happen to think WOM is something that doesn’t get nearly enough attention, so I’m always happy when sessions like these arise.

The session got off to a humorous start when Zdeneck Kratky introduced attendees to Norelco’s ShaveEverywhere campaign. If you’re not familiar with the campaign, go check out that site (but come back!) and peruse the collection of videos.

Aside from just being humorous and blush-inducing, Zdeneck’s example showed the power of attacking even sensitive issues head on. If you appear uncomfortable with what you’re marketing, so will your users. (I’ll never look at a peach the same way again *shivers*)

Jason Woodmansee took over once Zdeneck finished embarrassing the group and outlined a strong WOM strategy. What I really liked about what Jason was offering was he talked a lot about establishing a presence in a market where a dominant player is already exists. I’m sure it’s something a lot of attendees could relate to (perhaps Yahoo should have been there…) and it put a whole new spin on the concept of getting your message out.

Jason’s strategy involved four basic steps.

Prepare the field -- Before you launch your viral campaign, leak rumors that something may be in the works. Google is the king of this. How many times have we ‘accidentally’ discovered a new beta they were working on or a new service that was about to be released. By getting the information out early, it puts your name back in user’s top of mind and makes people more receptive to what you’re offering.

Let consumers to do your marketing – If you’re having an event, invite bloggers and other media and let them do the work for you. You’d be surprise how a bunch of enthusiastic voices can stir up positive attention. Many bloggers have very loyal audiences, if you win them over, you’ll win over their audience. This is a great way to promote good will and get ‘more authentic’ buzz.

Get the product in the hand of influencers – Bloggers aren’t the only people who can help put fire under your viral campaign. Before your campaign goes public, send consumers of your most prized demographic a sample of your product. Go out to message boards and give them a special link or code to get an advanced copy of whatever you’re selling. This will generate an awareness and an interest in your product, and you may even see people posting positive reviews on the message boards.

Start the official marketing campaign – Now that people are talking and buzz has already been generated, it’s safe to launch your official marketing campaign. Your audience is already waiting.

Your job isn’t over once your launch your campaign. It’s important that you monitor the conversation about both you, and your product. In today’s market, not only do you have to market what you make, you also have to market who you are. Users won’t buy your products if they don’t trust who you are and what your company represents.

And don’t underestimate the power of negative feedback. Rumors and conspiracy theories grow like wildfires on the Internet. If you don’t monitor your buzz, you may find yourself quite surprised to hear what people are saying behind your back.

The best way to monitor the conversation is to join in. Find out where your users are expressing themselves and be there. Create a portion of your web site, perhaps a company blog, which will address and add to these online conversations. Maybe you should start a newsletter or offer an opt-in RSS feed. Create SEM initiatives that use relevant keywords to invite visitors into your site.

Most importantly, if you do add a voice, it has to be an honest one. This includes being honest in your relationships with other people, your opinions and your identity. Remember what happened to Edelman.

WOM is the most powerful marketing tool at your disposal. Start your viral campaigns off on the right foot and you’ll have a greater chance at success.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 7/06 at 10:29 AM | TrackBack (0)
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SEO Optimization Strategies and Tactics

The SEO Optimization Strategies and Tactics panel gave users valuable tips for creating a sound organic search engine optimization campaign.

First up, Gary Smith.

Gary’s speech focused on optimizing your entire Web site, from top to bottom. According to Gary, optimization isn’t just about making a few pages engine-friendly or identifying keywords, it’s about making the entire site a subject matter expert. Long time readers know that we couldn't agree more.

In order to do this, you have to optimize for both broad and niche (long-tail) terms. These niche or long tail terms have a much higher conversion rate than the broad search terms. As a result, we’re seeing the popular broad term search phrases are accounting for a smaller percentage of total search engine traffic and conversions.

Gary shared his recipe for optimizing the long tail:

Create a content rich site to attract qualified traffic. The Long Tail is about individual pages.
Whole Site Optimization – Optimize the entire site and get it indexed to maximize keyword combinations and traffic, which is a challenge for large sites.
Search Saturation – you want to appear in more searchers than your competitors.
Analyze your site content and keyword combinations and match pages with the search terms people are actually looking for and look for gaps. When you find the gaps, plug them by creating content to meet that need.
Scalability

Gary applies this ‘recipe’ for long-tail terms, but really, adhering to Gary’s ways will give you a good basis for creating any type of search engine optimization campaign.

Next up was Ellen Duffie-Fritz who gave tips for increasing your site’s link popularity by following the strategy outlined below:

Internally

Every page of content must be accessible to the engines and to users.
All links should be text base to encourage spiders to crawl the entire site.
Anchor text should always use important keyword phrases.

Externally

Create a list of respected sites in your industry that would give you the highest “vote of relevancy” and obtain links from them.

Authoritatively

Create compelling content to encourage linking. Content can be in the form of unique tools, proprietary content or rich information.

Up next, Brian Kaminski (iProspect) who focuses on customizing search engine strategies to your specific site needs.

It’s natural that every site will have different goals for SEO. Understand your organization’s strengths and weaknesses and build your strategy based on your own objectives. If you’re just starting out, don’t try to do too much at once. Make sure to cover the basics (technology, metrics, etc) before moving on to more complex issues (audience, conversions, credibility). Getting proportions right is what will help your campaign to be successful.

Once you get those set, here’s a list of other tools you may want to consider to increase traffic:

Create optimized press releases
Images/PDFs
Video Optimization
Local Search
YouTube strategy
Blogging
User Generated Content

Lynne DeRoche discussed how to take your site from invisible to center stage.

Why is it important that your content be searchable? Lynn noted that increasing searchable content gives you more ‘chances’ to appear on the engines' SERPs. It also helps you stand out from your competition and establish yourself as an expert. All the great content in the world won’t matter if no one knows you exist.

Lynne shared four strategies to optimizing your content:

Map strategic keyword phrases

Lynn recommends only optimizing for one or two keyword phrases per page (we typically recommend 3 or 4 related words) to not dilute your efforts.
Don’t force your content. Google SEO = a good user experience.
Is this an appropriate entry page for you consumers? Is it contextually relevant? Will it meet users’ needs?

Improve your Site’s Crawl-ability

Spiders can’t find text ‘hidden’ behind drop down menus, text-based forums, JavaScript navigation or Flash. Instead, create text based versions of Flash elements or links found in drop-down menus.

Build New Pages

You may find it necessary to build new content to appeal to new keywords or site goals. Remember that all new content should appeal to search engines and search engine users.
Think carefully about page placement – give pages a ‘home’ within your site navigation.

Build a Theme

Create keyword-rich text, using keyword phrases 2-3 times per page.
Include targeted keywords within your URLs.
Leverage keywords within link text.
Include keyword in title and description tags.
Use the keyword phrase intact.

Some great words from our panelists here. I think if you’re looking for the ultimate search engine optimization strategy, combing the advice of Lynne and Gary will help your site see strong rankings.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 7/06 at 10:14 AM | TrackBack (0)
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The Online Video Revolution

Maybe it’s because it’s 9am and people are still jazzed up from their morning coffee, but these early morning keynotes are turning out some powerful stuff.

This morning’s keynote was entitled “The Online Video Revolution: A Marketer’s Dream or a Consumer-Generated Mess?” and was delivered by Paul Sagan (Akamai Technologies), Suzie Reider (YouTube), Jonathan Klein (CNN), and Sarah Fay (Isobar Communications).

It doesn’t take much to see that over the past year, users have been very vocal about wanting to see online video. Sarah Fay noted that the number of users watching television shows online has double since this time last year; YouTube’s Suzie Reader stated that 65,000 videos are being uploaded a day to YouTube, with far more than 100,000 videos being watched; and over at CNN, Jonathan Klein says users can’t get enough video – the more video CNN uploads, the more users who are watching.

Regardless of how you feel about it, video is here to stay.

One thing I found interesting was that, when asked by moderator Drew Ianni what was on her top of mind, Suzie Reader responded:

“How do we take the YouTube environment, capture what’s going on and bring marketers into it in a meaningful way without messing it up.”

An important statement because I think that’s on everything’s mind these days. How do you take something so controlled by users and not let it get away from you? And then, how do you let marketers in without allowing them to affect (and ultimately destroy) what users have created naturally for themselves?

Sarah Fay, who was in my eyes the star of the panel, smartly noted that consumers have always had a ton of control over the success of brands, whether the brands purposely gave it to them or not.

Sarah Fay stated (slightly paraphrased):

“People are tuning out ads. By letting them create their own media on your site, it’s an attempt to try and bring them back into your brand. It’s a way to show the consumer that you trust them and that you are willing to let them have a voice in your world. There’s always going to be risk and potential for backlash, but if you respond in the right way it’s ultimately a positive thing.”

By far the smartest statement I’ve heard in the past day and a half.

The panel also noted that users’ patience threshold is dropping at a rapid rate. In years passed it was said that a user would give your site 7 seconds to load before eyeing the back button. Now that number is down to less than 4 seconds. With users becoming increasingly more impatient, how do you create a system that uploads video as fast as users create them and how do you instill editorial control without creating a delayed system?

This problem becomes intensified for a site like YouTube. When YouTube launched it unleashed a system where brands have thousands of publishers instead of just one (themselves). YouTube (or perhaps now Google) will need to create an infrastructure that constantly able to handle the increase demands of users.

Infrastructure concerns are what separate online video from television and other forms of media. With television, it doesn’t matter what time of the day you watch or how many other people are watching the same show – it always works. On the Internet, if you air a program between 12pm and 2pm EST, it degrades severely because it’s the busiest time of the day. Along the same lines, if too many people try to access the same site, that site will crash

But customers don’t care. They expect higher performance with immediate, perfect results. If you don’t give it to them, they’ll find someone who will.

This was a great keynote and touched on a number of important issues facing online video. If you look at social networking and video, the consumption rate is going up at an alarming rate, which presents a big opportunity for marketers.

I have to admit, it was surprising to hear these panelists talk about online video in such a powerful way. It’s clear they don’t view consumer-generated media as the mess I thought they would. Instead, they understand its potential and are working hard to try and leverage it the most efficient way possible. Which is exactly what you should be doing.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 7/06 at 9:10 AM | TrackBack (0)
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November 6, 2006

The Anywhere Consumer

Monday night’s keynote was delivered by the Yankee Group’s Emily Green and focused on the emergence of the Anywhere Consumer. It seems that according to Emily, a battle is upon us.

What’s creating the Anywhere Consumer

The Anywhere Consumer refers to today’s customer who is available anywhere, at anytime, as a result of the emerging technology. This new type of consumer was ultimately formed through the rise of broadband, the constant connectivity of today’s Anywhere Network, and what Emily called "the Trinity", which includes:

Mobility – Extends the value of all consumer services, like voice, messaging, imaging, audio, video, socializing, etc.
Network Applications – The computer has developed into our network, while the Web has been demoted into the content platform.
Entertainment: The motive force behind the next generation of home devices, mobile devices and consumer electronics, services and apps.

The battle of the anywhere experience

According to Emily, the stage is set for battle between The Imperialists and The Guerilla’s, but who are they?

The Imperialists are the Telcos, the wireless operators, cable companies and retailers who work off a subscription business model. They are the old dogs in the fight still holding onto their old networks and infrastructure. They want to guide consumers into the future with a gentle embrace of connected, managed devices in the home and on the go. They fear the loss of control that comes with users venturing off their networks.

The Guerillas are the Web 1.0 survivors, PC vendors, bloggers and podcasters. They believe that consumers will reject the old Imperialist services and will instead opt for network platforms that allow them to be connected without relying on the Telcos infrastructure. This group works off an advertising subscription or transaction business model -- or maybe even none at all.

Emily harks that unless Imperialists see the light and upgrade ad networks, appease Wall Street, and protect their bandwidth, while still moving at the speed of the consumer marketplace, The Guerillas will be victorious in battle with few of the network providers surviving.

Marketing to the anywhere consumer

There are three ways to reach today’s Anywhere Consumer:

Broadband TV (watching cable channels via your PC) – When polled by Yankee Group, 55 percent of users who bought subscription video said they were also interested in having TV channels delivered to their PC. It’s become more apparent that users want to take their television shows out of the TV set and enjoy them on their own time.

Mobile Information Services – Studies have shown users are very interested in using mobile information services, especially if they get it for free in exchange for watching advertising.

Mobile TV – An interesting study of Korean mobile TV users found that drama and music videos far surpassed news and sports for preferred genres. Most surprisingly, the average viewing time was 20-30 minutes – that’s a full episode of television!

The biggest challenge right now for mobile is that many users find it too expensive. People fear how much it will cost, and fear that browsing once will sign them up for a monthly service. Marketers are working to combat this.

The impact of ‘anywhereness’

What will happen as the idea of ‘anywhereness’ begins to grow in the industry?

Users are showing a need for media to be fluid. They want to be able to download music and video and be able to listen to it on a variety of platforms. Media can no longer be anchored.

Network providers will realize that the information they have about their audience is the most valuable asset they have, not the actual network.

There will be ‘mobility premium’. Mobile media providers will have to establish what the mobile premium will be. How much money, time, commitment can we expect users to make?

Platforms will continue to diversify and consumers will continue to lean towards the ad-supported models that cost them less.

Users have to work at not being reachable, instead of the other way around.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 6/06 at 7:54 PM | TrackBack (0)
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Fireside Chat with the SEO Experts

Though I’ve never had the chance to attend it before today, I’ve always been a big fan of this Fireside Chat with the SEO Experts session, and it has nothing to do with the fact that Bruce is one of the co-presenters. It just always struck me as the perfect way to run a session – let people ask questions and allow them to get answers from people who actually know what they’re talking about. It sounds simple, but it’s really not.

Today, Bruce and Dana Todd were on hand to discuss a number of important search engine optimization issues, including technical, content, linking, and server and architecture-based issues. A lot of excellent information and tips were revealed in this fast-paced sessions, so I’ll highlight some of the main points here.

Technical issues

Keyword Density – in order for you to hit the ideal density for your keywords, you need to know how the engines index data. Bruce defined ideal density as the top of a bell curve, with most sites either falling either over or below the optimum mark. True keyword density goals will be determined by the index as a whole. Each of your keywords will have a different density.

To find your keyword density, you want to look at what your competition is doing and figuring out how many times they’re using a word.
Bruce on code: “Keep it simple, do it right and you’ll be okay.” Some sage words there from our Bruce.

Content Issues

Optimize for both broad and targeted words. Dana Todd noted that she doesn’t waste time on words that have less than 200 monthly searches, but really marketers should be more concerned about the ROI.
Misspelled words belong in the Meta Keyword tag and only in the Meta Keyword tag.
Don’t optimize for research terms and shopping terms on the same page, it will dilute your rankings for both. Each page should target a unique set of keywords that help reaffirm your theme.
Search engines are looking at the intent of the query to determine if you could be a subject matter expert. If your site has a lot of content, you’ll have a greater chance of being labeled an expert than a thinner site.

If you want to experiment with this, head over to mindset.yahoo.com and see how the SERP changes based on the position of the slider.
The search engines will determine your site’s theme internal navigation and depth of content.

Linking Issues

Dana: Linking is the online method of namedropping at a cocktail party. It’s not just who you know, but who knows you. (Awesome!)
Just like with dating, it’s quality, not quantity that counts when measuring the importance of inbound links. The strongest inbound links are links from respected sites in your industry.

Server and Architecture Issues:

If the spiders can’t crawl through your site, you won’t be in the index. This has a lot to do with architecture and the kind of technology you’re using (i.e. Flash).
Be aware that hosting companies have been known to accidentally block the search engine spiders in order to save bandwidth.
If your server is slower than the person next to you, the engines will spider less content and your site won’t appear as deep.
The more technological complicated your site is, the harder it is for the engines to crawl.
Use W3C to check your site for compatibility with HTML standards.

Greatest Line of the Session

"Paid Inclusion is like SEO on steroids" – Dana

Heh. Great session guys. Tons of top-notch information!

On to the next…

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 6/06 at 2:32 PM | TrackBack (0)
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Mobile Marketing 101

This was a packed session, which should come as no surprise given all the attention that the mobile Web has received over the last month. Mobile marketing is being called the “any” era because customers are always on and always available for a one-on-one dialogue. Like Visa, the mobile web is suddenly everywhere you want to be.

Establishing a company presence on the Web means that you have access to your audience whenever and wherever they happen to be. It’s your job to deliver the right message, to the right customer, at the right time. As mobile becomes important, it means integrating mobile into your already established campaigns.

Mobile can build brand awareness, generate revenue, drive up attendance to events, encourage engagement and improve customer loyalty. Basically, it’s the Swiss army knife of marketing, with tools you never knew you didn’t have.

But how do you start? What should you keep in mind when creating your first mobile initiative? Here are some tips.

Panelist Laura Marriot noted the first step in your mobile marketing campaign should be to define your strategic objectives. Your goals don’t have to be complex, but you should be able to define them in order to measure success later on. Let your customers dictate where you choose to stick your toe in the water. They’ll tell you what sites they are interested in, don’t try and dictate them.

Find a carrier that you’re compatible with. Realize that your audience is also the customer of the carrier, meaning they may dictate what you’re allowed to do. If carriers aren’t 100 percent on board with your marketing campaign, they may shoot down your marketing ideas. Know this in advance.

Another tip, understand that mobile marketing really is similar to marketing on the traditional web. Its choices may be more complex, but the actual medium is no different.

What about obstacles?

According to panelists, the biggest obstacle to mobile marketing is coming up with a valuable consumer proposition so that users want to communicate with you. Your first meeting about mobile should be why a consumer should let your company send them a text message. There must be some sincere value or users won’t opt-in. Your mobile marketing campaign should address user needs, not your own.

A second obstacle is the lack of education. Getting the word out about mobile marketing is still a difficult process. Users are more engaged now than before, but there is still a hesitation to accept a new format. The existence of browser charges is always keeping many users off the Web.
On the marketing side, many companies still don’t know what it means to market on the Mobile web, so there’s a learning curve that needs to be addressed there, as well.

To sum things up, the panelists gave their predictions on where will mobile marketing go in 2007?

Mobile video
Mobile search
More locally-based

Overall, this panel gave a good introduction to mobile marketing. I would have loved to have seen more in-depth analysis and more information on starting a mobile campaign from scratch, but this session gave more tips than new information. Maybe next time.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 6/06 at 2:20 PM | TrackBack (0)
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Finding the value in consumer generate media

It’s a well known fact in the office that I have two very serious crushes. The first is on a certain Seattle-based SEO and the other is on brilliant video blogger, Ze Frank (congrats on your two Vloggies, Ze!). The latter is sitting on a panel about 5 feet in front of me and part of me just wants to hide under the chair (the other part just won’t stop staring).

Ze is taking part on today’s Consumer-Generated Media's Role in The Engagement Equation, along with Terry Pittman (AOL Digital Services), Jonah Peretti (Huffington Post) and Bob DeSena (Mediaedge:cia).

Today’s session was supposed to help marketers identify the individuals who are engaged, determine their engagement level and predict what their response will be to a product based on that level. But none of that happened.

It didn’t happen because among the panel (as well as on the Web in general), no one could agree on what the term “engagement” actually meant. If we can’t define it, how can we add value to it?

Bob DeSena started the session by giving users the ARF definition of the term engagement, which is:

“Turning on a prospect to a brand idea enhanced by the surrounding context.”

What does that mean? I have no idea. It takes a vague concept and somehow makes it even harder to distinguish. Bob noted that even when first formed, the definition he gave was thought of as a “working definition”, and he agreed it didn’t accurately reflect the term.

That’s kind of lame.

Moving on, he saved himself (in my eyes) by noting that engagement is really a symptom, not a cause. If you deal with engagement by talking solely about engagement and not your product, you end up with a lot of talk and no product. Terry Pittman says, sometimes “it’s all about the product, stupid”.

Absolutely.

For Ze, engagement is about learning to take advantage of this huge distribution platform that is the Internet. It’s about facilitating energy stages and figuring out how to play with it. (Facilitating energy states? Sexy.)

I think what Ze’s saying is that you have to learn how to use the Internet to give your users what they want in a new way. It’s about bringing something new to the table that will make users voluntarily interact with it. It’s similar to what David spoke about in his keynote earlier this morning.

And it wasn’t just defining engagement that tripped up the panel, so did trying to put value to it. What defines an engaged audience? Is it measurable?

Yes it is, but you have to determine what’s more valuable – a unique visitor, a video download, a page view, that they perform some over specific action, etc? And when you determine a site has “more value” – more value than whom, in what regard?

For example, Ze Frank has a hugely popular video blog called “The Show” where users are actively (perhaps over-actively) engaged. But should advertisers pay more to advertise on ZeFrank.com than on a site where users are less engaged?

It depends on your site. Instead of blindly putting your ad dollars towards popular sites, do some research. Use the engagement of Ze’s site to get to know his audience. Then determine if his audience is valuable to you. Are the people who flock to Ze’s site (card-carrying Sports Racer right here), the kind of people who would be excited about what you’re offering? If they are, then yes, it’s worth paying a little more to reach them, if not, well, there’s your answer.

In the engagement war, it’s not just about finding an engaged audience, it’s about finding out where your audience is engaging and putting yourself there.

The one thing audience members took away from today’s panel was that site owners have to be “in the game”. They have to be there to see what’s working and what’s not. They should be going to interest points that are unexpected to customers. It doesn’t mean you’re losing control by following them, it means you’re reacting to your customers' movements.

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 6/06 at 10:20 AM | TrackBack (0)
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From the Alley to the Avenue

Ad:Tech New York 2006 kicks off with a keynote by new media expert David Lumbars. The keynote was introduced by ad:Tech chair Drew Ianni, and if you missed it, you may want to start pestering Google about their time machine plans. This was one of the good ones.

David is Chairman and CCO of BBDO North American. He is something of a savant in the new media and television world, but his insights can easily be transferred onto the Web and implemented into your marketing strategy.

This morning’s keynote focused on the following topics:

Brand planning
Producing quality creative
Dealing with short attention spans
Engaging user controlled media

What I loved about David’s speech is that he really never answers any of the questions posed. Instead, he produces more questions and ultimately dares marketers to be creative enough to find the answers within themselves. I completely love that about him.

Drew Ianni questioned David about what’s on his top of mind right now. What are the things that he is focused on?

It seems that David, like most of you, is focused on creating things that are so great and engaging that users voluntarily want to go and grab it.

Well, sure, but how do you do that?

You make brilliant content and put it on a medium no one would ever expect. Don’t think about the new online video you want to make or the MySpace page you’re waiting to create for your client. Think about whom you’re engaging and how they like to be engaged. Think about the “what” before you determine the “how”. The medium will always follow.

As David stated, “I don’t care what the medium is, as long as it’s something people want to engage with… I’m just about reaching people.”

Amen, David.

David’s about reaching people, not offending them. When asked what keeps him up at night (in the context of his job. David was quickly reminded this wasn’t a Barbara Walters interview. Heh!), David answered that he fears now that there are so many ways to engage customers, we’ll upset them by bombarding them with too many ads and giving them no room to escape. By constantly asking users to engage, you risk upsetting them.

How do you get around this?

David answered his typical, “I don’t know” (David is not concerned with having answers to everything), but I think the way to get around this is to not to ask them to engage, but to make them want to. Make them seek out the experience. Put a lot of colors on your palette. Find mediums you didn’t know existed and be there.

For example, David talks about the grates that business owners in New York pull down at night to secure their shops. Artists are now using them to paint and create beautiful murals. Be where people don’t expect you to be. People will notice.

One of the best questions asked during the keynote was, “how do you convince a client to be doing something online or in mobile when they’re hesitant?”

The quick answer is you don’t.

You should never have to convince a client to do anything. If your insight is rich and deep, the work that falls out it should seem like common sense. It should be that Eureka! factor. The logical path you never saw before.

I love that. I think the reason David struck such a chord with me is because he reminds me of one of our Analysts. David is Bruce Clay’s version of Bradley.

Bradley Leese is one of Bruce Clay, Inc. most successful analysts. He’s nothing short of brilliant, and his mind works in the same abstract way that David seems to do. You see the tree bark and visualize the leaves. Bradley and David see the leaves and figure out how to connect it to the tree. They think outside the box and they create amazing things you never would have thought of. If you haven’t met our Bradley, he’s at ad:Tech right now, so come on down to the booth and introduce yourself. You can tell him Lisa sent you. :)

To end, David reaffirms that your quest as a site owner or marketer will always be to find something engaging and fulfilling. Unfortunately, there’s no gospel to tell you how to do this. Wherever the genius (madness?) comes from is entirely up to you. Go be mad!

Posted by Lisa Barone on 11/ 6/06 at 9:40 AM | TrackBack (0)
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