Simple Principles for all New Media Marketing
This was a very animated session which examined the landscape of new media, and touched on some very thought-provoking issues. The panelists were Greg Smith, Director of Media at Carat Interactive, Leslie Laredo of the Laredo Group, which provides courses in internet media, Arthur Chan of Palisades Interactive, an independent agency which does a lot of work with entertainment clients, and Rick Bruner, Director of Research at Doubleclick. Andrew Ianni, an interactive consultant formerly with AKQA, did a great job moderating this lively session.
Everyone agreed that the new media landscape has expanded significantly, and that it's an exciting time to be in this business. Interactive has profoundly changed the definition of media and marketing, and it's been developing so quickly that there are some real challenges. The top challenge, according to the panelists, has been finding good people and managing growth. Keeping on top of the constant change, and keeping track of new players and new developments is key.
There are opportunities in the "long tail" of internet content like social networks and blogs, which have not been exploited. This is especially important in light of the increasing competitiveness in ads and inventory and the escalating cost of CPMs. Nobody has sold into the long tail, and this is a great opportunity. The big threat is that consumers have unprecedented control over how they consume media with TiVO and DVRs. Figuring out the next generation of consumer-friendly advertising, "consumer-centric" advertising which will engage consumers instead of interruptive advertising, is a key issue keeping people up at night.
Mechanisms the panelists use for helping to stay on top of emerging trends included newsletters and blogs, and prime examples given included MarketingVox, mediabuyerplanner.com and adrants.com (one panelist actually claims to read 50+ per week). Blogs are perceived as giving better perspective than traditional publications like Ad Age and seem to be more in touch with what's actually happening. As aggregators of content, blogs (MarketingVox was mentioned here again...) are an efficient way to get insight. Greg Smith said that Carat has "experts", individuals who, in addition to their regular duties, take on responsibility to keep up on specific issues like blogs or the future of TV. They become in-house experts who are consulted by Carat staff on client issues to avoid duplication of effort. Networking with experts and trade associations like the IAB, OPA, 212NYC are also great resources. Arthur Chan mentioned that he also finds it useful to use other people as a filter: sharing e-mails like "have you seen this" and counterparts at other agencies give perspective. Rick Bruner commented that networking is critical-- "if I don't know the answer, I know who knows the answer"-- as well as listening to the clients. He also mentioned Daypop, Technorati and Blog Pulse to see what bloggers are linking to on one day, and thus to see what the "buzz" is in the blogosphere. E-mail discussion lists like the 100 Club and Old Timers are also good resources. DoubleClick actually runs its own internal blogs as a knowledge management resource.
When asked the perennial question where money is coming from, and whether panelists are seeing an incremental spend or a shift from orther media (TV in particular), the panelists agreed that we're seeing clients go online who have never gone online. Although a lot is coming from TV, there are a lot of problems related to a lack of comfort level with interactive as well as problems fitting interactive initiatives into the currend ad models. Doubleclick is also seeing money migrating from direct mail and telemarketing given do not call lists. It's hard to educate the old school, which sees the online infrastructure as less efficient than TV. Greg Smith of Carat put it this way: "We paint in color and they evaluate in black and white". Some work is being done by big player marketers to redefine measures because the old model is broken, but there needs to be a new way to do things.
On the subject of finding good people, panelists commented that companies shouldn't restrict talent search to interactive experience but should look outside at other disciplines as well. Companies should empower people by giving them lots of responsibility, client time, and credit.
Overall, it was a dynamic and entertaining session which answered some questions while raising a lot of new ones-- the usual punishment for being in a rapidly evolving field.
