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Editor's Note: Continue to check back here for twice-daily updates from New Orleans as well as features on panel discussions and keynote addresses, opinion pieces and an extensive wrap-up. All coverage will be highlighted on AdBanter.com, in lagniappe and on the Online Ads Discussion List.
Thursday, Jan. 26, 2000 -- PM Update
NEW ORLEANS - The official part of Online Advertising 2000 is over, yet there are many lessons to be learned from this conference. Many of the presenters left attendees with great ideas and excellent case studies, but the top lesson learned here is a very simple one: if you're going to host an Online Advertising conference, please select a hotel with data ports. This seemingly small luxury has caused havoc with many of the attendees all week and on top of the other problems associated with this year's conference, has made it a week to forget for many conference-goers.
The Thursday afternoon sessions were shortened to just two as a rescheduling move canceled two of the presentations, replacing only one of them. Most of those who plunked down $1500 for the two-day event were long-gone before the announcements were made that the afternoon would be shortened. Indeed, tomorrow's workshop is not expected to have any seating problems.
Dan Green, senior strategist at Bigfoot Interactive, delivered a solid speech on the technological aspects of branding and marketing through email. While the gist of the speech concentrated on how to construct your message and deliver it in a timely and efficient fashion, Mr. Green's most interesting points were his thoughts on strategy.
"The three most important factors of implementing your strategy for an effective campaign are your first impression, the confidence the consumer has in your brand and your ability to creatively use this dynamic medium we have," Green said. "It's these three things that will ultimately make or break your campaign."
Mr. Green suggested that a marketing email make three to four fast impressions about the product or service you are trying to sell. He also said that consumers should have confidence in your brand and that the emails you send to them should be relevant to them and legitimately be something close to what they agreed to in their opt-in.
The final point on strategy Mr. Green made was the importance of fully-understanding the dynamic medium that the industry has in its hands. Personalization of the message, using well-placed and thought-out jumps and the use of rich media should all be areas that marketers look towards to enhance their campaigns.
This conference will definitely be one of the forgotten ones in this year's saturated calendar. Hopefully, the workshops tomorrow will be of some use. World Research Group should not be held responsible for all of the problems this week, but the heavy emphasis on email marketing and its differences from direct marketing are not exactly topics that should consume an entire Online Advertising conference. Hopefully conference planners will take notes and not repeat the mistakes of this week.
Thursday, Jan. 26, 2000 -- AM Update
NEW ORLEANS - After getting off to such a lackluster start yesterday, Online Advertising 2000 picked up some steam on Thursday morning with the best panel discussion to date, one regarding permission-based marketing.
The panel, moderated by Geoff Smith of ClickAction, was comprised of the following people:
Scott Grafft, Flycast
Derek Scruggs, Message Media
George Burrows, Muller & Burrows
Ken Wruk, YesMail.com
Christine Frye, Exactis.com
Mr. Smith, Mr. Wruk and Ms. Frye were substitutes from the scheduled panel, all replacing someone from their company. Key Compton, CEO of Solbright, was not in attendance and did not have a replacement.
The discussion began with Mr. Smith offering a few tidbits on email marketing, many of which were eye-popping. According to Forrester Research, over $33B will be made in email marketing by the year 2004 and over 200B emails will be sent out by marketers by that time. Smith then asked the panel why the medium would explode like that.
Mr. Grafft opened the discussion saying that high interaction and low friction made marketing via email an easier prospect than by traditional direct mailings.
Mr. Scruggs, who made many valid points by stating the obvious, said that because people opt-in with permission-based marketing, they actually want to see the information being provided and therefore, customers turn into buyers at a much higher rate. Scruggs could not recall exact numbers, but guesstimated that response rates average between 5 and 15 percent through his company's campaigns.
Ms Frye continued on Scruggs' original thought by saying that, "opt-in customers initiate the dialogue. Never before in the history of advertising has there been a more powerful way to begin and cultivate a relationship."
Mr. Burrows decided to play contrary to the rest of the panel and said that he thinks that the pinnacle window for email marketing might have passed us by and that since so many people have gotten into email marketing, the medium has been overwhelmed by constant harassment, something consumers are tired of. Mr. Burrows later defined himself to be a supporter of permission-based marketing but said that he is not enamored by it like others have been.
An audience member asked the panelists why their clients have chosen to add to the clutter of Inboxes on weekdays, when they could wait until the weekends and be one of the few pieces of email. Several of the panelists had ideas on this, but Mr. Scruggs admitted that the space and the medium have not been perfected and that many companies are working on ways to make certain that their clients message is heard by a greater audience.
The most compelling part of the discussion was a question that may have gone unnoticed but the response may have resounding effects. An audience member asked if any of the companies represented on the panel, most of which offer databases of email addresses to their clients as well as writing the content of the marketing emails, have engaged in revenue-sharing based on the results of the campaigns they send out. The intent of the question was to see how much each company truly believed in their philosophy and was willing to go to show the promise of the concept of permission-based marketing.
All of the panelists agreed that it would not be possible in the near future. They all said it was best for their clients to pay the fee for the service and to reap all of the rewards. Mr. Scruggs went as far as to say that discussing revenue-sharing would be out of line with what they are trying to do, even though in reality, it would make perfect sense for a company willing to prove it's worth.
The discussion ended with several minor discussions which all ended up with shameless plugs of all of the represented companies. Even with a less-than-stellar ending, the panel was the best of the conference by far.
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