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January 2004
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Product Placement the New Pop-upIn his OnlineSpin column, Jim Meskauskas takes look at the proliferation of product placement both good ("Queer Eye") and bad ("The Restaurant") and warns we will see much more of the latter before we settle into the glee of the... continue reading »GM Promotes 'The Hot Button'General Motors started a $50 million campaign to promote its brands in the U.S. with the "Hot Button" program. The first step sent out a direct mail piece to six million consumers nationwide and will include television, print, Internet and... continue reading »Local Search May See ConvergenceGreg Sterling thinks about local advertising and local search listings all the time. It's what he does at the Kelsey Group. So it's not surprising to see him put on the analyst hat to predict the future of paid... continue reading »Jockey Viral Advergame a SuccessClickZ's Tessa Wegert look back to 2003 and singles out a notable microsite campaign for Jockey in which the apparel manufacturer sponsored a Flash application called Make-A-Flake. Promoted only with a house list of 1,500 names, the microsite garnered 17.4... continue reading »Survey Puts Search and Email TopsThe MarketingSherpa/AD:TECH survey results failed to shock, with search marketing (price-per-click in particular) and house lists ranking as most effective. Apparently, while increased spam has pushed list rental to the bottom of the heap, mailing house lists produces results. It... continue reading »Online Job Ads Break $3 Billion MarkOnline job recruitment advertising broke through the $3 billion ceiling last year, severely infringing on a market once owned almost exclusively by newspapers. Recruitment firm Borrell Associates, though, released a study showing that newspapers may yet strike back effectively, as... continue reading »Allocating Search Dollars for the New YearKevin Lee explains the trade-offs in the various strategies for making the new year's aggressive revenue goals via search marketing. Sure, marketers can stamp on the gas pedal and maximize revenues by going number one on a wide array of... continue reading »Wireless Infotainment Has Big FutureA new report by Alexander Resources states that mobile infotainment is expected to generate worldwide revenues of $7.2 billion by 2008. But before the industry's consolidation, significant hurdles must be overcome. Martina Zavagno comments.... continue reading »Yahoo's New RSS Feature Briefly LeakedYahoo insiders have been slowly leaking details about its upcoming Really Simple Syndication (RSS) feature that is likely to be made part of its MyYahoo product. The RSS standard allows for web news and headlines to be pushed to newsreader... continue reading »Agencies (Again) Vow this Time They'll Be Tough on NetsThe annual dance has already started, where agency television network buyers complain about the unreasonableness of network TV prices, falling ratings, ludicrous network claims. This annual phase leads up to the multi-billion-dollar television upfront season - due to start in... continue reading »Donor Thwarted, Blames FrenchRebecca Lieb tells the cautionary tale of how well-intended, but half-hearted sites can do more to frustrate potential donors to nonprofit causes. Her effort to give money to the Cousteau Society at first failed when she found herself directed to... continue reading »Former Ogilvy Execs Plead Not GuiltyThe two former Ogilvy executives indicted in the last few days for allegedly bilking the federal government by tampering with ad agency timecards both pleaded not guilty. Thomas Early, until recently Ogilvy's director of finance, and Shona Seifert, once an... continue reading »Sites Balance Fraud Prevention and EfficiencyAn online retailer in the consumer electronics market significantly improved its ability to handle suspicious transactions using software from CyberSource. Fraud prevention can be resource intensive (read: time consuming for customer service reps), and automation is often welcome, provided it's... continue reading »AOL's Lisa Brown DepartsOnly eight months into her new position as interactive media executive vice president, Lisa Brown is leaving AOL. Brown cites "health and personal reasons." Industry trades quote anonymous sources as having said Brown was under investigation for questionable expense reports... continue reading »Lawyers, IPOs and GoogleThe New York Lawyer magazine conjures up the image of salivating lawyers to describe the catalytic effect that Google's IPO is expected to have on the IPO market in general. No one seems to be asking the question of whether... continue reading »Masha Geller Takes Job as Marketing Director at EyeblasterMasha Geller, former editor of MediaPost, has just accepted a position as director of marketing at the rich media services firm Eyeblaster. Geller also briefly worked here at MarketingWonk before taking this new position. We are sorry to see her... continue reading »Neuro-Marketing, Making Branding ScientificHave a Coke and a smile, and then measure that smile in a magnetic resonance imaging machine. Yes, for all of those brand doubters out there, there is now a burgeoning field of pseudo-science to mock. It attempts to measure... continue reading »Howard Dean Songs to Get Elected ByHoward Dean enthusiasts not only blog and go to MeetUps for their candidate, they write and record Howard Dean Songs to Get Elected By, original compositions ranging from rock to rap. Included on the site are"The Bush Spin," "Battle Hymn... continue reading »Agency Site Traffic Oddly DisproportionateA Hitwise ranking of top visited ad agency sites shows some strange traffic patterns. Some agency sites, it seems, benefit from confusing brand names - Modem Media and MediaCom among them - that are likely to tempt web surfers to... continue reading »Complying with Can-SpamClickZ's Paul Soltoff describes how advertisers using third party lists can help ensure that their marketing efforts conform to the newly-enacted Can-Spam legislation. He suggests seeding rented lists to ensure that headers aren't falsified and subject lines don't become misleading... continue reading »Can-Spam Takes on Role of Bogeyman in AdsEmail software companies and research firms are using the Can-Spam Act as a scary bogeyman in marketing of their products and services. The act allows for very stiff civil penalties for companies falling out of compliance, and that liability gives... continue reading »I-Advertising Oldtimer Starts Email BlogLong-time e-marketing consultant Adam Boettiger, best known for his discussion list and consulting service I-Advertising, says that there is no perfect spam filter. The only real solution to spam is a "personal email strategy," a combination of the right filters,... continue reading »Sites Translate Editions for Broader MarketAmerican publishers and some ecommerce firms are translating their sites into foreign languages to try to exploit the global nature of the Internet's market. Even British sites, like the BBC's, are creating alternative sites in the same language, geared more... continue reading »Campaign News Audiences Shift to Cable, OnlinePeople are turning less to network news and newspapers to get news and information, especially on campaign issues. Four years ago, 45 percent of people got news from network TV news and 40 percent received it from newspapers. Now both... continue reading »Q4 Ecommerce Rose 22 PercentBizRate reports that Q4 ecommerce grew by 22 percent. That included a rise from 110 million orders to 180 million orders, making for about $18 billion in spending versus 2002's $15 billion. Women out-represented men by a 3-2 ratio. Internet... continue reading »Half of Internet Households Have BroadbandThat broadband access is growing is no secret. That it has penetrated almost half of households is worth noting. A study shows that while dial-up Internet access has stagnated, broadband has about caught up to it. Another study (Knowledge Networks/SRI's... continue reading »Top Brands Featured in Billboard Top 20 SongsAs tolerance for and the effectiveness of traditional advertising declines, brands are still alive and well in song lyrics. Mercedes, Cadillac and Lexus are the top three brands mentioned in the top 20 songs on the Billboard Hot 100 chart,... continue reading »IAB Forms Hispanic CommitteeThe IAB announced the formation of the IAB Hispanic Committee, a collaborative effort among Hispanic online publishers to educate agencies and marketers on how best to use online marketing to reach the Hispanic community. The committee has already put together... continue reading »Online Adspends Predicted for VerticalsGartner G2 Analyst Denise Garcia, in this transcript of her presentation to attendees at the Beaver Creek Agency Summit, presented the firm's Advertising Trends Report which explored the issues facing seven vertical industries as they relate to online advertising. iMediaConnection... continue reading »YAROBFBYAROBFB = "yet another report on blogging for business." At 93 pages, it looks promising, if somewhat academic (a sample sentence fragment from the abstract: "Weblogs, in other words, envisage a hierarchy circumvention mechanism..."). Author George Dafermos has his own... continue reading »Google a Go-To Engine for UPCs, VINs and TrackingIt's getting to the point where Google can tell users about any string of text or numbers. Of course they will also serve up some highly-targeted ads at the same time. Now, in addition to tying phone number into Google... continue reading »Symantec in PR Faux PasIn what is turning out to be a major PR faux pas, many people have been angered by Symantec, seller of Norton Anti-Virus Software. Where they normally send out alerts to customers who face performance-affecting problems, they decided not to... continue reading »Chili Advergame without SpiceHormel Foods launched an advergame to increase consumer demand of Stagg Chili. Players joining the competition can win electronics, bikes and cash. But the way the contest is executed may lead to obstacles to building long term product awareness. Martina... continue reading »Accipiter Announces Compliance With Explorer 7.0Accipiter announced its adserving platform, AdManager V7, will comply with Microsoft and Macromedia guidelines regarding Active X Controls. The new version of Microsoft Explorer will stop page content from loading every time active content is encountered and present the user... continue reading »Spurned Lingerie Bowl Wins SponsorAfter getting cold feet and bowing to interest groups, Chrysler withdrew its planned sponsorship of the Lingerie Bowl, the "alternative" pay-per-view half-time show featuring women wearing next to nothing while playing contact football. Event producer Horizon Productions has found a... continue reading »Celebrity Finds Success with Viral and Online MarketingSinger-songwriter Fefe Dobsen went from obscurity to a top ten artist on MTV's TRL in fewer than two months with the help of some smart online and viral marketing. 360 Youth helped the singer get in front of teens and... continue reading »Broadband Growth May be UnderestimatedVP of online media for Zentropy Partners Mark Redetzke says that household broadband penetration in 2004 will achieve greater penetration than is currently being predicted. Redetzke also says home networking will flourish and that online ad spending will rise. ClickZ... continue reading »Dilution May Kill the Golden GoosePaid placement auction values are based on the degree to which the media is well targeted, and Hans Riemer points to the potential disastrous impact on the industry if search traffic providers like Google and Overture don't do everything possible... continue reading »MyPetFat Promotes Dieting With Fat SackIn one of the odder Internet diet-of-the-moment programs, MyPetFat approaches the promotion of weight loss a bit differently than other programs. It grosses out dieters by giving them a sack of fat to carry around, reminding them of how disgusting... continue reading »They Who Own the Traffic WinCNET reports that for Overture, TAC (traffic acquisition costs) as a percentage of revenue are growing due to competition for deals with portals. That's one reason Yahoo and Overture became one, to keep those costs in-house. It creates a domino... continue reading »Sender Line More Important than Subject LineJoanna Belbey and Karen Gedney write that the sender line can be more important than the subject line in email marketing. This logic should carry through the creative, making sure that it makes for a personal message with a... continue reading »Just a Little Friction Causes Cart AbandonmentObstacles or added costs to a site's purchase process lead to abandoned shopping carts, according to new research by WebTrends. This contribution to the marketing sciences rivals past findings, such as speed bumps causing cars to slow down, slapping customers... continue reading »Switchboard Signs Up Shopping.comSwitchboard, the local listings company, and Shopping.com plugged their products together in hopes of providing a more comprehensive yellow pages offering. Switchboard has been week on national advertisers, while Shopping.com has not been able to concentrate on local markets. Shopping.com... continue reading »Amazon Bested by HSN.com for Shopping Session LengthsAmazon again leads the list of top ten ecommerce sites in terms of visitors, but HSN.com usurped its lead in length of shopping sessions. HSN shoppers spent more than 13 minutes apiece, while Amazon shoppers spent closer to 10 minutes... continue reading »New Interactive Trade Group LaunchesFilling a recently-created void, several New York City online executives launched a new interactive trade group, called 212. The group, geared towards those who "do the work," rather than top level executives, hopes to mirror the success of the Boston... continue reading »Big Agency Gets Lazy, Plays Clout Card for Rich MediaGiving DoubleClick the love - and displaying an apparent lack of interest in other vendors - Starcom anointed DART Motif its preferred rich media vendor. Starcom IP Director Jeff Marshall says, "In our world there are a lot of little... continue reading »Vail Launches Desktop Snow ReporterVail Resorts partnered with AdTools, Inc. to create SnowMate - a branded desktop application with a personality named Trevor - that alerts users to weather conditions and delivers ski condition reports. Vail can "push" information out when it chooses, and... continue reading »MoveOn Selects Anti-Bush Ad for Broadcast Against State of UnionAs we reported a couple of weeks ago, the online liberal political organization MoveOn.org, sponsored a contest, Bush in 30 Seconds, to find the best home-made anti-Bush ad, which it plans to air on TV. After receiving more than 1,500... continue reading »DMOZ Founders Launch Topix, News Agg SiteSome of the founders of the Open Directory Project DMOZ just launched an automated news aggregation service. The Company Information page says: "These algorithms read every story as it is released and then categorize each one into one or more... continue reading » |