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June 2004
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DMA Site Reduces 'Junk' in JunkmailHorrified to hear that one in five U.K. direct mail pieces falls is addressed to a previous occupant, the Direct Marketing Association, in conjunction with environmental group PlanetArk, released a new website that allows people to get such mailings stopped.... continue reading »Mediocre Excellence Awards CancelledPlanning for an upcoming "Advertising Week" in September, the National Television Academy of Arts and Sciences has been forced to downscale and then cancel its Advertising Awards for Excellence program. Seeing paltry entries, the Academy decided against renaming the program... continue reading »Viral Ad Group Launches AssociationJoining the large and unruly pantheon of advertising media and methods, viral marketing now has its own trade group. The Viral & Buzz Marketing Association (VBMA, pronounced v-aye-b-ma) launched with founding members from several European and Commonwealth countries. The group... continue reading »Clutter Reaches Tipping Point, Causes RevoltsAd Age put together a decent review of the battle against clutter, with some cities becoming so stifled with guerilla marketers, outdoor advertising and street hawkers that a simple walk outdoors can be akin to surfing on AOL. Consumers and... continue reading »Google Threatens B-to-B PublishersB-to-B magazine publishers are the latest group to see threat from the Google giant. At the recent annual American Business Media conference, IDG CEO Pat Kenealy advised attendees that Google should be considered a real threat to their business model... continue reading »Bloggers Start Running AdsBloggers are starting to run paid search advertising to promote their sites. As bloggers slowly begin to run ads and gain revenues, the big can get bigger by turning revenues back into traffic investments. Some commentators noted that it can... continue reading »Broadband Erodes TV UseWanadoo found that the cure for the common TV habit just might be putting broadband in the household. Monitoring changed media habits for those getting fast Internet access, Wanadoo found that the biggest change was two hours less of TV... continue reading »Red Lobster to Real BrandingRed Lobster chose Real Branding for its interactive advertising duties. The San Francisco shop, winning a nation-wide review, is charged with an all-you-can-eat assortment of web development, media planning and creative duties. The responsibilities shouldn't be too hard for the... continue reading »DoubleClick Reports Lowered Rev per EmailA quarterly study put out by DoubleClick shows that email delivery rates and click rates have remained stable, but that revenue per email sent declined by about a 17 percent over the same quarter last year. The results can be... continue reading »New Ad Network Puts Control in Consumer's HandThere's a new opt-in ad network in town, and it aims to hand control of marketing over to consumers. Dotomi launched Direct Messaging, which provides opt-in, on-page banner advertising tying a marketer and its customer database to viewers that join... continue reading »Paid Search Optimization Now 'Basic' Suite FeatureDoubleClick and AtlasDMT have both added search keyword bid management tools to their ad serving product suites, making marketing return on investment a more apples-to-apples comparison when looking across display advertising, email marketing (also included) and paid search. The development... continue reading »Google Improves its Non-Web SearchGoogle updated its internal corporate search product today, releasing a version that can index up to 1.5 million documents and 300 queries per minute, about five times the speed the earlier version boasted. The enterprise product cannot take advantage of... continue reading »Look Out World, Here Comes BPABPA International will change its name to BPA Worldwide after nagging fears that some markets use the word "international" to mean "foreign," rather than to imply the company operates across many countries. BPA, a non-profit, competes in an ancient rivalry... continue reading »Emerging Email Audit Wins VentureDirect BizEmerging Audit's email audit tool was selected by VentureDirect to provide assurance for clients that its XactMail Opt-in E-mail Network is delivering as promised. Oddly, in a marketing landscape in which email marketing is the most distrusted form, until recently... continue reading »Hallmark Launches Viral CampaignPay TV firm The Hallmark Channel (yes, the Brits have to pay to see Judging Amy and Touched by an Angel, the poor souls) launched a viral campaign helped along by digital agency Skive. The channel's email database is getting... continue reading »Microsoft Ladles Faint Praise on GoogleA smack-talking Microsoft vice president gave faint praise to Google at an investors conference, calling the search giant an admirable one-trick pony. MSN vice president Yusuf Mehdi said that once Google started expanding into related markets, it would find the... continue reading »Online Sales Grow, but More SlowlyE-commerce was up for the week ending May 16, but not much relative to the blazing pace set in the last few months. Online sales for the week ending May 16 grew to $1.08 billion, up 13 percent from the... continue reading »Online Dating Dark Horse Vaults to No. 1eHarmony.com, high on a PR buzz about its patent on a certain form of match making and pushed by a $10 million ad campaign, now accounts for 38 percent of online dating industry revenues, according to comScore. While Hitwise reports... continue reading »E-Commerce Sites Avoiding International SalesFraud from international customers is so rampant that only about six in ten e-commerce companies accept non-domestic transactions, according to a CyberSource study. Only an additional five percent plan on starting to accept international transactions in the future. Additional factors... continue reading »Media Account Turnover SlowsMedia account turnover increased last month versus April, but continues to be lower relative to last year. $680 million of media billings shifted agencies in May, down by almost a third from 2003 and about half from 2002. Big account... continue reading »Caught Search 'Cheaters' Remain VeiledDanny Sullivan laments the lack of guts search engine companies are showing in banning search engine optimization "cheaters," but failing to warn the public which brands and service firms have been so punished. After a concise description of what constitutes... continue reading »Quarter Brings More Shoppers, Fewer Looky-LousA DoubleClick study showed that the share of shoppers on e-commerce sites who actually buy something went up about 15 percent, to one in every 25 visitors. $5 dollars was left abandoned in shopping carts for every $1 purchased. But... continue reading »Gmail Reviewed: Eh, It's NiceAn Associated Press reporter reviewed Google's Gmail email service and found all the hoo-hah to be a bit overblown. While privacy advocates have vilified the idea of a large-storage free email application, especially one that "reads" emails to target ads,... continue reading »Oracle Media to StarcomStarcom picked up the Oracle media account, which billed $30 million last year, although the company claims to be running a $40- to $50-million campaign for 2004. The win came after besting incumbent Grey and fellow challenger Initiative. Creative duties... continue reading »Disney Recreating TV on WebDisney is repackaging video content from its various pieces of empire and stuffing it into a new, proprietary Motion format to deliver to a web audience under the name FamilyFun TV. Including content from ABC News, ESPN and Disney's own... continue reading »Behavioral Efforts Not Doomed to Repeat 90s MistakesTacoda CEO Dave Morgan writes convincingly why, this time around, behavioral targeting won't be just a flash in the pan. While many trendy marketing concepts come and go in the ADD world of Internet marketing, perhaps the strongest and most... continue reading »Wal-Mart, Target Vie for Web-to-Store LeadershipA Forrester study that looked at credit card data found that Wal-Mart leads retailers in its ability to convert online shoppers to bricks and mortar shoppers. This might also be skewed by the fact that Wal-Mart is the largest retailer... continue reading »$4 Billion P&G Review Unlikely to Lead to ChangeBallyhooed as part of an effort to break the lazy habit of buying too much TV, even as "below the line" marketing methods are proving out to have a higher return on investment, Procter & Gamble's review of media planning... continue reading »Friendster Hires CEO, Hints at Biz ModelFriendster finally hired a non-interim CEO, former NBC executive Scott Sassa. In a signal that the company may actually want to start making some revenues, Sassa indicated that the key money-making opportunity for Friendster lies in having members recommend products... continue reading »Study: Bonded Sender Anti-Spam Tech ProblematicA report evaluating IronPort's Bonded Sender anti-spam solution - recently endorsed by Microsoft - revealed that a test of the system inappropriately triggered fine payments of would-be commercial emailers in 35 percent of cases. The system requires commercial emailers to... continue reading »Digital River Buys Metrics Firm for $7.5 MillionDigital River bought web metrics analysis firm Fireclick for $7.5 million. Fireclick boasts retail and catalog clients such as AnnTaylor, Guess, RadioShack, Skechers, Patagonia, Venus Swimwear and Lillian Vernon. The Fireclick system benchmarks ecommerce results and merchandising reports against industry... continue reading »Email Click Decline Self ImposedMuch of the decline in email clickthrough rates may have more to do with amateurish email mistakes than it does with declining effectiveness. Bill McCloskey points out specific format errors, compliance errors and redirect errors, all of which he sees... continue reading »Online Ad Spend Up 28 Percent in Q1As ad spending across the board rose ten percent in the first quarter, TNS Media Intelligence/CMR reported online spending rose a whopping 28 percent to $1.9 billion. These figures expand the difference seen between the CMR numbers and those reported... continue reading »Benchmark Conversion Rates Vary by CategoryBryan Eisenberg, in a column complaining about companies that don't know their own site's conversion rate, revealed benchmark rates seen in various industries. The numbers, from web analytics firm Fireclick - recently purchased by Digital River - show catalogers winning... continue reading »Hockey Site Keeps Paid Search Costs in CheckSports retailer HockeyGiant detailed to Internet Retailer how it managed to optimize its paid search campaign on Overture, increasing transaction rates while it kept paid listings costs roughly even. The new Overture Conversion Counter tool made the optimization possible. Through... continue reading »Brits: Online Creative StinksA British panel of media owners and agency people at least partially blamed lame creative for creating an environment in which online advertising remains an afterthought for most marketers. An AOL UK representative pointed out the harsh fact that "Online... continue reading »Pop-Up Blockers Losing EffectivenessPop-up blockers are losing the arms race, with pop-ups effectively blocking the blockers. As many as 30 percent of internet users currently use pop-up blockers, and Microsoft's upcoming Internet Explorer release is set to both include a blocker and have... continue reading »Branded Online Storage Brings Loss RisksSun's old saw "The network is the computer" seems to be coming true, even if Sun itself didn't manage to be the company bringing it to us. That said, you better darned well back it up, because network services holding... continue reading »WhenU Seeks Financing, Founder BuyoutWhenU's founders are reportedly looking to get out, seeking a deal that would pay them about $30 million and add another $20 million in working capital for the adware firm. WhenU distributes software like BearShare for free in return for... continue reading »Study: Marketers Lack ROI Measuring SystemsTech marketers tend not to measure their return on investment for marketing, according to a new study by the Chief Marketing Officer Council. Four out of five companies completely lacked the systems necessary to measure the impact of marketing efforts,... continue reading »Naked Man Sues AbsolutThe "hunk" in a fake Absolut ad shown in an HBO Sex in the City episode last summer is suing the real Absolut company for what he alleges is an improper adoption of the ad as a real marketing... continue reading »Gawker Goes Custom Publishing, Launches Nike SiteGawker created a site for Nike, entering the market for custom publishing and lending its bloggy credentials to the shoe purveyor. The Art of Speed site, served on Gawker's domain, showcases 15 film makers' interpretation of speed and adds a... continue reading »Pop-Up Redux: Firms Look to IAB for TamingA Pittsburgh paper produced the best-yet summary of issues facing pop-up advertising, bringing up the fact that the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) is in the midst of its comment period for voluntary guidelines on pop-ups. The IAB let loose its... continue reading »U.K. Study Finds E-Commerce Performance AppallingBritish e-commerce technology performed appallingly in April, according to a U.K-based web applications testing firm. SciVisum studied more than 50 U.K. sites, finding that sites failed to add an item into an online shopping cart one to five times per... continue reading »Study: 'Geek' Image Makes Women Avoid TechA research report indicates that women turn to technology and technology careers less often then men because of a persistent "geeky" image. The study, which followed women in five European countries, found that women felt as though they would not... continue reading »Porn Still Dominates Online Traffic CategoriesFor all the hubbub about the dominance of search on the web, porn remains the most trafficked online destination, accounting for almost one in five visits, according to Hitwise. The imbalance - with about 19 percent of traffic headed to... continue reading »Lufthansa Bows Online Booking CampaignBritish ad firm Profero created an online campaign for Lufthansa, to go with the airline's existing outdoor campaign from mega firm McCann Erickson. Profero created the spots - mostly skyscrapers - and conducted the buying and planning. The promotion will... continue reading »Media Buyers Said to Want AuditsEuropean media buyers are demanding independent industry standard metrics to justify their online buying investments, according to a new study sponsored by web traffic auditing firm ABC Electronic. According to the study, conducted by Benchmark, 90 percent of media buyers... continue reading »J. Crew Pulls Away from Pack… In Wrong DirectionAgainst the rising tide of almost all e-commerce firms experiencing increased revenues, if not profits, J. Crew stubbornly continues to wallow in worsening losses. Internet sales dropped abruptly by 43 percent, to $21 million. General revenues fell only 9.3 percent.... continue reading » |