This morning’s article on eMarketer, “Marketers Moving to Digital Media” had some really encouraging and powerful data in it. For all of us in the interactive agency and email marketing industry, this is great news that validates our gut instinct that we’ve been seeing anecdotally. The article begins:
“Looking for an upside. In the wake of the global economic downturn, marketers worldwide are shifting more of their budgets into cheaper, more-measurable categories. In most cases, that means online.
Although the name of the organization might imply a slight bias, in a survey by the Society of Digital Agencies (SoDA), 81% of respondents said they plan to invest at least as much in digital marketing in 2009 as in the previous year.
More than 77% of traditional advertising agencies are increasing the amount of digital in their budgets by 1% to 29%. And over 10% are upping online budgets by 30% or more.
Some guys will just have more talent than I will ever have. This guy is absolutely amazing. It has nothing to do with online marketing but everything to do with inspiration. It keeps getting better throughout the video. Write your comment in haiku if you feel inspired.
The unsung hero behind an amazing integrated, grassroots campaign of traditional marketing, in-person events, and social media (well, she was mainly the social media part) gave a great keynote speech at the eMarketing Summit of Innotech today. Rahaf Harfoush was great. I show my twitter stream below of notes from the event, but also noticed she just launched a new site and blog – http://www.rahafharfoush.com/
Here is my twitter stream from Rahaf Harfoush’s awesome keynote speech at Innotech:
As I was biking in to work this morning along Waterfront Park (Willamette River and Mt. Hood views), I caught up with a colleague of mine who works at the PDC and we rode the rest of the way into work together. It was one of those “Portland moments” where it would be unexpected anywhere else for a couple business guys who haven’t seen each other in 3 months connect on a morning commute into work. Portland, like Amsterdam, has a biking culture, and with the right gear, it’s refreshing to bike rain or shine (although SUN is so so much better). Here is the NY Times article my Dad (who lives in Washington DC) sent me as I arrived at my desk this morning:
“A LOT of good cyclists come out of Portland just because you can ride year-round,” said Bruce Rogers, an athletic-shoe designer visiting from his home in Hailey, Idaho. “I love coming back because I love the biking, no matter what time of year it is. More than fitness, it’s a fun outlet. As long as you have decent rainwear you can ride in any weather.”
Careering through streets on a bicycle in Portland, Ore., this time of year can be an easy weekend adventure that mixes showers, sunbursts, cafes and a robust bicycle culture. And equipped with a sturdy rain jacket, booties, fenders and a bike map (a waterproof version that folds to the size of a credit card is handy), visitors can enjoy the city the way locals do.
We, at eROI, have been working the last year on creating a new generation of Event Registration Software, eROI Event, with an enhanced user experience. We are currently in the Beta Launch Phase with a limited feature set, but we are excited to get this early-release version of the product out in front of our clients and the tech community in Portland. Our goal is to gather real user feedback as we continue to develop and enhance the product. We are offering a freemium version of the product for free events, but should a user prefer to hold paid events, we can enable the Payment Gateway feature for a minimal monthly fee of $50.00.
Novel concept, but I actually used our eROI Event tool to create an event for our Employee Disco Party on June 26th (if you are one of the 2 friends that employees can invite, then you too can join in the fun). I thought some screen shots of the back-end admin area would help you see why we are excited about this beta release (even though the feature set is slightly limited for the next 1-2 months until we get feedback from all of you that want to signup for a FREE account for free events (to use for RSVPs to dinner parties, seminars, BBQs, industry networking events, business meetings, etc.)
I love the comments from this video (and I need to give thanks to Alex Williams at eROI for sharing this enlightening piece of film below). Here is my favorite comment (by “iknklst” on YouTube):
“I make my business cards out of unrefined nuclear waste. They glow in the dark quite nicely, and give the receiver terminal cancer within ten minutes of touching it.
One person I know , a self-made man, very succesful in business, was aked for his card one day.
He looked at the person blankly, then said “Business cards are for used car salesman and hotel managers. If you don’t already know how to contact my office, there is nothing I need to talk to you about anyway.”
Portland, Oregon is a long way from Washington D.C. So, we should be psyched about playing host to the New Media Strategist, Rahaf Harfoush. She led arguably the social media strategy for the best online campaign implementation of any major politician in the history of politics (love the drama of that sentence even though politicians have really only used the web significantly in the past 4 years). Harfoush is the keynote speaker at InnoTech Portland:
Date: April 23, 2009
Time: InnoTech starts at 8am, Harfoush speaks at 11:30am
Place: Oregon Convention Center, Portland, Oregon
How much: BIG DISCOUNT if you use these codes when you REGISTER HERE >>
(INN48 – gets you a $12 Discount so it’s only $48 for General Administration)
(EMS20AT – gets you a $20 Discount so it’s only $129 for the two day eMarketing summit)
I got a lot of comments on my look (see below) where I sported the 70′s stache for a solid 2 days. Most of you cringed in pain just looking at me with my stache. But some of you liked it, like a yearning for the days of Saturday Night Fever. So, your task is to comment below with a haiku on how you feel about 70′s style in today’s age.
Ah, the vastly entertaining Guy Kawasaki started off the keynote with swagger and a few digs on Sarah Lacy’s dismal interview of Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg which happened exactly one year ago at SXSW. Guy followed up with some poignant questions for Wired Magazine publisher Chris Anderson who is about to publish his book “FREE” which of course be free in its electronic version. The debate centered around whether or not freemium (new word thrown around liberally in this SXSW Kawasaki / Anderson interview) products lower the value of that product based on pricing it as FREE for the standard/limited/trial version and a cost to the premium version of that product or software. Check out the video and tweets below to draw your own conclusions.
My Kawasaki / Anderson tweets—-
#sxsw keynote – who’s going to be the star – Guy Kawasaki or Chris Anderson? Will Guy give more Apple examples or Alltop?11:49 AM Mar 17thfrom TweetDeck
Kawasaki and anderson take the stage now. Gonna be good – I feel it.12:04 PM Mar 17thfrom web
Sarah lacey jabs already by kawasaki – nice.12:06 PM Mar 17thfrom web
The big question is how will twitter make money now?12:07 PM Mar 17thfrom web
I went back through my 287 tweets from five days at SXSW Interactive with an intention to do a dozen different blog posts. Instead, I realize that I just need to share bits of inspiration instead of piecing together thorough notes for each session I attended.
Overall takeaways:
Portland interactive and social media attendees were huge – there were probably 250+ Portlanders attending SXSW and we got to spend more quality time in sessions, restaurants, house parties, and bars in Austin, TX than in Portland – funny how that happens.
eROI team-building was pretty amazing. There were 15 of us at the event and it allowed us to learn and share in a very human way, which is a lot tougher to do in the office.
Informal vibe to the event: thankfully. Couches were in some sessions, outdoor tent parties just outside the Convention Center. But, the tone that speakers and attendees had was very informal and allowed for the walls/barricades to be down to facilitate networking and learning.
Rebellious attitude – maybe this is the influence of indie musicians and film-makers filling in towards the end of the Interactive part of SXSW, but one keynote in particular exemplified this: James Powderly explaining his mass-scale graffiti art. I loved this edge to the speakers and sessions.
OK – I guess I need to do separate blog posts to show some cool visuals and videos of my favorite influences there.
This morning, eROI Sales & Strategist, Alex Williams took this fine photo in Los Angeles, of all places. Hopefully, Alex will comment on this blog post with a quick update of what he’s learned from Mediapost’s OMMA Hollywood event, which is all about online media, marketing, and advertising. A quick reminder that Optimism is the eROI mantra for 2009 and beyond, and what better day to see this huge banner than a day the stock market skyrockets.
If you’ve got a couple hours to spare, then you should read this whole 176 page report. If you only have 5 minutes, it’s worth skimming thru the online pages. Razorfish, one of the largest digital agencies in the world, did a phenomenal job with laying out the landscape of online for the first half of this year (I don’t think anyone can accurately predict what’s going to happen 6 months from now, but I am an optimist and think our industry will grow at a healthy clip in the second half).
I’m publishing my schedule for SXSW – it’s kind of ridiculous how much stuff there is to see and learn. This is my first time to the amazing, well-known event and we are showing up in full force – 1/3 of eROI staffers will be there, but clients, don’t fret, we will be on email and working during most of it. Cheers!
The End Of A Chapter – My Next Move - Just like a good book, there are never really any endings, only beginnings. I wanted to take a moment to let you know that I am leaving my position at eROI as of January 31st, 2011. I will be starting a new position at a company outside of the email marketing and interactive agency business [...]
Join eROI at DMA 2010 in San Francisco – October 11th-14th - Alex Williams, Strategy for eROI, will be presenting in San Francisco at DMA2010 on email, social, mobile and ecommerce. DMA2010 is the global event covering all marketing channels — from traditional...
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