Here was my presentation from the Lake Oswego Chamber of Commerce FORGE Marketing Annual Summit – great event!
As usual, I learned a ton from the other speakers:
Kimberly Barta, VP of Marketing, Dr. Martens Shoes
Dayn Wilberding, Dir of Technology, Grady Britton
Kent Lewis, President, Anvil Media
Enjoy this eROI presentation!
I also included a few of my tweets below as well:
@kentjlewis nice. “remember your marketing budget is unlimited” 11:41 AM Jan 28th from Tweetie
Top paid placement is based on Quality Score, not just on highest price. 11:32 AM Jan 28th from Tweetie
As I looked over my online marketing predictions from last year, what struck me was my tone of optimism in the face of doomsday articles swirling about for 2009. To some degree, 2009 has much to be optimistic about for online marketers. Finally, there is a broad agreement in organizations that the web is an important business and marketing medium, and a greater percentage of marketing dollars are going online (even though overall marketing budgets are flat or slightly down compared to 2008). On the flipside, online marketers are expected to do more with less resources than ever before.
While you may still have the title as Email Marketing Manager, you are likely expected to have some expertise and drive inbound marketing, marketing automation programs, coordinate integration with social media and potentially be the online community manager for your company, closely tie into your search engine marketing program, and all of this is on top of the strategy and implementation of your marketing plan for the year. It’s exhausting and the pressure is on – 2010 is about action and results – and the tension between marketing and sales is going to increase with the demand for quality leads that convert into real sales.
So, let’s cut to the chase and dig into what will happen in 2010. Here are my 11 Web + Email Marketing Predictions:
Major props to the very talented Chris Masagatani who is our NYC Director and also an amazing video creator and producer. The video says it all, but I just want to reinforce how proud I am of Chris and Kavita for being one of our true bright spots this past year. eROI New York City has also done an awesome job staying connected to HQ in P’town. Check it out – the video makes you feel like you are in NYC – raw yet refined – is that possible?
Something that we recommend for our clients is the integration of Social Media into their marketing campaigns. Social media monitoring goes hand in hand with creating a strong social media presence. I came across an article that breaks social media monitoring down into 4 manageable parts.
“The four cornerstones of social media monitoring are (1) Competitive Analysis, (2) Product Development, (3) Reputation Management and (4) Outreach.”
Competitive Analysis – If your competition is engaged in social media, pay attention to what they are doing and the responses they are receiving and learn from them.
Product Development – Use social media as a way to find out what your consumers want.
Reputation Management – Make sure the people responsible for and reacting to posts on various sites are educated in the importance of their responses and in the brand they are trying to portray.
Outreach – Identify who the influencers are outside of your company and create relationships with them.
I was forwarded a link to a site that engages the user through Facebook Connect. It had a total video game vibe and my curiosity got the best of me. There was a sense of doom from the beginning. A New York City cab flipped on it’s side, men with guns and – wait – my face? Flash forward to predictions of my kids deaths and pictures of them overtaken by worms, it was an experience that fascinated me and creeped me out at the same time.
I don’t know about you, but I love to moon the people in my life. No, I’m not talking 8 year old boy humor here I’m talking the new site we launched, Moonit.
It’s a place where you can evaluate and track your relationships, get advice on things happening in your life and catch up on celebrity gossip, all while Mooning your friends. Really “Mooning” is checking your compatibility but that doesn’t sound nearly as fun. We are so excited to see this dream become a reality. For me, an internal brainstorming session for Moonit was the very first meeting at eROI I ever attended. I feel an attachment to Moonit, I wonder if I put in the site’s launch date and my birth date if we would be compatible…
The site is fun, easy to use and is a perfect compliment to your social media life (you can even use facebook connect.) If nothing else, at least you can moon your boss.
There is nothing like a little distance to make the heart grow fonder. The past 5 days, I’ve spent with my little family in a remote, rustic cabin in the forested Wallowa Mountains outside of Joseph, Oregon (6 hour drive from Portland). As with any vacation, it took a couple days to unwind, then it was pure bliss doing what I love doing – being outdoors nonstop, hiking, spending time with my family, and being undistracted by all the craziness in our technology-laden lives.
Upon my return to the grid (meaning my iPhone on the drive back), I realized that my longing for technology was really in communication of key information and emotional connection through my inbox (email is not, nor will it ever be dead in the foreseeable future), not through Tweetie, Tweetdeck when I returned to my laptop at home, Facebook, LinkedIn, or any website at all – it was spending 6 hours of catching up on all of the things that are hyper-relevant to me in my inbox. Interestingly enough, I could only really scan and internalize all the issues brought up through hundreds of emails on my iPhone for about an hour, and the other 5 hours of digging way deeper and responding happened through my Outlook inbox on my laptop. It’s a totally different mode of thinking on a 14″ screen than a 2″ screen.
There is a lot of chatter over the past several months among Email Marketing industry execs (over a hundred of us on a private email list) about whether or not Twitter is a complete waste of time or if it will kill Email, and it seems so obvious to me that Twitter is a useful conversation piece that has its place in the marketing mix, but is not yet the killer addictive app/platform/communication channel that email is. In each of our daily lives, the large majority of us prioritize our Inbox over everything else. It took almost a week in the woods to be able to articulate this simple gravitational pull towards email.
To the blog that brought you the Crispin video on interns (probably after you had seen it a couple times – sorry I was a little late to the game on that one), NOW I show you a local agency – little shop called Wieden+Kennedy and a different kind of culture / humor w/ their 12 program of interns.
If you have little kids around your computer, like I do right now, you might want to watch the frequent, casual F bombs used in the video, albeit educational.
When it comes to Twitter I read more than write. I’m sad to say I have had to say goodbye to some celebs that I have followed (Demi and Ashton) but celebrity stylist Rachel Zoe hasn’t disappointed me yet with her twitpics of worship worthy rooms full of shoes, fashion advice and generally cheery tweets. Rachel finds time between tweets to create her own branded empire. In addition to her stylist gig she has a reality show, partnership with Piperlime, she’s introducing a new line of products for QVC and just launched her new website – RachelZoe.com.
I’m usually curious enough to click on the links she offers and yesterday I found myself at her new site. What I was surprised and delighted by was the ease at which she engaged the user in a multitude of interactions. As a first time visitor to the site you are invited to “Get The Zoe Report” by simply giving your email address and zip code. The call to action is straight forward and simple.
Next you are taken to a thank you page where they segment your gender, age and preferences with an option to add a category they haven’t listed. I think this page starts to build the relationship with the user. You are asked about what is important to you and given the chance to elaborate, in a way it sets the tone for the pages that follow. (more…)
A couple of days ago, we launched our brand new homepage and we are all psyched with the way it turned out. As usual for creative agencies, we are our own toughest client, trying to please lots of detail-oriented, savvy decision-makers from every department and aspect of the company. However, we truly followed our own highly-collaborative process, and while it may have taken longer than we wanted to fit this project into all of our client work as well, we were extremely happy with the end result. The user-centered design includes an element of flash which was integrated seamlessly and our production team made everything work like a charm.
One of the most noticeable new features was the integration of tabs on the page. There are 10 tabs in all that help the user easily navigate what we offer along with content from each of our five blogs. At eROI, we drink our own Koolaid when it comes to online marketing. We have a clear call-out to sign up for our newsletter in the bottom section of our page, we invite people to become a fan of eROI on Facebook, follow us on Twitter, or see our profile on Linkedin and even our most recent tweets are displayed to the right of the page.
Please give us feedback in the form of a haiku – tell us if you love our new homepage or you hate it or something in between, but please please do NOT be boring. thx.
Dawn Foster just sent out an awesome Flickr slideshow done by Aaron Hockley. I’ll figure out the iframe work-around to get the embedded slideshow working correctly when I get into the office tomorrow. As I was sitting next to fellow current, current, and former eROI teammates Dylan, Summer, and Garrett, I couldn’t help but commenting on all of the things that Portland creativity, informality, and general vibe offer that you simply can’t find anywhere else. For example: I would never see a toddler or infant at a late-night business event on the East Coast where “ear muffs” are needed in many of the presentations. I doubt other cities have women crescendo into near-real orgasms over vegetables during a presentation. So, to start off my twitter stream from the big Ignite6 night, I’ll pick the one that sums it all up – “What’s great about portland? So communal – techies bring kids to the event, casual, real, accepting, creative, inspiring.” Here’s the rest of my tweets:
# James keller on being a hooker in rugby. Great lessons, entertaining #ignite6
Eva – brilliant thinking
Authority – like librarians – its about what’s real
Anything happens at #ignite6 – veggies an aphrodisiac
Ice cold swim after sauna – shrinkage can be an issue #ignite6
Sauna cleanses you inside and out #ignite6
After intermission – sauna etiquette pres, #ignite6
# Kgw – lesson 1 – be careful who you call a hipster. Epic fail. At #ignite4 (more…)
The eROI presenters, Dylan Boyd, Alex Williams, and I, have traveled all over the country to give presentations on various topics from Building Community Online to The Value of a Welcome Email Program to New Trends in Measuring the Success of your Online Marketing & Social Media Efforts. This blog post is an overload of resource material for 3 great presentations – enjoy!
This year’s theme for our company appreciation party was put to a vote. After the votes were tallied the theme was shrouded in mystery until a team email was sent with the reveal in true eROI Rock star fashion. This year it was fated to be… Summer White Party! Using our new eROI Event system we created a totally themed event that the email linked to. Check out the process for creating The eROI Summer White Party.
The Portland Creative Community took some bold steps with its launch of the Portland Ad Federation Rosey Awards website themed “Nothing Says I’m Better than you Like a Rosey.” The messaging has an East Coast directness to it that takes many Portlanders by surprise in a city that fosters friendliness to strangers, foes, and friends. However, I think it’s the perfect time for Portland to step up and talk with confidence about its creative talent here. Yes, we’ve recently been discovered by the NY Times, Wall Street Journal, and other publications as the destination for hipsters (employed and unemployed) to hang out. But, we aren’t getting much positive press for having the second highest unemployment in the country. Now is the right time to shout from the roof-tops that Portland creative agencies do kick-ass work! Kudos to Anthill Marketing for the concept, design, and messaging in the site and entire Roseys this year!
2009 PAF Rosey Awards site
I’m not so sure this site would work in most other industries as it is definitely edgy, controversial, and provocative, but I think it’s a shot in the arm that Portland needs. The true test is to see if agencies from other cities take notice. Then, an interesting dialog will begin.
You’ll start to see this campaign promoted more on Twitter (I love the “Rosey Smack Feed” section of the ‘Win Tix’ part of the site), Facebook, and other blogs in the upcoming months. I’ve got to sign off from this blog post to think of some good Smack Talk myself – submit your own here >>
My two fellow eROI NYC folks, Chris Masagatani and Kavita Makadia, joined me in attending the June 1 Ignite NYC event just a block from Chris’s apartment in Midtown. I had been to an Ignite event in Washington DC which was pretty good, but a little stiff and serious, so my expectations were moderate before going to the event. At this NYC event, I was blown away by how creative, funny, and polished each of the 5-minute presentations were. I highly highly recommend you watch the video below of the brilliantly funny Baratunde Shares of The Onion.
What Is Acceptable - Are we setting realistic expecations as an industry on welcome emails when it comes to offline collection at stores, events and more? This is often a point that email marketers bring up and I would love to hear your thoughts on it. I sometimes think that as email marketers we expect more from programs and [...]
Below is a list of real holidays, wacky holidays, and pop culture events in March and ideas you can utilize to develop timely and relevant email marketing campaigns.
The finished product, see how it was done below.
Here it is, your March Email Marketing Calendar.
