eROI Days Email Agency

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

(more…)

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:

(more…)

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.

(more…)

The calm before the storm at #inc5000. Already connected with old friends and Inc magazine staff  http://yfrog.com/0oqxmjj 5:56 PM Sep 23rd from Tweetie

One more photo from Gaylord resort in wash dc. Schwanky. http://yfrog.com/16vonyj 5:57 PM Sep 23rd from Tweetie

#inc5000 conf starting now. Largest attendance ever at 1,700 of us. Aggregate rev of $214 billion http://yfrog.com/0nxn1jj 6:14 AM Sep 24th from Tweetie

(more…)

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…

Beyond my fondness for the site, Moonit has been getting really positive reviews.  They had the honor of being a part of the TechCrunch50, in what felt like minutes after the launch, allowing them to showcase the site and even bribe a security guard to allow them access to a special room in exchange for figuring out his “crazy love life.”

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.

Moonit Press:

The Moonit Blog»

Read the blogher Article»

Moonit on Forbes.com»

“Friend or boyfriend” in the examiner.com»

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.

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…)