All of us in the online marketing business have to admire the Obama Team’s mastery of the internet as a campaigning tool for the USA 2008 Elections.

“From day one of his bid for the White House, the President-Elect grasped the potential of the web to spread his message and organise party activists in a way that no other medium could achieve.

As well as sending out millions of emails to potential Democratic voters, in particular first-time voters, the Obama camp created its own social networking site, my.barackobama.com, after Chris Hughes, the co-founder of Facebook, was brought onto the campaign team.

The website attracted more than 1.5 million members who organised themselves into 35,000 separate activists’ groups, each of which could be contacted instantly from the Obama campaign headquarters to be given specific tasks in drumming up support.”

Read full article “How the internet helped propel Barack Obama to the White House”

New rules to protect consumers against unfair business practices will come into force today, opening the door for companies to be prosecuted if they treat their customers unfairly.

The so-called Consumer Protection Regulations will make it illegal to omit important information from their trading documents, and to make misleading statements. Furthermore, it will ban 31 specific practices, such as falsely claiming to be a signatory on a code of conduct, or advertising a special offer but claiming it is not in stock.

Other things covered by the rules include a crackdown on scare tactics, “closing down” sales when stores are not actually closing, and pyramid schemes.

Businesses that fall outside the new laws can be prosecuted by both the Trading Standards Authority and the Office of Fair Trading.

Commenting on the introduction of the regulations, Carl Belgrove, a senior policy advocate at the National Consumer Council, which has spent 20 years campaigning for the legislation, said: “These new laws represent a big boost to consumer protection, particularly for vulnerable people who are targeted by rogue traders.

“The one thing missing is a way for consumers to claim compensation when businesses act unfairly and we hope that will be remedied soon.”

Similar regulations in Ireland allow consumers to also pursue civil redress against businesses which treat them unfairly. However, the UK laws have no such provision. The Department of Business, Enterprise and Regulatory Reform has asked the Law Commission to look into the possibility of introducing a civil redress mechanism, but it is not expected to even start work on the project until 2010 at the earliest.

Chris Warner, an in-house lawyer at Which?, the consumers’ association, also welcomed the new regulations, but warned that it was crucial that the new landscape was properly policed. “Rogue traders are a nuisance for the most part, but in the worst cases they’ve ruined people’s lives,” he said.

“Doorstepping and aggressive selling are unacceptable and we are delighted that many of these practices are now rightly considered to be criminal offences. However, the devil is in the detail and this will only work if the OFT and Trading Standards enforce it firmly.”

Source:James Daley Personal Finance Editor, Independent

Dave Morgan’s eloquent article on the changes in the online world encapsulates much of what small business worry about on a daily basis asking the questions “will this approach work?” In his article, Morgan traces the evolution of online advertising where you can glean the potential for your specific business requirements. He states that “we’ve seen the online world change a lot over the past 15 years. We’ve seen several shifts in the key battlegrounds for control of the value generated by consumers’ use of online services.

Throughout the ’90s, it was all about the pipes. Access was the watchword and the business was all about providing consumers with the “pipe” to access online services. Advertising was not a big part of the picture, though charging “slotting fees” to sponsors was a big business.

By the end of the ’90s, with the Web finally displacing proprietary online services, the battle shifted to building and owning the largest portals. Aggregation was the watchword, and the business was all about amassing the most users on gateway pages providing news, information and entertainment. Advertising moved into the foreground, and the value in business shifted from sponsorship and position to a heavy focus on delivering tonnage. Raw scale was the name of the game.

Once again, we’re in the middle of another major change, and it’s going to be just as significant as the shift from pipes to portals.

Click here to read this article in full.

Gord Hotchkiss in his article at ‘outofmygord’ discusses his ‘Wedding Night Advice to Yahoo and Microsoft’. He comments that “now that there seems to be some sort of union in Yahoo’s future, blessed or otherwise, I felt the urge to pass along some advice to whoever the happy couple might be. For, in all this talk about the impending nuptials, the clear objective is to survive and compete in the business of attracting the attention of prospects online.

I offer this advice on behalf of users, because frankly, I think that’s the only perspective you should be interested in. I’ll explain why.

Why Search is Essential

First of all, there’s a lot of talk about how a Microsoft-Yahoo deal would give you the biggest chunk of the online ad network space, and this is true. But I hasten to add: Don’t forget search. Google has stumbled in rolling out another significant revenue channel that holds up against its search business, yet it has still dominated. That’s because the importance of search has been understated up to this point. Here’s why search matters.

Search is the thin edge of a wedge that is marking a fundamental change in advertising. And it’s fundamental because it’s initiated by the prospect. The importance of that sometimes gets missed by marketers, who start looking at search as just another weapon in their arsenal.

Click here to read the article in full.

Jere Doyle writing for the Online Publishing Insiders brings to our attention a pertinent question – is there a need for social networking and community-based sites? In this informative article, Doyle reveals a multitude of conflicts and contradictions and tells it as it is. He writes:

The Past Repeats Itself: Social Media Needs Advertising

THERE’S BEEN MUCH ATTENTION paid recently to whether or not social networking and community-based sites will embrace advertising. It’s a touchy subject for publishers in this realm, and understandably so. Much of the controversy revolves around concerns that consumers won’t tolerate marketing messages in this environment, since they often feel a very personal connection and a certain level of ownership over the contents of these sites. Publishers worry about turning their visitors off and sending massive amounts of their traffic to competitors.

To me, the answer is clear. All media, throughout history, has been supported by advertising — and in general consumers are accustomed to this reality. In fact, when advertisements and offers are presented in a meaningful and relevant way, consumers welcome them and seek out relationships with their preferred brands. This concept is even more important in situations where the users are highly engaged and have strong attachments to the medium. So, when looking at the current landscape, you should not ask yourself “will” social networking sites embrace ads – the better question is “how” can they go about integrating advertising messages and offers in ways that truly add to the user’s experience.

Click here to read the article in full.

Wendy Davis writing for the Media Post publications stated that “the interactive advertising bureau Thursday issued best practices guidelines for online lead generation, saying its recommendations will help the industry grow while building trust with consumers. But the guidelines immediately sparked criticism by another trade group, the Online Lead Generation Association, which says the recommendations don’t adequately protect consumers from being bombarded with unwanted e-mail ads.

The IAB’s voluntary guidelines state that Web publishers should ask consumers for permission to share their e-mail addresses with other marketers. But the IAB is not recommending that publishers name the specific marketers it will share information with. 

OLGA, however, argues that publishers should tell consumers which other marketers will receive their e-mail addresses and obtain consent for each. Otherwise, the group says, consumers might find themselves “receiving hundreds of emails a day as a result of one offer sign-up.”

“Consumers lose confidence in signing up for an offer because they don’t know for sure where their names are going,” said Jere Doyle, a member of OLGA and president and CEO of online marketing company Prospectiv.

OLGA had unsuccessfully pressed for language stating, “Data should not be shared with or sold to un-named or anonymous third party marketers.”

Gayle Guzzardo, who chaired the IAB Lead Generation Committee, said the IAB rejected the suggestion that publishers should name each marketing partner, because doing so might put publishers at a competitive disadvantage.

“We thought it would be not in the best interest of the publishers to specifically list every partner that they work with on their registration page,” said Guzzardo, senior vice president, product management at Q Interactive.

Click here to read the article in full.

Glenn Warren at Accountancy Age writes that outsourcing to not one but several suppliers can spread risk and offer greater choice. These are some things that we have been aware of for sometime at Equilibrium and we understand the importance of a good and effective service that would enable companies and individuals business venture greater success. And outsourcing can mean quick turn arounds and it’s an approach that many businesses are taking on board. 

“Outsourcing is continuously evolving, with more choice than ever before – in geographies, providers, skills and processes. In turn, there is growing pressure for organisations to optimise their use of providers and geographies to spread risk and secure a competitive rate.

But gone are the days when outsourcing essentially meant global monoliths winning all-encompassing contracts that ran for a decade or more. Multisourcing – the use of several providers by one buyer – is a tactic increasingly adopted by purchasers in all sectors.

In 2000, 81% of outsourcing buyers were using only one or two providers. But, so far, in 2007 the number of buyers using three or more providers has almost doubled to 36%. The trend is partly attributable to buyers’ wanting to utilise the large number of niche providers now available. Many are also realising that dependence on one large provider is not necessarily secure or desirable.

Multisourcing has a range of benefits. It introduces competition between suppliers, increasing the buyer’s bargaining power throughout the contract term. And it encourages a strategic, company-wide sourcing approach, meaning that buyers can benefit from economies of scale and better co-ordinated management”.

Click here to read the article in full.

The power of the interactive facilities was evident at Tommy Hilfiger’s London store when overnight the company collected 1500 plus subscribers to its e-newsletter. Obviously a large budget helps, but even on a small scale for up-coming and small business it may just be the ticket. Digital Signage Today reports that customers at selected Tommy Hilfiger Denim stores can now join the Hilfiger Hall of Fame by adding their pictures to an interactive storefront campaign that launched on 3rd January 2008.
 
“Hilfiger stores in London, Amsterdam, Cologne, Antwerp and Dublin now feature through-window touch screens, providing an interface for passing shoppers to capture, stylize and submit their image as part of collage of images being shown on digital screens in the shop windows.
 
The digital storefronts enable customers to interact with the Hilfiger brand even outside of business hours. At the end of the campaign, customers will be able to return to the store and have their own T-shirt specially printed using the image they created as the design. The campaign also serves as mechanic for driving subscriptions to Hilfiger’s email newsletter, with users being asked to opt-in when uploading their images.”

Click here to read in full.

Pew Research Centre Publications reports that one quarter of teens are super communicators.

Now, many of us have known that since the explosion of the internet, it essentially started as a teenage phenomenon, okay so there were some geeks in there somewhere! But the surprise for many is the fact that the teenage influence is increasing in many parts of the world, in particular American. So, if you are looking a new market potential and have a viable product, or simply want to consolidate, here’s a ready made market waiting for you.

“The Pew Internet & American Life Project finds that 93% of teens use the internet, and more of them than ever are treating it as a venue for social interaction — a place where they can share creations, tell stories, and interact with others. 64% of online teens ages 12-17 have participated in one or more among a wide range of content-creating activities on the internet, up from 57% of online teens in a similar survey at the end of 2004.

Girls continue to dominate most elements of content creation:

35% of all teen girls Blog, compared with 20% of online boys
54% of wired girls post photos online compared with 40% of online boys.
19% of online boys post video content online, compared to 10% of online girls who have posted a video online where others could see it.”

Click here to read the report in full.

As the debate rages about the effectiveness of video ads or video’s per se on the internet, it has become difficult for business, small or big to know what works and how effective video’s can be to further their market potential. In this insightful article by Steve Robinson, some light is shed on what seems to be working.

“A FEW MONTHS AGO, IN its “Interactive Marketing Forecast 2007-2012,” Forrester reported that a staggering 82% of consumers find pre-roll, in-player and in-stream video “annoying.” In the next sentence of the report, video overlays are hailed as generating five to 10 times more clicks than banner ads.

A month later, AOL and PointRoll were credited by the trade press for their innovation in “developing the video ticker ad platform,” but just as quickly dismissed by eWeek as “the latest alternative to pre-roll and overlaying ads that tick off users.” One day, YouTube’s use of so-called “lower third” ads is predicted to become industry status quo; the next day the blogs are calling these ads intrusive, unintuitive and stale. And the most recent contradicting report from Tremor Media shows, “Pre-roll is still hot… Twenty-seven percent of all video ad spend is in pre-roll, and we don’t see that ratio moving dramatically to overlay technology or other alternatives.”

What’s a Web publisher to do when consumer behaviours indicate pre-rolls, overlays and other new ad formats are not producing the desired and promised CPMs, and it’s still unclear what will achieve mass appeal? Many publishers have been led to believe they must deploy engineering resources to execute complex and expensive technology updates — such as building custom applications for advertisers and modifying player technologies — in order to deliver whatever new fly-by-night ad formats and styles of avails Madison Avenue has developed to entice their advertisers and consumers. This process is costly, time-consuming and does not guarantee results”.

Click here to read the article in full.