Interactive

Below were my 2011 marketing predictions. Let’s journey together and see if my crystal ball needs cleaning:

I can’t really claim these are anticipated, but here they are, my 2011 predictions advertising/marketing/communication specific to the New Year. For the record, my last few years’ predictions have been accurate. Use or dismiss this prose at your discretion.

Prediction #1: Video will play a keener role in website conversions, and marketing as a whole. It’s already happening and with YouTube the second most popular search engine (that’s right, only Google is bigger), it just makes sense. Zappos and other sites already know this, so test video on your site(s) and watch conversions skyrocket. As such, SEO/SEM will play a critical role in marketing effectiveness next year.



Video is being added to every new website that we now build and is being incorporated into old sites as well. YouTube continues to grow, so I would say this was spot-on. How often do you view video content on websites compared to one year ago?

Prediction #2: Consumer and Business purchasing decision-makers are changing their buying patterns because of advances in technology and the ubiquity of information that can be had on Google, YouTube, Yahoo, Bing, Rock Melt and the like. Thus, those who understand data – specifically how that data relates to transactional occurrences by each KEY target market segment – will rule the day. This applies to both customer and prospect segments. We have trained buyers to this fact: know intuitively who I am, what I am seeking and make it as easy as possible for me to do/continue to do business with you. Those companies that don’t understand this will be watching their bottom lines evaporate.

The web is blurring the lines between B2B and B2C marketing. Relevancy is the key to making me want to buy from you. Agree?

Prediction #3: Larger companies will hire more reputation mangers to make sure they can react swiftly to the chatter – specifically the negative chatter – that is so easy to post and even easier to go viral in 2011 and beyond. It’s a trend that will continue to grow and customers/prospects gain more powerful customer relation options thanks to the the web. more

Once upon a time, orange and black were the prevailing colors of October. Today, of course, thanks to Breast Cancer Awareness Month, pink is also the hue of the moment.

PartySuppliesDelivered.com—a new party supply website that went live last month—is donating six percent of its total sale of pink ribbon party favors, bracelets, hats, decor and the like to the Barbara Ann Karmanos Cancer Institute in Detroit.

The site didn’t use social media to promote the pink donations. “We’re so new that we don’t really have an existing Facebook or Twitter presence yet,” says Ian MacDonald, vice president, ecommerce and marketing, who was leery of having their first foray into social seem opportunistic. “It just seemed odd.”

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Oh, man, the Jeter Filter has been invented! If you’re a hater and you use Google Chrome, the app will remove Derek Jeter from the World Wide Web.

This could be one of the funniest things I’ve seen in a long time. And at the same time, this could be one of the scariest. Picture you’re a marketer and Derek Jeter is your spokesperson. Your message is not going to make it to the Jeter haters. And if you’re someone like Ford Motor Company, whose brand loyalty extends beyond Yankees Universe (as they call it), an audience of Ford fans is going to miss your campaign. more

I’m sure Jay Weintraub didn’t envision such a turnout when he came up with the idea to host the first-ever tradeshow for flash sale sellers and technology platforms. Heck, he planned for 300 attendees to be at the Daily Deal Summit in New York. Weintraub instead yesterday had a party of about 500.

Daily Deals are kind of a big deal. Social sellers, coupon code aggregaters, deal-providers and local couponers all had a story to tell. To sum everything up, they educated each other on the benefits of new technologies that allow merchants to offer up the most relevant deals at the right time, in the right place and to the right customers.

It’s too bad traditional merchants weren’t there to listen. more

I recently read an article in Business Week on content farms, the companies that provide a bare minimum of information on a subject to rank high in Google’s organic search. They then sell ads based on traffic to their sites, mainly behavioral targeted ads. The article focused on a firm called Demand Media and here is the piece.

The article, in my mind, underscores the ever-growing importance of organic search (which, for the record, my firm Johnson Direct does) and the value of great content versus basic, lower quality content. In fairness, there is a place for both, however, due to the backlash that Google heard about content farms and how it was ranking their content, it changed its algorithm to give these farmers a much lower and thus, more ineffective web presence via organic search.

Prior to the change and after reading the article, I was both amused and annoyed at the business model. It did make me pause and more

Hello faithful BFMB Readers

I am elated to tell you that after 4 months of hard work it’s over, and that we’ve completed the world’s largest experiential marketing study. It’s complimentary! Over the course of this upcoming year, I will be working with Chief marketer to have exclusive stories and various other things for their readers. Chief Marketer is THE SOURCE for experiential marketing.

Please visit the EMF and get your complimentary copy. I wanted to share this with everyone. We’ve got big plans with Chief marketer as it’s the best publication and on-line marketing resource - so I will be working with them to bring you all the great research.