the Web Chef's e-Bytes

Web Tidbits - MMA Announces New Ad Guidelines

The Mobile Marketing Association (MMA) has released their new Mobile Advertising Guidelines (PDF).  The 14 page Guidelines include standards for SMS and MMS ads. 

Web Tidbits - Advertising & Online Video

Ad Lab posted a link to AdSlogans and their advertising slogan hall of fame.  The top slogans were analyzed to see what characteristics made them work including "5 words; new brand mention; declarative; grammatically complete; contain alliteration, metaphor or rhyme".

Financial Times reports on the top 5 online video campaigns of 2007 (ranked by GoViral).   

I've embedded my favorite "WillitBlend".

Financial Times also had an interesting article discussing how online video is converging with television.  In the article they referenced a few video sites that might be of interest.  Unfortunately they don't provided links to the sites, something that I thought diministhed the online value of their story.  Among the sites referenced are the following:

• PurePlays - YouTube, VideoEgg, DailyMotion, Revver, Vimeo
• Video Verticals - FunnyorDie, DanceJam (coming soon), Jaman (world video)
• Media Companies - Hulu, Crackle, SyncTV
• Video Search Enginess - Dabble, Blinkx, Taboola (coming soon), Truveo, CastTv (invitation only beta)

For more on online video see my article "Lights, Camera, Action - the state of Online Video" on Wisconsin Technology Network.

Web Tidbits - Online Advertising

Online advertising continues to grow as mainstream advertisers shift their marketing budgets to where the eyes are.  The options for online advertisers continue to grow with video ads, banner ads, in-text ads, out of banner ads, interstitials, sponsorships, PDF ads, etc all being part of the available options.

According to statistics from the Newspaper Association of America reported in a recent Business Week article, newspaper advertising continued to decline last year to $46.6 billion, a decrease of 1.7%.  The article also quoted eMarketer statistics that showed online advertising grew 27% to $19.6 billion. 

The same article focused on one of the growing areas for online advertising - in text ads.  These ads are found within the editorial content and are triggered off a highlighted keyword that when rolled over generates a related ad.  One of the firms discussed in the article that delivers these ads was Vibrant Media, "the in-text advertising leader" and an Inc. 500 firm in the last two years. Vibrant Media provides publishers with up to three ads per article and has set up technology to try and avoid ad placement in negative stories according to Business Week.

Meanwhile Inc. Magazine reviewed some of the ways that publishers could make money from their site in a December article "Clicks for Cash".  Among the services referenced were Google AdSense, AdBrite, AuctionAds, Vizu and ValueClick. 

In other advertising developments, Adobe has announced a partnership with Yahoo!, that will allow for the placement of ads in PDFs according to published reports in CNET and other sources.  The ads will also be keyword triggered and will appear in a righthand panel of the PDFs.

Web Tidbits - Social Networks, Dell

Breaking news - Microsoft and Facebook
Microsoft has acquired 1.6% of Facebook for $240 million.  The deal values the social networking king at $15 billion, far more than the $1 billion offer that Yahoo! made for the site earlier according to CNNMoney and The New York Times.  Microsoft will be the exclusive advertising platform and will gain rights to sell adverrtising around the world.

For more on social networks see my article "The expanding world of Social Networking" at Wisconsin Technology Networks.

Dell Strategy Changes - Social Media, Retail Channel Expansion
In a continuing evolution of their business strategies Dell is learning how to listen and join the conversation with a range of web 2.0 technologies according to Michael Jarvis in a recent Business Week article.  Jarvis is a blogger who infamously had taken Dell to task in the past.

In other Dell strategy changes, Dell has expanded beyond their direct sales model overseas according to Business Week and in the U.S. signed a deal with Staples to sell select small business equipment starting November 11th according to eWeek.  This retail expansion follows their earlier agreements with Wal-Mart to sell consumer models in their stores.  

Web Tidbits - Acquisitions of Interest to Marketers

September was a busy month in the M&A (Mergers and Acquisition) space for companies of interest to e-marketers.  Among the acquisitions that were announced during the month and the value of the acquisitions were the following:

• Nokia acquires Enpocket a global leader in mobile advertising. Value - Undisclosed, private company.
• Yahoo acquires Zimbra a "leader in e-mail and collaboration software". Value - $350 million..
• Idearc (Superpages.com and Verizon Yellow Pages) acquires Switchboard.com increasing their local search reach and opportunities for local advertisers. Value - $225 million.

Web Tidbits - Mobile Marketing

Mobile Metrics
M:Metrics and AdMob have released research that finds that 65.5% of the recipients of ads delivered over the AdMob mobile network of over 2000 mobile sites delivering 1.4 billion ads found they are in the hard-to-reach 18 - 34 year old age group.  The research results include audience composition by age segment based on the network web site type - community, downloads, entertainment, news/info and portals. 

Mobile Marketing
In a related story, James Briggs, CEO of Briabe Media, points out that African American and Hispanic 18 - 34 year olds "consume far more mobile services than other groups". Among their activities are downloads, SMS, MMS and web browsing.

Web Tidbits - UGM and Viral Content (Updated)

User Generated Contest - jetBlue
In an interesting example of User Generated Marketing or Content, JetBlue created a photography contest that ran from June 5th to September 5th to launch their new real time flight tracking with Google Maps.  As part of the entry the photographs needed to be taken on a JetBlue flight and the location of the photo needed to be mapped using the real time Google Map that was available on the seatback monitor in front of them. 

The number of contest entrants (1700) exceeded their expectations.  They also reflect some very interesting images.  You can vote for your favorite at the site through September 28th.
Hat tip to AdFreak.

UPDATE
User Generated Content Research Results
McKinsey reports (registration required) on research they conducted in Germany to determine why people contribute video to video sharing sites.  The results found that 65% reported they were seeking fame, 50% reported it was fun, 41% wanted to share videos with friends, 29% wanted others to benefit from the information in their video.  In the same report

Online Viral Game - General Mills EatBetterAmerica.com Food Fight
Meanwhile halfway across the country, General Mills has launched a fun online game the Good Food Fight that allows you to select a healthy recipe, a character and start an online food fight.  I had fun with the hot dog vendor and the spaghetti recipe.
Hat tip to AdRants

Online Viral Promotion - Dylan's New Album
Getting on our plane and flying across the Atlantic we come to the Ten4 produced viral site to create pre-launch buzz for Bob Dylan's compilation of greatest hits to be released on October 1.  The site (Dylan Messaging) allows you to compose a message that is in turn displayed in a "video", along with a Dylan song and sent to a friend or friends.
Hat tip to AdverBlog

New Buzz Networks Article - Online Advertising Resurrection

I'm proud to share insights, resources and perspectives on the latest in e-business and marketing on this blog, on my website, in my monthly column on Wisconsin Technology Network, through contributions to other print and online publications and as a consultant and professional speaker.  Through these initiatives, I'm helping readers and listeners "connect the dots" surrounding this ever changing digital world, living up to the promise of my firm's name ConnectingDots and tagline "higher resolution marketing".

This posting brings the release of my latest article for the Buzz Networks column that I write for Wisconsin Technology Network.  The article "Business would be wise to note the resurrection of online Ads" covers some of the trends and expectations for the growth in online advertising over the next 4 years. 

Since writing the article, Publicis announced the acquisition of Phonevalley, a 60 person mobile marketing agency according to AdWeek. 

In keeping with the online advertising theme, here are some resources that you might want to check out:

• AdAge
• AdFreak - Adweek's cheeky blog
• AdRants
• AdScam - rants about the "big dumb agencies"
• Adverblog
• Adverlicious - online advertising archive showcases some of the latest online ads
• Advertising Lab - trends and tips on the changing world of advertising
• AdWeek

Other sites that I like include ClickZ, eMarketer, iMediaConnection, MarketingCharts, MarketingProfs, MarketingSherpa, MediaPost

Paul Gibler
the Web Chef
ConnectingDots

P.S. One of my presentation topics is on online advertising. 
I'd be happy to talk to your group about this presentation.

Give me a call at 608 255 4092!

POST # 300 - Advertising Banner Blindness

This is my 300th posting on the Web Chef's e-Bytes.  I'm proud to be able to contribute to the conversation on the trends, techniques and statistics behind the continuing growth of the digital world.

I came across an interesting posting at usability expert Jakob Nielsen's Useit.com site that discusses research findings on what he calls "banner blindness".  His research using eyetracking has found that banner ads are ignored regardless of the viewers engagement and whether they are doing "quick scanning (the most common level of engagement), partial reading or thorough reading".  As he says "users almost never look at anything that looks like an advertisement whether or not it's actually an ad",  He has a couple of interesting video clips where eyetracking of viewers on the Money.com site are showcased.   

In the review article, he states that there are 4 ways that ad content can get attention, although he doesn't necessarily advocate using them:

1. Plain text
2. Faces
3. Cleavage or other sexual body parts
4. Looking like the surrounding content

This is an itnteresting study that with wider release and acceptance by advertisers could have a significant impact for publishers, advertising agencies and ad networks. 

Watch for my article on the resurrgence of online advertising that will be released soon on Wisconsin Technology Network.

Paul Gibler
the Web Chef
ConnectingDots

P.S. If you are looking for a presenter on the latest trends in online advertising give me a call or drop me a line.

New Video Advertising Technique

YouTube announced that they are going to begin selling ads within videos.  The new semi-transparent in-video ads, not to be confused with pre- or post roll ads that are attached before and after the video clip, will be sold only on videos that are provided by their content partners.  This should give advertisers some relief that their video ads won't be attached to questionable user generated content that could negatively impact their brand's perception. 

So what do consumers think of these ads?  According to a report in The Wall Street Journal, during testing of these ads in June and July, YouTube found that 75% of consumers watched the entire ad and that clickthrough rates for the ads were 5 - 10 times higher than typical banner ads.  eMarketer reports in a recent article that research from Piper Jaffray found that only 30% of viewers would be unwilling to watch a video ad, that 30% of ad viewers checked out the advertisers web site (Online Publishers Association data) and that spending on online advertising was projected to increase to $4.3 billion by 2011 (eMarketer research). 

For more information on some of the trends in online advertising watch for my upcoming column in Buzz Networks on Wisconsin Technology Network. 

To find out more about the advertising opportunities on YouTube submit your interest through their advertising form. 

Here's a sample video clip from YouTube that shows how these ads will work.