Howdy from the floor of Future of Online Advertising. Here’s the lowdown on what’s going down at the show.

Keynote:
Greg Stuart from the IAB and author of "What Sticks".

Summary: His talk was primarily based on the large (and getting
dated?) IAB cross media study. Targeted at the traditional marketer and
how to make online an effective part of your media mix.  Big on
measurement.

1. 1.1 million consumers surveyed and participation by many of the
   largest brands in North America (P&G, Ford, McDonalds, Kraft,
   J&J, etc. etc.)
2. $112 billion of the $295 billion spent on advertising is wasted
3. Broke measuring campaigns into three areas: Motivation, Messaging and Media
4. 36% of them failed on Motivation, 31% failed on Messaging, and 86% were seriously sub-optimal in their use of media
5. Went through the classic fragmentation of media. Interesting in that he pulled out Blackberry and Home Networked Game Consoles (50 Million)
6. Most firms and agencies are judging ads by looking at them. Not testing them. And when tested, they generally fail.
7. Online ads: must pass the 2 second test. You have to get the
   brand, product, message and impact in under 2 seconds (and you don’t
   know what 2 seconds of an animated ad they are seeing)

Second Speaker:
Future of Search Marketing, Ron Belanger, Yahoo

Summary: Good presentation but a strong predisposition that consumer
2.0’ers (whoever they are) are primarily Yahoo search users. So to
reach them, use Search engine marketing tactics. That said, Ron
Belanger made some great points. Like the fact that users do NOT
remember URLs. Reach them where they are going (search sites).

• Over 50% of users surf the web while watching TV
• Majority of online consumers are passionate about brands, only 5% are writing badly about them
• Search is on the rise. The more savvy a user gets online, the more they use search. It’s not for those that can’t find it.
• One of the top search terms on Yahoo is Google and vica versa
• Users do NOT remember custom URLs. They use search to find products and brands.
• 20% don’t remember URLs at all. 52% don’t remember URLs very well. 27% sometimes remember. 1% always remember.
• Search users are more likely to consider different brands before purchasing (duh)

Wrapup

Overall, It’s very strong on the selling online media as a
viable alternative to traditional marketers so far. I expect we will see the
2-5% of media is spent online, but users are spending 20% plus of their
time any moment now.

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