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Welcome!
This is my occasional coverage of interesting developments in online marketing. Please feel free to comment and contribute by emailing me at riggs@riggs.com.
Trends in Internet Activities
Among the activities that measured the greatest increases from 2000 to 2003: information gathering about products and services; research for work or school; obtaining information on local amusements and activities; and exploring new and different sites.
| Internet Activities Performed Often or Very Often | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Activity | Dec. 2003 | Dec. 2000 | Change |
| Gather information about products and services | 41% | 25% | +16 |
| Research for work or school | 45% | 37% | +8 |
| Explore new and different sites | 32% | 24% | +8 |
| Obtain information on local amusements and activities | 19% | 11% | +8 |
| Source: Harris Interactive | |||
"Our general reaction to this research is that people are finding different uses for the Internet, other than e-mail," said Humphrey Taylor, chairman of the Harris Poll, Harris Interactive.
Source: "E-mail, VoIP Span Net Activities List" www.clickz.com/stats/big_picture/applications/article.php/3326121
The Dispatching of a time-honored Courier
"History, by the way, from Charlemagne to Hitler, shows that government edicts in favor of standardized typefaces are often one of the first steps in creating an empire: Is there something that the State Department isn't telling us?" An interesting retrospective on the Courier font coming out of a recent State Department edict replacing the very familiar Courier New 12, whose origins are tied to the development of IBM Selectric typewriters, with Times Roman 14 as the official font for all State Department documents.
Change of Font.StateDept.pdf
Change of Font.StateDept.pdf
Organic Listing Search Engine SEO Tips
...What are organic listings anyway, where did this name come from? As pay per click became more relevant and started to find its way on most of the major search results page it became clear that paid listings were here to stay. The listings which are not paid are called organic listings, On most major search engines a common search will return advertisements as well as organic listings. As internet advertising began to split and ideals about how to market became less clear, the name for returning in the normal search engine results was tagged organic listing.
If people thought their searches returned nothing but a bunch of advertisements, they would stop searching. For that reason these organic listings are pure, or at least the search engines want us to believe they are pure. Google has been praised heavily for returning what many have deemed the most relevant search results while keeping their revenue stream clearly isolated from the organic listing results.
| There are many stages to achieving organic listings.
|
http://www.seobook.com/: a new chapter every day..
Is Microsoft Marketing going generic?
While at Microsoft a few years ago Alec Saunders was involved in the launch of DOS 6 and Windows 95 as well as some ancillary products. Today he writes from the perspective of an ex-employee working outside Microsoft. Have a look at his perspective on why WinXP upgrades are not happening as successfully as the results from earlier O/S launches.
The popcorn-popper process
There are four key elements in the popcorn-popper process.
- Leverage the commodity value of your product or service. Find ways to propagate that virally (no paying for leverage!) (See the Panda case study reported on below.)
- Become valuable as an information source concerning the issues in your field. Great example is the case study here.
- Develop and operate the "popcorn popper" sales funnel to segment and develop reach among your leads. The segmentation part is particularly important so you handle each type of customer most efficiently.
- Implement your channel (distribution, partnerships).
Through all this process I would work on product marketing (branding, packaging, naming, tactical positioning) to respond to specific opportunities.
FUD Marketing: it's really effective to develop an effective FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) factor to get the attention of your prospects. This is especially true in IT, which operates on the principle of risk management.
Riggs
Marketing Expertise Site Publishes Panda Case Study 
Marketing Sherpa selects campaign story for yearly compilation
Marina Del Rey, 3 March 2004: A major know-how site has honored Riggs Eckelberry's Panda case study in its 2004 roundup.
The respected Marketing Sherpa, publisher of practical know-how and case studies published weekly to an audience of 147,000 marketing, advertising and PR pros, selected the Panda study for its yearbook, "Marketing Wisdom for 2004 - 99 Marketers Share Real-Life Tips". This complimentary publication can be downloaded at the Marketing Sherpa site or here.
The Panda story is Case Study #4, Part I, "Real-Life Campaign Stories".
Lorem Ipsum Generator - using 16th century technology today...
Every wonder the history behind the "Lorem Ipsum......" that you always see as a place holder when laying out print media. With the Lorem Ipsum Generator you can not only learn about the background that takes you back to its origins with 16th century typesetters but also experience an engine for generating such text for your next marketing communications project where you want to focus on the layout without the distraction of content.
You've gotta have a hook: owning the issue
As we always say, it's not enough to promote, you have to own the issue and give people useful info about it.
This week's tip is contributed by Bruce Freeman, president of ProLine Communications, a marketing and public relations firm. Freeman is also an adjunct professor of marketing and public relations at Kean University in Union, New Jersey, and he hosts the "Be Your Own Boss" segment of New Jersey Business on News12 New Jersey.
There are other press opportunities out there besides product reviews.
We recently initiated a web site at Aladdin Systems called www.spamcontroversy.com. The site monitors spam laws and legislation across the USA. We promoted it at ShowStoppers COMDEX and CES by handing out information cards.
It is a worthwhile service to editors and consumers -- and it brings visitors to the Aladdin Systems web site, resulting in increased press and business for its new product, SpamCatcher.
From This week's ShowStoppers PR Tips: Subscribe/Unsubscribe
Pew Report on Content Creation Online
What is Pew? From their website Mission statement: "The Pew Internet & American Life Project will create and fund original, academic-quality research that explores the impact of the Internet on children, families, communities, the work place, schools, health care and civic/political life. The Project aims to be an authoritative source for timely information on the Internet's growth and societal impact, through research that is scrupulously impartial. "
At the end of February, 2004 they released these statistics covering online content creation during the spring of 2003. Their summary:
44% of Internet users have created content for the online world through building or posting to Web sites, creating blogs, and sharing files
In a national phone survey between March 12 and May 20, 2003, the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that more than 53 million American adults have used the Internet to publish their thoughts, respond to others, post pictures, share files and otherwise contribute to the explosion of content available online. Some 44% of the nation?s adult Internet users (those 18 and over) have done at least one of the following:
21% of Internet users say they have posted photographs to Web sites.
20% say they have allowed others to download music or video files from their computers.
17% have posted written material on Web sites.
13% maintain their own Web sites.
10% have posted comments to an online newsgroup. A small fraction of them have posted files to a newsgroup such as video, audio, or photo files.
8% have contributed material to Web sites run by their businesses.
7% have contributed material to Web sites run by organizations to which they belong such as church or professional groups.
7% have Web cams running on their computers that allow other Internet users to see live pictures of them and their surroundings.
6% have posted artwork on Web sites.
5% have contributed audio files to Web sites.
4% have contributed material to Web sites created for their families.
3% have contributed video files to Web sites.
2% maintain Web diaries or Web blogs, according to respondents to this phone survey.
In other phone surveys prior to this one, and one more recently fielded in early 2004, we have heard that between 2% and 7% of adult Internet users have created diaries or blogs. In this survey we found that 11% of Internet users have read the blogs or diaries of other Internet users. About a third of these blog visitors have posted material to the blog.
Most of those who do contribute material are not constantly updating or freshening content. Rather, they occasionally add to the material they have posted, created, or shared. For instance, more than two thirds of those who have their own Web sites add new content only every few weeks or less often than that. There is a similar story related to the small proportion of Americans who have blogs.
The most eager and productive content creators break into three distinct groups:
Power creators are the Internet users who are most enthusiastic about content-creating activities. They are young ? their average age is 25 ? and they are more likely than other kinds of creators do things like use instant messaging, play games, and download music. And they are the most likely group to be blogging.
Older creators have an average age of 58 and are experienced Internet users. They are highly educated, like sharing pictures, and are the most likely of the creator groups to have built their own Web sites. They are also the most likely to have used the Internet for genealogical research.
Content omnivores are among the heaviest overall users of the Internet. Most are employed. Most log on frequently and spend considerable time online doing a variety of activities. They are likely to have broadband connections at home. The average age of this group is 40.
From an original post by Jim Courtney to the TechTransform BusinessBlog.
At the end of February, 2004 they released these statistics covering online content creation during the spring of 2003. Their summary:
44% of Internet users have created content for the online world through building or posting to Web sites, creating blogs, and sharing files
In a national phone survey between March 12 and May 20, 2003, the Pew Internet & American Life Project found that more than 53 million American adults have used the Internet to publish their thoughts, respond to others, post pictures, share files and otherwise contribute to the explosion of content available online. Some 44% of the nation?s adult Internet users (those 18 and over) have done at least one of the following:
In other phone surveys prior to this one, and one more recently fielded in early 2004, we have heard that between 2% and 7% of adult Internet users have created diaries or blogs. In this survey we found that 11% of Internet users have read the blogs or diaries of other Internet users. About a third of these blog visitors have posted material to the blog.
Most of those who do contribute material are not constantly updating or freshening content. Rather, they occasionally add to the material they have posted, created, or shared. For instance, more than two thirds of those who have their own Web sites add new content only every few weeks or less often than that. There is a similar story related to the small proportion of Americans who have blogs.
The most eager and productive content creators break into three distinct groups:
From an original post by Jim Courtney to the TechTransform BusinessBlog.
Microsoft Chats With Investors On The Server Market
Last Friday (2/27) Microsoft’s General Manager of Platform Strategy Martin Taylor hosted a call with investors to discuss the company’s server segment. The call largely focused on the company’s server strategy and to dispel some myths on Open Source, more specifically Linux. Mr. Taylor differentiated the server and the desktop markets. On the server side, he estimates that Microsoft’s market share to be approximately 55%, while the remainder of the market is evenly split among Novell, UNIX and Linux. Microsoft believes that growth in Linux is coming from a few different areas: Unix migration; on Edge server networks, high-performance computing grid types of environments, and in Web hosting environments. On the desktop, Microsoft estimates that Linux penetration is approximately 1.5%, and much of the share gains are at the cost of Unix workstations. Although the Linux operating system is available to users at no cost, he shed a little light on total cost of ownership (TCO) between the two platforms. A study that the company conducted with independent IT research vendor Giga revealed the TCO of a Windows “stack” had a 22 – 25% cost advantage over a comparable Linux “stack”. In terms of reliability and security, Mr. Taylor indicated that Linux is not necessarily a more secure platform. Without going into specifics, he indicated that Linux has its fair share of vulnerabilities and may have issues with patch distribution. The company is placing meaningful effort to educate customers in order to put Linux on an even playing field. (BR)
Marketing Renaissance ROI Calculator
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Web Digest Sales Lead Generation - Special Focus Issue.htm
Marketing Renaissance - Direct Response Marketing Solutions That Sell
Web Digest Sales Lead Generation - Special Focus Issue.htm
