Rubel's Pollute The Web Post Offers Valuable Marketing Tips

Last week Steve Rubel posted on his Micro Persuasion blog An All Too Convenient Truth:  Many Marketers Pollute The Web and at first I thought it was self-serving since he is in the PR business, however it provides a framework for wanna be online marketers.  The only part of the post that I take umbrage with are the remarks on banner advertising, but even that section provides a good warning.  You can read the post yourself for the details, but here's what I think you online marketers should take away from the post.

1. Banner Ads - Click through rates on average are abysmal, but they've always been like that.  However, I've seen marvelous ones for highly targeted and relevant ads (1% which is still low, but then you figure out if it meets allowable cost goals, etc).  Banner ads suffer the same types of problems that all forms of marketing does - a vast majority of the impressions bought yield little but unlike TV, print, and even direct mail we can measure directly how many people saw the ads, clicked on it, interacted with it, and how many people took direct action.  To me the much maligned banner ad suffers from too much analysis - we know exactly what works and doesn't while something like print we are left guessing or running survey samples to guesstimate its effectiveness.  Why is Online Advertising Held to A Higher Standard?  Because we can measure it.
2. Spam, Splogs, Click Fraud - Steve is right all of these tactics are total wastes of time and you should avoid associating yourself with them.  Sure, you might get the occasional sale from little or no marketing dollars but in the end you are eroding everyone's ability to market online.
3. Social Networking/Social Media Optimization - All online marketers need to have this at their disposal.  Whether you are someone like me that believes that for acquisition marketing the results are less than stellar and that social networking is really in the CRM space or someone that believe deeply in it, you need to monitor what's being said, encourage followers by giving them tools and widgets to promote your product, and generally embrace what is happening in this space otherwise you'll be left out.
4. Open Source Marketing  - Again Steve's post was a little self-serving but this section was very useful so I'll quote the most important part of it "This means companies and consumers need to partner toward shared outcomes."  Instead of constantly controlling the message online we should take a little part of the Ron Paul play book and turn our supporters into evangelists.  Give them access to marketing for you online by providing a framework that allows them to promote your goals.  Sure some of it might not be exactly what you are looking for, but as a marketing professional you really are only in place to hit your annual objectives not to make pretty pictures.

Great article.  It should be posted  by your desk.

PardonMyFrench,

Eric