I was going to post this yesterday.  But after downloading IE7 and realizing that my last template looked horrible in that browser, I spent the better part of last night trying to fix the style sheet.  You can see by the new template, that this is still a work in progress ;).  I guess I’m not alone in the “My site looks horrible in IE7” category today, huh?! 

The What Have I Been Reading Reading List:

• Avinash Kauhik’s Emetrics Summit Review:  I love when people post presentations from conferences especially when I am unable to attend. In this round-up post, Avinash gives the Who, What, Where and Why of why these three presentations are worth a read: Quantifying the Corporate Value of the Website (PDF), Web Analytics: The World Bank Experience(PDF), Click Fraud Myths and Truths (PDF)
• And since we are on the topic of Analytics check out: Statistics Open Learning Initiative at Carnegie-Mellon University Aka: Statistics for Analysts - the course you keep meaning to take. Via: Luna Metrics Blog
• Building a Website for Analytics: “Many companies don’t think about measurement when building a site, and they get stuck trying to retrofit it later”.

The I Also Glanced Over Reading List:

• Almost All Affluent Working Women Turning to the Internet
• How to Get Into News Search Engines
• Oilman’s SEO Toolbox
• Adotas’ Young Men Survey

“Every time I thought I’d got it made / It seemed the taste was not so sweet” – Changes – David Bowie

Posted by: Natasha “That Girl From Marketing” Robinson

AKA: Why, in spite of my better judgement, I will use the term Social Media Optimization in every post for the next month…

What is Social Media Optimization(SMO)? Well it is the new term dujour in online marketing. When I read the first article mentioning SMO a month or so ago, I thought “Cool, I like the concept”. Then I began seeing it everywhere.

And now I cringe when I read about SMO…everywhere! I cringe because here we go again, with yet another acronym with a nebulous definition in the online marketing industry. I cringe because I know it will be a topic of a panel at whatever is the next Online Marketing Conference. I cringe because I will be forced to read it everywhere. And, I cringe because of all the bandwagoneers who rush to use the term because it is the term dujour. And I especially cringe because… well if ya can’t beat ‘em….

The Online Marketing industry especially Search Engine Marketers suffer from Next Big Thing Syndrome. How many times have we read: “(insert tool, technology or new marketing term) is the Next Big Thing.” I believe it was not that long ago that I read that RSS was the Next Big Thing and Blogs were the Next Big Thing and Social Networks are the next Big Thing and SEOPR and Linkbaiting and so forth and so on.

But here’s my issue: while I have read articles on what Social Media Optimization is, and why you should implement social media optimization, I have yet to read an article on how a company allocates budget to include Social Media Optimization in their next campaign. Anyone? And don’t even get me started on the question that we all know a client will eventually ask, “So how many visitors do I get for that?”

And on that , I’ll leave you to ponder a quote from the article: Viral Smoke n’ Mirrors: Comparing Stunts vs. Buzz in a Viral Marketing Campaign:

“Many clients and agencies are missing the point – mistaking the means for the ends. The means are a well thought-out marketing program that might include a viral component. The end is the ever-elusive and often ill-defined buzz. Good viral campaigns make you stop and look. They sneak up on you. You have an ‘aha’ moment of realization. Stunts make you look, but you quickly forget. Viral campaigns make you wonder who’s behind them. Stunts often have nothing at all to do with the company paying for them. Smart viral campaigns take advantage of the intimate connection between a brand and the community.”

The What Have I Been Reading Reading List:

• Should B2B Marketers blog? - “Of the marketers who told us that they use these emerging tactics today, over 70% said they planned to boost their spending on social computing tactics during the next 12 months. Successful blogs have two interconnected ingredients, a community that finds reading the blog -– and contributing to it — valuable. From our own experience at Forrester, blogs are a bit like children –- they demand constant attention and nurturing to grow up properly –- so deciding to initiate a blog is not a decision taken lightly. Questions marketers should answer are: What is the purpose of the blog? Who is the audience? Will the blog encourage participation? And, who should own the blog’s content?” See also: These lists of Corporate Blogs: Fortune 500 Business Blogging Wiki, A List of Business Blogs & Corporate Blogs in Europe
• Benchmark Study on the Internet’s Influence on Consumer Moviegoing: “The study found that these moviegoers recall television advertising, trailers and word-of-mouth as the most important sources of what MarketCast called “first awareness”–essentially the first introduction of a movie to a potential consumer. However, in between first awareness and the point of sale–during the critical period in which consumers learn more about movies, winnow their choices, and look up showtimes and theater locations–the Internet’s influence is vast. MarketCast found that 49% of moviegoers surveyed actively research a movie after first hearing about it; and of these, seven in ten go the Internet. “(via Marketing Pilgrim). See also: Google’s Treasure Trove of Industry Market Research

The I Also Glanced Over Reading list:

• Adidas Opens Second Life Store
• If You Want Visitors To Come Back, Send Them Away
• Social Networking Can Work For Businesses - (via media 2.0 blog)
• A look inside the Monitor110 research suite
• Game publishers need to better understand how to exploit market research

“In the real world, these just people with ideas/ they just like me and you /when the smoke and cameras dissappear”. Hip Hop - Dead Prez

Posted by: Natasha “That Girl From Marketing” Robinson