Traditional marketers....especially those with a 'Brand' focus are still trying to make the internet like TV, Radio, Newspapers, Magazines or any of the other old fashioned interruption based mass media. Common sense and all the data continue to support the simple fact that the Internet is different. Better, but different.What's wrong with the Internet is that so many marketers are still trying to force old media 'advertising' onto what is clearly not old media.
There was a great article in the Wall Street Journal Thursday talking about the gap in spending on display advertising vs. search marketing. Search advertising is grown to 42% of all online ad spending. Display ads are flat at 21% according to eMarketer.
Of course. THE INTERNET ISN'T A MAGAZINE!
As such, Magazine tactics generally don't work. They actually don't work in magazines either for that matter but in the olden days that's all there was.
The job of the marketer today is to listen. Your customers will summon you when they have an issue. It's called searching. They make the search, you make sure you have positioned yourself to be there when the right combination of keywords come together. Just like real marketing....prospect expresses a need and you solve that need.
This is why business blogging is so powerful for both large corporate enterprises and small business alike. Blog writing software is one of the best tools for organic search which is where about 80% of all the clicks on a search engine results page (serp) happens. If a marketer has identified keywords they are getting results on through PPC, they should also consider aiming their Corporate Blogging efforts at those terms as well.
