Wayne Wall, CEO of Hopkinton, Mass.-based on-demand video software provider Flimp Media, discusses video and its impact on the marketing, especially mobile devices and email marketing to those devices. I found it telling that visitors to pages with video spent approximately 1.5 minutes on page compared to 8 to 10 seconds on pages without. This begs the question, ‘Is it time to start embedding video in marketing email?’

Read the entire print article here.

View the article on the Target Marketing site, here.

Jeremy Goldkorn founded the popular China media website Danwei.org, and acts as editor and publisher. The site has tracked the changes in China’s media and Internet on a daily basis since 2003 and also produces video interviews with people in culture and the media in China. Here, in this piece in fastcompany.com magazine, he outlines the copykat sites that have sprung up in China.
Read the print article here.

57% of online retailers plan to spend more on e-commerce technology in 2010, including 49% whose investment priorities cover new or upgraded e-commerce technology platforms, Forrester Research Inc. says in the study, “2010 U.S. Online Retail Technology Investment Outlook.” The report is based on a survey of 291 online retailers in the fourth quarter of 2009. Other popular areas of technology investment this year include content management tools, multichannel order management integration, system security and mobile commerce. Among the goals underlying many investment plans this year are improved marketing capabilities, including a strong focus on social marketing as well as search and other forms of online marketing, the study says. See the summary report here.

Ralph Tegtmeier, co-founder and principal of fantomaster.com: “We have been in the Internet business since 1999. You do tend to get a bit jaded after all that time spent in pursuing countless fads, the dotcom bubble, the incessant hype over IT, and lots more. The Twitter experience, however, has effectively managed to revert all of this – not the least because it’s so eminently profitable if you do it right.

So, what’s involved in ‘doing it right’? Ralph outlines in this article the tact to take when automating your twitter campaign. The biggest challenge is figuring out how to engage followers. He counters the contention that “Twitter is an utter waste of time…you can’t make any money with Twitter”

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Bill Siwicki, editor of Mobile Commerce Report, put together an interesting piece for Intenet Retailer Magazine discussing the pros and cons of mobile sites and mobile apps. He contrasts sites (which have a large reach) with apps (which provide a better user experience). In addition to the clearing up some of the confusion regarding the 2 marketing channels, he discusses why one would go in one direction or the other. For example, an app would potentially have access to the address on someone’s smartphone, where a site would not. Conversely, a site would be available to far more users without the overhead of having to download and install an app.

Read article on Internet Retailer here

Read print article here

Keith Peterson, the senior vice president of the data division of Experian Marketing Services writes this piece for Target Marketing outlining strategies for reactivating stagnant customers. This can be some of the most rewarding ‘cold-calling’ one can do. These folks have bought from you before and just need a little nudge to bring them back into the fold. Today, this nudge can take many different forms (perhaps more than one), given the new social media explosion.

Read the print article here

Access the TM article online here

Dion Hinchcliffe is an internationally-recognized business strategist and enterprise architect who has worked for 20 years to bring innovative solutions to clients in the Global 2000, federal government, and Internet startup community. He tackles the question “What is Web 2.0?” in this article on AIIM.org. AIIM was founded in 1943 as the National Microfilm Association and later became the Association for Information and Image Management.

For some time I had assumed that web 2.0 was a technology, like xhtml or perhaps a wider browser layout. As Dion describes in this article, it is really more about a collaborative, distributive approach to the handling of data. If you’re not on board, Web 2.0′s time is here and now.

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See the online version here

John goes indepth into the questions that we should be asking about social media. Is this something my company should be doing? Is there a payoff? What are the pitfalls? Do you know what the three R’s of social media are?

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Elaine Chen of FatWire Software discusses the industry trend toward WEM (web experience management). Formerly called WCM (web content management), our sites should be able to target, deliver dynamic content, track results and allow users to participate in the process. These are the goals that she laid out in this 2009 article. How are we doing so far?

Read full article online here

or see the print article here

Retailers are moving toward engaging consumers through social marketing, though new-age techniques like blogs and social networks still take a back seat to search and e-mail marketing, according to a study from Forrester Research Inc., “Top US eCommerce and Online Retail Predictions for 2008.”

At the same time, when they set their priorities for 2008, most retailers focused on improving how they engage consumers online by upgrading the usability, usefulness and enjoyableness of the online experience, according to a second Forrester report, “Customer Experience Spending Intensifies in 2008.” Companies are looking beyond the traditional web browsing experience and concentrating on rich Internet applications, cross-channel interactions and mobile commerce. As a result, most companies plan to boost spending this year on tools that can improve the online customer experience, including web analytics and customer satisfaction surveys, Forrester says.

Read more here