Spinfield: Web marketing trends today, tomorrow, and beyond…

I attended the Cleveland AMA (American Marketing Association) monthly networking event to listen to Ted Souder, Head of Sales, Midwest Travel at Google, Inc. present “Ten Best Practices Shaping the Future of Marketing.” Here are his top ten:

1. Data, not opinion: The new focus is on the math and science of marketing. It is no longer enough to say, “in our opinion…” Use instead, “the data suggests…” It’s more quantifiable.
2. Support online what is happening offline: Be ready to close the loop! For example, if you’re doing a radio spot, TV ad, etc. always have information online to back it up. You’re leaving sales on the table if you don’t! Let’s say the searcher goes online to find you and your offer and you’re not there – they will surely click on to your competitor.
3. Don’t build it and hope they will come: Atomize and distribute. Especially with video. You have to drive traffic to your video by announcing it or posting snippets via other channels such as blogs, your Web site, etc.
4. Small niche sites are just as important as large portals: We have always known the Internet levels the playing field and it is being recognized more and more that it is not necessary to be everywhere, just where you are supposed to be. As clutter goes down, real engagement begins.
5. Make video the center piece: Online video is the new TV. Here’s an interesting fact - 10 hours of video is uploaded to YouTube every hour. Think about it. Where do most people spend a majority of their day? In front of the computer of course.
6. It’s time to take social media seriously: It’s not just a “tween” fad anymore. Your competitors are probably already there and you should be too.
7. The wisdom of crowds: Actually a book written by James Surowiecki, that explains how the collective many are smarter than the few.
8. Be there in the moment of relevance: Target market to your audience. Ted used the example of when it’s 20 degrees in Cleveland – run ads for travel to Hawaii.
9. Computing Cloud: The computing cloud was a new one to me. It is estimated that 1 billion users will be using mobile devices by 2011. How and where will all the information like your pictures, video, music, files etc. be stored? In a cloud! No not really a cloud but, on a large server as opposed to your hard drive - sort of like e-mail now.
10. You’re always on in a global community: Ted said that it is even possible to achieve self-funded search. Start small, watch it grow and pay for itself.

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