The quantitative is out of the way, so let’s take a look at the qualitative. The question, simply, was this: Want to add your $.02 about any aspect of online marketing? Here’s the place to do so! Fourteen people did so. Here’s their unedited two bits plus three (though I did remove a few individuals’ names, to protect the innocent):

1. it’s legalized gambling when you play PPC 90% of the time, a crystall ball works just as good as a well-thought out sales forecast/ ROI plan it’s the future, and its the most hokey science ever known to mankind.
2. Despite there are ever increasing numbers of people knowledgeable about online marketing, it’s still such early days and things are changing so rapidly that often times it’s a matter of taking a punt and going with gut feel more than relying on past experience or the so-called experts opinions….that’s why I think it’s such an exciting field because you don’t have too many people yelling at you “I just KNOW that won’t work”….!
3. Very inefficient to buy, place, traffic and optimize campaigns.
4. Blogs, search engine PR and organic search engine optimization combined provide the best mix of non-advertising visibility online.
5. Online marketing is in vogue. It’s neat, and has the POTENTIAL to be creatively persuasive. Because it’s in vogue, and evolving, it may be falling victim to being perceived as a magic bullet for reaching demographic/lifestyle segments otherwise hard to capture. That’s partially true. Online marketing should pay heed to the fact that it’s in a thicket of many, many online choices…far more than any other medium. As such, online marketing should flank other established and effective marketing and marketing communications tactics.
6. Your questions #4 and #5 should be unanswerable to any marketing professional. Every problem has its own parameters and solutions – there is no universal ‘best/worst-bang-for-the-buck’ tactic.
7. the use of this medium, like all other marketing communication mediums, needs to follow the consumers lead
8. I feel that at least on the client side, online marketing is still limited to building a web site with adequate keywords, phrases and meta tags. It is often difficult to get a client to commit to an extended SEO budget outside the development of the site.
9. It’s all still in a growth period and practices, standards, etc. are still being worked out.
10. Viral campaigns seem to be the most effective method of getting a company’s branding and product into the public forum. The underground, below-the-radar feel many of these ads possess add to their allure, thus making them more acceptable to those who download and pass on. I compare a viral ad to a hard-to-find antique or even a VIP pass, its exclusivity gives it a value that is unmatched in modern advertising.
11. Online marketing does best when it is supported by traditional print, etc.
12. I am a HUGE believer in viral marketing… and many of the things you listed as choices in the survey can be tweaked to be part of a viral marketing campaign… so something like online coupons may not be that great… BUT an online coupon with viral components built into both the offer and the delivery mechanism can be extremely effective.
13. Great content + right offer + right time=success. Few are doing it.
14. Online marketing tends towards the over glamourous, over spectacular and style over content.

This entry was posted on Monday, July 11th, 2005 at 12:01 am and is filed under Internet Stuff, Marketing Stuff.