Business Blogs – Beyond the Hype

Posted on September 7, 2007. Filed under: Internet marketing articles |

By Peter DeLegge

“Blogs are the most important thing to online marketing since sliced bread.” “Blogs may have their place… but it’s not in direct marketing.” With such disparate views, whom do you believe? The blog consultants? Or established “old school” marketing mavens?

Barraged with hype, marketers can have a tough time deciding whether blogs should be part of their arsenal. Listen to the blog consultants? But who profits from the blog phenomenon? Are we talking “opportunistic agenda” or “objective perspective”?

How about the marketing experts? Is it fair to say that blogging doesn’t belong in a direct or business-to-business marketing program? Why do so many veterans bristle at the idea of blogs? Is it simply because of imagined shortcomings? Or do blogs stump an “old school” sensibility that seeks a precedent for comparison? 

A decade ago, with the dawning of the commercial web, marketers faced a similar dilemma. One faction wrote the web off as negligible, while another took to the barricades, waving the web banner and proclaiming the demise of other channels. As we learned, new vehicles do not necessarily replace old ones — in fact, they may even supplement them.

“Okay,” you say, “history is well and good. But what happens in the next senior-management meeting when the CEO asks, ‘Does blogging belong in our marketing communications program?’ What do I tell him?”

First, you can tell him blogs are not an effective direct marketing tool. I doubt they ever will be. Blogging doesn’t allow you to precisely target audiences or permit any discernable control over who sees your message. However…

Blogs have already proven useful in publicity campaigns, generating word-of-mouth and, in some cases, media attention. CPG marketers have made the most effective use of commercial blogs, with highly imaginative efforts attracting throngs of consumers. There’s no question these blogs have affected consumer bonding with brands.

Blogs can also play an important role in business-to-business marketing. Management gurus, public speakers and prominent business leaders can wield some mean business-to-business blogs. Tom Peters, for one, has a very successful blog. For Peters’ fans, this is a godsend — access to Peter’s daily thought process. Of course, the more people who clamor to glean Peters’ next idea, the more likely his next seminar will sell out and his next tome will fly off the bookshelves.  

Are blogs right for every company or brand? No.

Are bloggers, and especially blog consultants, over-hyping blogs? Absolutely.  

The first group is merely excited about technology. The second benefits from getting businesspeople to turn off their logic and open their pocket books. The unfortunate backlash — wholesale discrediting of blogs by critics who have either never used them effectively or never used them altogether.

A brave new nirvana? Or just a passing fad? The importance of blogging shouldn’t be overstated or ignored. (Though, currently, the most interesting aspect of blogs is social, not commercial.) Blogs are unique. They aren’t direct mail, telemarketing, direct response TV, e-commerce or e-mail marketing … and that’s fine. Defining what they aren’t doesn’t diminish their potential in the hands of a smart marketer.

The Current State of Business-to-Business E-commerce

Posted on September 7, 2007. Filed under: Internet marketing articles |

by Peter De Legge

With all the attention Amazon.com and other consumer Web sites receive, one would think the big money is in business-to-consumer e-commerce. The real story is that business-to-business e-commerce is a much larger market. Forrester research estimates that b-to-b e-commerce for 1998 was $43 billion, or more than five times b-to-c. What’s more, Forrester projects that b-to-b e-commerce will reach $1.3 trillion by 2003. The Aberdeen Group estimates actual b-to-b commerce at ten to twenty times that of b-to-c commerce. A survey by Cahner’s Publishing found that “61% of manufacturing professionals have made a purchase as a result of seeing a product or service on the Internet.” Their 1998  Internet-influenced purchasing increased 13% from the prior year. It’s very clear that the Internet will not soon be an important part of business-to-business marketing, it already is.

Still, many business sectors have yet to embrace e-commerce. Experts are now estimating the cost of putting together a serious, yet status quo, e-commerce Web site at around $1 million. A cutting edge site is much more costly. Clearly, this figure has kept many businesses from moving their Web efforts from the realm of brochureware to become a more serious part of their business.

The potential of b-to-b e-commerce to cut costs in the supply chain is significant — in some cases, e-commerce has the potential to  eliminate the need for certain channel members completely. E-commerce even allows some manufacturers of consumer products who have traditionally sold to retailers to sell directly to consumers, but this, of course, can greatly upset retailers and others in the value chain. A recent memo from Home Depot to its retail goods suppliers warned them that if they sell their goods directly on the Internet, Home Depot will stop doing business with them — clearly illustrating some of the temptation and dangers of e-commerce for manufacturers who currently sell to retailers.

Another strong reason why business-to-business e-commerce is certain to grow is its ability to save money for both the buyer and the seller. According to Giga Information Group, by 2002,  e-commerce will save businesses $1.25 billion a year (companies saved approximately $17.6 billion in 1998; US companies saved about $15.2 billion).

But the real killer for companies not embracing e-commerce may be time. Companies who are late to embrace e-commerce may be ruined by e-commerce savvy competitors. The time it takes to develop and implement e-commerce systems can be lengthy. A recent example of the consequences of being too late comes from a Fortune 100 manufacturer of consumer electronics. Recently, the manufacturer told its suppliers that if they do not presently have e-commerce capabilities they will soon be eliminated as suppliers. Companies without current e-commerce capabilities didn’t even get the chance to adapt — they were blindsided. Why did this manufacturer do this? Because they realized that implementing e-commerce systems is a very long and costly process that can be filled with setbacks — they knew that they would lose potential cost savings in the process.

It is certain that traditional value-added network (VAN)-based EDI (Electronic Data Interchange) will soon be replaced by Internet-based EDI. In fact, Internet-based EDI may be one of the chief factors driving b-to-b e-commerce initiatives. The cost efficiencies of replacing VAN-based EDI with Internet-based EDI is simply too attractive on too many levels to be ignored. For example, VAN based EDI is cost prohibitive for many small businesses, while Internet-based EDI is relatively inexpensive. Consequently, Internet-based EDI will be the technology that levels the playing field for many small businesses.

For many companies, it appears that the largest factors impeding the progress of b-to-b e-commerce are a lack of management commitment, high start-up costs and a lack of technology standards. It seems almost certain that competitive pressures will soon dictate that e-commerce is not simply an option but a standard part of doing business, just as the telephone, fax and e-mail have all become standards. 

So welcome to the e-commerce revolution. The overblown hype about the Internet is now clearing and the real revolution has begun. Unquestionably, every company that implements e-commerce will take risks and make mistakes. However, no mistake is worse than assuming that this revolution will not affect your industry — because it will eventually touch just about every industry in some way.

Peter De Legge is an Internet Marketing Consultant and Developer with over 10 years of Marketing/Marketing Communications experience, primarily in the business to business arena. Prior to the advent of the commercial Internet, Mr. De Legge worked mostly with print advertising, direct mail, trade shows and collateral pieces. He presently lives in Chicago and handles both business-to-business and business-to-consumer Web site development and strategy for a number of companies. To learn more about his services, visit his Web site at http://www.businessmarketing.net.

Internet Marketing Basics

Posted on September 7, 2007. Filed under: Internet marketing articles |

by Peter DeLegge

Whether you have recently been given responsibility for getting your business on the Web or to handle a pre-existing Web site, there are some general truths (at least in this consultant’s eyes) that you should strongly consider. Do not consider the Internet simply as a place to put your brochures in electronic form. Do not make the mistake of treating the Internet as if it is simply an advertising medium. The Web has more in common with the telephone than print. It is different from traditional media in many respects. Even Internet advertising requires a different approach than off-line advertising. Exploit the Web’s unique qualities to provide a richer experience for customers and prospects.   

Find out what your competitors are doing on the Web. Spend a few days checking out how your competitors are using the Web. Analyze each site. How does the site help tell the world about that company’s products or services; is it easy to use; is it enjoyable to use; does it add value to the company’s customer service; is it integrated with the company’s other marketing efforts.

Create an Internet business plan and live it. Before starting your company’s Web site project, determine measurable goals and objectives for your company’s site, establish milestones. Make them both qualitative and quantitative. This may sound obvious, but planning is one of the most neglected areas of corporate Web site management. Your Internet business strategy should be an extension of your company’s existing business strategy and well-integrated with everything your company does off-line.

Don’t be inconsistent with your off-line brand. Make sure your Web site experience is consistent with your brand image. For instance, is your brand known for superior engineering and being easy-to-use? Make sure your Web site experience is consistent. A recent study found that corporate Web site email responses are highly informal and unbranded.   

Email marketing works, but be careful. Email marketing is one of the most effective ways to stay in touch with customers and prospects online. It can also be effective as a direct-marketing device. My advice to B2B marketers, in most cases, do not rent email lists, build your own. Do not rent out your list. Never spam, under any circumstances. Let email subscribers know in advance how often you will send messages and what type of content they can expect. Make messages as targeted as possible; relevancy keeps people listening.

Be sure your Web site is integrated with your company’s other marketing activities. Don’t make the mistake some traditional companies do and create an Internet effort that is disconnected with your company’s off-line efforts. Your Web site should be connected with your company’s off-line efforts. This means more than throwing the company Web address in your ads.

Segment and target. Even without sophisticated personalization technology, the Web allows you to easily target your messages, making them more relevant to users. Find out who they are in the least intrusive way possible and then talk to them more personally. 

Use your company’s Web site to enhance customer service — especially for prospects who may be researching. The Internet allows your company to stay in touch with its customers and provide them with answers to questions they are likely to ask. Make sure your site makes it easy for your customers to find what they want and communicate with your company. A good corporate Web site helps current customers and develops new customers too. Consider real-time online help systems.

Make your site an information resource for its target markets. Becoming a trusted resource of high quality information for your customers is of tremendous value to your business, in addition, it can help win your company free press and word-of-mouth/mouse.

Do user testing. If you have the budget, do usability testing prior to launching your Web site. Bring in an expert usability group — don’t merely rely on the company that developed your site, bring in another, unrelated usability testing firm. If you cannot afford to do formal testing with a usability group, I would recommend you bring in a usability expert and afterwards, test with several of your customers.

Care about privacy. Even though most users don’t bother to read privacy policies, studies show they do care. My guess is that this will only increase over time. Make sure you have a good privacy policy and a privacy statement on your site that is easy to find and customer friendly. Build your privacy policy around your customers’ concerns. When it comes to email, never send out unsolicited email (spam), it not only damages your reputation and could get you into hot water, it also has extremely low response rates.    

Be ready for inquiries. Most corporate Web sites are horrible about responding to email inquiries, don’t let yours be one. Also, be ready for international business inquiries, even if it means telling visitors you don’t handle out of country orders.

Outsource areas your company does not have expertise. If you plan on getting real value out of your Web site, outsourcing its development to the right firm is critical. I would recommend that you find a firm with marketing experience, not just designers and computer programmers. Remember that a designer’s expertise is in design, a programmer’s expertise is in programming and an Internet marketer’s expertise is in Internet marketing.

Keeping up with the rapid changes of Internet marketing is a full time job. Find an expert and use him or her. Concentrate your efforts on running your business or handling your professional responsibilities.

Promote Your Web site. There is a popular misconception that Web sites do not need to be promoted. Consider that some of the Web’s biggest successes spend about 75% of their advertising budgets on non-Internet media. Having a Web site is like having a toll-free number that’s not listed in every phone book…you need to work hard to drive visitors to your Web site. As with any other media, it costs money to make it a success. Plaster your Web site address (URL) everywhere you can — at trade show appearances, on business cards, stationary, in ads and everywhere else you can think of.

Use Internet advertising where it makes sense. Internet advertising has been pushed as a direct-response device, but the B2B process is far more complex and longer than with B2C. Where a B2C ad may attempt to get a consumer to make a purchase, this is not realistic for high-ticket B2B items. Instead, B2B marketers should consider using Internet advertising to reach targets that regularly use the Internet at the places they often go with ads that feature things like white papers, research, Web seminars and other information that is likely to be of strong interest to prospects.

Give it away free. For B2B marketers, the Internet provides a great opportunity to provide your target markets with high quality intellectual capital that can help position your company as a thought leader in the minds of your target markets.

Continuously analyze your Web traffic and other e-metrics to learn and improve. Find out how people are getting to your site and what they’re doing once they get there. Any good Web site statistics software package will tell you how many people are going to your site, what pages they’re viewing, what search engines they’re coming from and more. If you’re using a Web development firm, make sure that they  review this with you on no less than a quarterly basis. Find out what’s working and what’s not. Redesign your site to make it more effective for your users and for reaching your desired objectives (e.g., get leads, sales, etc.). Integrate your on-line and off-line information to provide a more complete picture of customers and prospects.   

Peter De Legge is an Internet Strategy and Marketing Consultant with over 10 years of marketing and e-business experience, primarily in the business to business arena. He has held marketing, advertising and e-business strategy positions from medium size to the Fortune 250. To learn more about his services, visit his Web site at http://www.businessmarketing.net. 

What Website Builders Need to Know About Trademark Law

Posted on September 7, 2007. Filed under: Internet marketing articles |

Doing business on the Web doesn’t spare you from many of the same laws and customs that govern businesses in the physical world. You must pay especially close attention to trademark law, which governs disputes between business owners over the names, logos and trademarks that identify their goods and services in the marketplace. Applied to Web businesses, trademark law determines when the use of a particular Internet domain name infringes someone else’s trademark.

The two most fundamental rules of trademark law are:

• You can’t use a name, logo or domain name that might confuse customers about the source of your goods or services.
• You can’t use a name, logo or domain name that invokes a famous product or service, even if customers wouldn’t be confused.

Opening Your Doors to the World

Until several years ago, only companies doing business on a national or regional level needed to be concerned about trademark law. A local business could reasonably expect its marketing activities to be limited to a neighborhood, town, city or county. As long as the name used by the business to identify itself in the marketplace didn’t seriously conflict with names used by other local businesses, there was little likelihood of customer confusion and so, little likelihood of legal conflict.

Today, the core concept of “local” has all but disappeared for many types of businesses. When you create a Web page, you enter a commercial realm that is in one stroke local, national and international. Local customers can search you out, but so can anyone anywhere in the U.S. or the world who has a computer and an Internet connection. Suddenly, you must pay attention to how your business name–or the names of products you are offering–fit within the vast sea of names that is the new world marketplace.

What’s in a Name

The first trademark issue to arise when you create a Web page has to do with the name you give your Web site–called your Internet domain name. It’s the unique part of your Internet address (Universal Resource Locator or URL). The Nolo Press URL, for instance, is http://www.nolo.com. The last part–nolo.com–is the domain name. Naturally, most businesses want the domain name for their Web site to be the same as their business name, so that customers can easily find their sites.

Here’s where you can inadvertently court trademark trouble. If you choose a domain name that is the same or similar to a business name that is already in use as a trademark anywhere in the country (in physical or virtual space), you could find yourself in a trademark infringement dispute. If you are offering goods or services on your website, you could even be sued.

The entity responsible for assigning domain names does not check to see if a requested domain name violates an existing trademark. It is concerned only with whether the name is already taken as a domain name. In other words, being assigned the domain name you request says nothing about whether it will conflict with an existing trademark. If it is the same or similar to a famous mark or is likely to cause customers to confuse your site with the business or products carrying the existing mark, you could be in violation of trademark law.

If you do pick a domain name that creates a trademark conflict, you will most likely lose the name. Given the energy that goes into building domain name recognition, this could be a major blow to your business. Here’s what could happen:

• If your domain name prevents the owner of a registered trademark from using its mark as its domain name, the owner of the registered mark may be able to cause your domain name to be deregistered. If that happens, you can’t use it anymore.
• If your domain name is the same or similar to an existing famous mark, the mark’s owner may file a lawsuit preventing any further use of your domain name, even if customers wouldn’t likely be confused. For example, if you decide to call your health food website foramazons.com, the real amazon.com could probably force you to stop using the name, simply because it calls amazon.com to mind.
• If your domain name conflicts with an existing mark and will likely lead to customer confusion between your business or products and those offered by the mark’s owner, you may be forced to stop using the name. And if your infringement is judged to be willful, you might have to both compensate the mark’s owner for any losses and pay thousands of dollars in statutory damages.

Avoiding Trouble

Before choosing a domain name, it is wise to conduct what’s known as a trademark search. A trademark search hunts for any trademarks, federally registered or not, that conflict with your proposed domain name.

You can do your own trademark search at the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office Website, www.uspto.gov. Or you can pay someone to do it for you. One good trademark searcher is the Sunnyvale Center on Innovation, Invention and Ideas at www.sci3.com.

If possible conflicts turn up, use a variant of the golden rule. Do not use an existing mark as your domain name if use of the mark would seriously tick you off if you were the mark’s owner.

PLEASE NOTE The information presented at MarketingToday is not legal advice, MarketingToday is not in the business of legal information, we are not lawyers, just publishers. We provide this information to help you understand the issues that we believe marketers should be aware of. We recommend that you consult a qualified attorney who specializes in trademarks, copyrights, advertising, intellectual property and the Internet for your questions or problems, we do.

What Internet Marketers Can Learn from the Boy Scouts

Posted on September 7, 2007. Filed under: Internet marketing articles |

by Peter De Legge

Perhaps marketers should have mandatory training from the Boy Scouts, where the motto is “be prepared.” It is a lesson Encyclopedia Britannica is learning the hard way. The Encyclopedia Britannica has long been highly regarded for their top notch product, but the company has historically been slow to embrace technology. They were late to get their encyclopedia into the CD-ROM market and late to put together a significant Web site effort. So their recent announcement to put their entire encyclopedia online for free created a giant media buzz.

You’re probably thinking to yourself, wow, the opportunity every business with a significant Web presence dreams of — tons of free publicity for a site launch.

The problem is, the folks at Britannica didn’t plan on their enormous success. And on the Internet, there is no forgiveness when it comes to significant increases or “spikes” in Web site traffic. 

Britannica.com’s servers were simply unprepared to handle the traffic and the company soon took their site down. It was a disaster.

Read this excerpt posted on the Britannica.com home page (at the time of publishing this article, the only available page on the britannica.com Web site):

“The launch of Britannica.com last week created such an enormous volume of traffic that we were simply unable to handle the demand. We have been working around the clock to correct the problem. Our teams have been busy unpacking crates, installing hardware, configuring software and boosting capacity worldwide.

What’s more, after evaluating the situation we have decided to not only boost our capacity several-fold; but redesign our system to meet the extraordinary demands placed on it. We’re taking this extraordinary step to ensure that we can meet the demands of our users going forward.

We apologize to everyone who has been unable to access Britannica.com. Soon we will be able to make the Britannica.com site available once again. In the meantime, I ask for your patience as we work to ensure that our systems around the world can meet the enormous demand for Britannica.com.”

What can marketers from companies big and small learn from this? First, you need to be ready for spikes in Internet traffic; Britannica blew an incredible opportunity because they were not prepared. Marketing and IT departments need to work closely and make sure that everyone in IT and involved in the technical side of the company’s Web site is aware of any potential large traffic spikes. If your company is going to have an executive appear on national television program such as an interview on CNN or Nightline, have a plan in place and get things ready long before the event. Experienced consultants should be brought in…experience is paramount.

Fortunately for Britannica, they are very likely to recover. But will Britannica receive the same amount of publicity for the re-launch of their site? If this same thing were to happen to a significant e-commerce or stock trading site it would have done serious damage to the company’s stock price, reputation and caused immediate losses in the millions.

Internet marketers don’t only need to be guerillas, they should also be good scouts.

Peter De Legge is the publisher and editor of Marketing Today. He has more than 15 years marketing and advertising experience that includes holding  various marketing management posts at several corporations and consulting to numerous companies, from start-ups to Fortune 500’s, in the areas of Internet Marketing, integrated marketing and Internet strategy. E-business efforts and Web sites Peter has been a part of have won the praise of leading marketing and e-business experts, including being selected being selected among E-Week’s “Top 500 E-business Innovators of 2000.” Peter’s MarketingToday.com Web site has received  the praise of e-marketing innovators like Seth Godin and industry publications such as Folio Magazine,  which recently selected the site as one of several “Web sites worth watching.” To learn more about Peter De Legge visit:  http://www.businessmarketing.net or e-mail marketingtoday@usa.net.

The Short Life Span of Ad Banners

Posted on September 7, 2007. Filed under: Internet marketing articles |

Source: AdRelevance, a division of Media Metrix. The majority of all online ad banners have short life spans, running on average three weeks or less, according to a new report released by AdRelevance, a division of Media Metrix. With few advertisers running large online campaigns, an overwhelming majority of advertisers have less than a 0.01 percent share of all online advertising impressions.

Key findings from the latest AdRelevance Intelligence Report, which analyzes standard 468×60 banner ad campaigns on the top 500 Web sites between July 1999 and June 2000, include:

• Although most banner ads run for three or fewer weeks, the average banner runs for five and a half weeks.
• The automotive industry schedules online ads to run the longest, an average of 7.8 weeks. This is almost twice as long as the average banner duration for a hardware and electronics ad, which typically lasts 4.1 weeks.
• The consumer goods industry embraces the most targeted ad approaches, with only 40 percent of online impressions appearing on broad reach sites like portals, search engines and community destinations. At the other end of the spectrum, Web media, financial services and travel advertisers appear to be targeting the least, running an overwhelming majority of ad impressions on broad reach sites.
• While the average campaign in the second quarter weighed in at 7,265,000 impressions, more than half of all advertisers ran campaigns with less than 44,000 impressions. A campaign this small would only garner a 0.0003 percent share of voice on a major portal like Yahoo!.
• Automotive industry runs banner ads almost twice as long as hardware and electronics advertisers 
• Broad reach more popular than targeted approach for recent online campaigns.

“While most advertisers are running relatively short campaigns, shorter campaigns are not necessarily better campaigns,” said Charlie Buchwalter, vice president of media research for the AdRelevance division of Media Metrix. “Although shorter campaigns may concentrate banner impressions, thereby increasing the share of voice and share of market for an advertiser, only longer campaigns can bring about a change in consumer attitudes and behavior. The latest AdRelevance findings suggest that automotive, financial services and travel advertisers are out to change behavior because they are running banners the longest, when compared to other industries.”

Table A:		Length of Time Banners Run
		Source: AdRelevance, a division of Media Metrix
		Number of Weeks	Percent
		1	23.7%
		2	16.0%
		3	11.9%
		4	9.3%
		5	7.8%
		6	5.4%
		7	4.0%
		8	3.3%
		9	2.8%
		10	2.4%
		11	1.8%
		12	1.6%
		13	1.3%
		14	1.1%
		15	0.9%
		16	0.8%
		17	0.7%
		18	0.6%
		19	0.5%
		20	0.5%
		More than 20	3.7%

Table B:	Average Number of Weeks a Banner Runs by Industry Source: AdRelevance, a division of Media Metrix
	Industry	Average Number of Weeks
	Automotive	7.8
	Financial Services	6.9
	Travel	6.0
	Consumer Goods	5.6
	Web Media	5.5
	Software	5.1
	Retail	5.0
	Entertainment	4.9
	Business-to-Business	4.9
	Telecommunications	4.8
	Hardware & Electronics	4.1

Table C:	Share of Impressions by Site Type Source: AdRelevance, a division of Media Metrix
	Web Media	86.20%	13.80%
	Financial Services	83.00%	17.00%
	Business to Business	72.70%	27.30%
	Telecom	72.70%	27.30%
	Retail	70.10%	29.90%
	Software	69.00%	31.00%
	Entertainment	58.90%	41.10%
	Hardware and Electronics	53.50%	46.50%
	Automotive	51.90%	48.10%
	Consumer Goods	40.40%	59.60%

The AdRelevance Intelligence Report also analyzes ad impression distribution strategies for campaigns running four, eight and 12 weeks – revealing that banner impressions, on average, are heavier in the beginning of four and 12 week campaigns. On the other hand, campaigns running eight weeks tend to feature higher impression levels in the middle. Impressions for the average banner in an eight week campaign peaked in the fifth week.

“There is no golden rule when it comes to campaign continuity, but it appears that advertisers are adopting two weighting approaches – either front-loading for shorter campaigns or pulsing for longer campaigns,” Buchwalter said. “The conclusions from this AdRelevance Intelligence Report support the fact that the online advertising market is still in its infancy, and has a way to go before analysts can accurately determine what constitutes an effective and successful online ad campaign. We’ll know things are changing when more companies commit to larger, longer and more targeted online campaigns.”

Definitions
Impressions: The number of times an ad is rendered for viewing. One impression is equivalent to one opportunity to see an ad.
Genre: Exclusive groups of sites similar in content and function.

AdKnowledge Study Reveals More Conversions Come After Ad Impressions Alone Than After Clicks

Posted on September 7, 2007. Filed under: Internet marketing articles |

Source: AdKnowledge A surprising finding from AdKnowledge has revealed that more conversions come after online banner ad impressions as opposed to click-throughs.

Adknowledge Inc.’s Online Advertising Report (OAR) reveals:

1. ROI Impact of Internet Advertising is Greater Than Previously Thought According to the OAR, on average, there are 33% more conversion events (such as purchases, registrations, etc.) from users who only viewed an ad, but did not click, than from users who clicked on an ad. “With AdKnowledge eAnalytics, we’ve been measuring conversions from impressions for our clients to track purchasers who convert from only seeing an online ad,” said Steve Findley, V.P. AdKnowledge Analytic Services, the company’s data mining and analysis arm. “This data yields two important conclusions. First, the potential ROI impact of Internet advertising is much greater than previously thought. Second, advertisers that focus only on clicks or even post-click conversions may miss vitally important effects of their advertising campaigns,” he explained.
2. Ad Conversion Events Peak Mid-Week OAR statistics show that ad deliveries, click throughs and customer conversion events peak during the lunch hour mid-week, with the lowest activity taking place on weekends. In the first quarter, AdKnowledge eAnalytics data shows 38% more activity taking place at noon Mondays through Wednesdays, than noon on Saturdays.
3. Web Advertising Growth Continues to Rise According to AdKnowledge’s OAR, the number of ad-supported sites and networks continues to grow rapidly. In the first quarter, the number of sites and networks grew by 723 – an increase of 22%.
4. CPMs Continue To Stabilize The OAR also shows online advertising rates continued to stabilize even as availability of sites continues to grow. Average cost-per-thousand impressions (CPM) rates remained nearly the same, falling only .48% in the first quarter of 2000 to $33.59 from the fourth quarter of 1999 rate of $33.75.

About the OAR Report
AdKnowledge uses aggregate statistics from its powerful data warehouse to supply valuable information in the Online Advertising Report (OAR) to marketers and agencies to help them optimize their Web advertising campaigns. The OAR is a compilation of Web advertising statistics analyzed by AdKnowledge eAnalytics, which provides marketers with a new level of insight into online advertising brand effects and resulting purchase behavior. The information is gathered from the AdKnowledge System, which includes four components that span planning, campaign buying and trafficking, ad serving and targeting, and reporting. The more than 4,000 sites and networks in the AdKnowledge System are representative of the Web advertising marketplace. According to Nielsen//NetRatings, the Web-wide reach of U.S. sites and networks tracked by AdKnowledge is 95.85% of the home audience and 98.42% of the work audience.

The full Online Advertising Report is available at: www.engage.com/adknowledge/oar/oar_docs/oar_1stqtr00.pdf
(Adobe Acrobat Reader 4.0 Required).