1

Dominic Miller

digital director, Niche Media

It’s Tuesday morning when I open my eyes to the sound of inner-city garbage collection, stagger into the shower, smack my head on the shower door, stagger out, throw on shirt/suit, mismatch my socks, throw a toothbrush into my mouth, kiss my girlfriend goodbye, log into my work email on my N95 as I get into the lift, scan for anything potentially damaging or from the chairman, get cut off from the network as I enter the underground car park, start the car and zip out just in front of a tram while using my thumb-memory to re-log in and reply to the most urgent emails leaving 76 to attend to once I get in, Frogger my way to work without killing anyone that I know of, hit my desk and log in as I hit speakerphone and scan my messages, tell the IT guys that I’ll see them in a minute and, yes, I know I have to get them the text for the new promotion, realise I haven’t sent the new sales proposals to my three biggest clients, so open my CRM to remind me where I’m at and get ‘invited’ to attend a meeting with the MD in 15 minutes as I realise that I still haven’t read ‘How to get noticed on Google’, which is becoming buried under email printouts in my paperless office as one of my colleagues reminds me that I only have today to book my next Sydney trip before another long weekend reduces my working week to six days and I have to somehow find another 12 hours between Friday night and Monday morning without actually killing my remaining relationship goodwill.

No matter. I will still find time today to get on my favourite forum because for every great idea that I contribute, I get 10 back. Period.

2

Brendon Cook

CEO, oOh! Media

Nowadays, everybody has less time to do more, and marketing professionals are no exception.

In fact, marketers are increasingly under more demands in their role than some other professionals. Why? With a fragmented audience, the challenge they face of ensuring their brands, products and/or services are connecting with the right people at the right time is challenging.

The media consumption landscape is changing and, as a result, marketers need to be more selective and targeted in the way they connect their brands, products and services to their audiences. 

It’s now not about simply pulling together a creative advertising campaign and placing it on TV, radio and in newspapers and magazines to get the attention of consumers. 

Marketers need to be looking at and testing new and innovative ways to touch the hearts and minds of a consumer most effectively. 

Given the fact that marketers are time-poor, they need to be just as selective and targeted with their own time, and how they spend it to learn about consumer trends and marketing solutions.

One of the options is online forums. If they get value out of contributing to them, then they can’t afford to ignore them. But they simply can’t comment on everything that comes their way, because it won’t be relevant.

This is really no different to the people that marketers are trying to connect with. That is why the outdoor industry has invested heavily in developing things like MOVE, technology and tailored brand experiences to help marketers better reach the right people with relevant messages.

3

Malcolm Auld

principal, Malcolm Auld Direct

Marketing professionals are no more time-poor than anyone else. But like most people do when making a decision, they ask the old question ‘What’s in it for me?’ Why should I give up my time to be involved in a forum – particularly one that’s work-related?

As a founder of Gooruze, the online marketer’s social network, I’ve discovered a few things about business social networks and forums. And one thing that stands out is that there’s an enormous amount of chaff and very little wheat being published. And the quality of the wheat often isn’t worth the time it takes you to sift through the chaff to find it.

Time is a valuable commodity and a marketer has to weigh up the value of ‘spending their time’ on a forum, with the return on their investment of time.

Deciding to participate in a forum depends upon the topic, the contributors and the relevance to you. For example, just because a bunch of industry peers is voicing opinions on a trade website doesn’t mean it’s worth your time getting involved. You may get more from them with a conversation in the pub.

But if the forum is a customer forum, marketers need to at least monitor them and contribute if and where appropriate.

Listening to customers always reveals valuable insights, so establishing your own customer forum and opening it for customers to contribute, will pay enormous dividends in brand loyalty. Kraft Foods demonstrated this with its case studies at the DMA in San Francisco in 2006, when it revealed how it has moved the majority of its marketing budget from mass media to direct marketing via the web, particularly using forums.

4

Nic Jones

MD digital, Starcom Mediavest Group

Marketing professionals will always consider themselves time-poor, even when they’ve got time to swan around on any number of media junkets they are still “too busy to talk now mate”.

It’s a bit like asking them to find the time to speak to a real customer… “too busy mate!”

One of the great benefits of the web today is there is no longer any excuse for being out of touch, or for being too busy! Now instead of wondering what everyone out there is saying about your brand… you can really find out!

What’s more, the depth and breadth of opinion and comment in itself can affect consumers’ attitudes toward your brand.

It’s a bit like a stampede – the more people tell me I’m stupid to like that brand of car the more I’ll tell people they’re stupid to like it too and the more the brand can be hurt.

So, taking part in online forums… the question is whether you can learn as much from watching as from doing. Just because I love watching too much football is not going to make me a great footballer… mind you playing football isn’t going to either, but that’s not the point! If I were young and fit and talented then playing football would indeed improve my skills – far more than just watching it.

Online forums give oxygen to opinions and get immediate response to them, and actually sometimes maybe even challenge them. And it doesn’t matter whether those challenges are successful (hey, you just learned something) or not (hey, you really are smart) it is all part of learning.

Now you just found out why I agreed to take part in this forum!

5

David Gillespie

senior project manager, IE Media

Everyone is asking what the ROI is for contributing online and no one has a solid answer. On the other hand, what’s the ROI on not contributing? It isn’t as cut and dried as ‘You’ve got to be in it to win it’, because to get involved you actually have to have something to offer, and this is more of a stretch than most people realise or are actually capable of.

The crux of the issue is the internet strips away the bullshit (or at least a large amount) that our day-to-day environments sometimes thrive on. Original thought is valued above all else, which unfortunately for the ECDs out there means the junior programmer in the corner has a better understanding of what’s going down than they do. Sure, they may have built fancy careers stealing ideas from the junior copywriters, but stealing a line of code is a little trickier.

In the great democratiser that is the double-u double-u double-u, title counts for less than the stale olive left in the glass of that third martini (extra brine in mine thanks, I like ‘em dirty). And everyone is time poor, so prioritise. If being seen around town is more important, then put your card behind the bar and let the tab run so the PYTs in account service know whose lap to sit on when their cosmopolitans need refilling. But if you have half an original thought and genuine value to offer there is no shortage of opportunities out there. I’m firmly in the ‘can’t afford to ignore’ camp; and if you’re unsure where to start, drop me a line – always happy to point someone in the right direction.