Online marketing: The internet is the place to be
“The Internet is becoming an increasingly important trading place.” This conviction was ultimately shared by Thomas Grolp, Head of Performance Marketing at the Schober Information Group, with all those involved in Swiss Online Marketing: a total of 71 exhibitors and 1,148 visitors came to the premiere of the new trade fair for digital marketing at the beginning of April in the Giessereihalle in Zurich. The successful start for the new industry get-together proves: The time is ripe for online marketing.
The Internet is the place to be: the changed user behaviour in Web 2.0 and the results of current market analyses speak for the fact that companies meet potential customers primarily on the web now and in the future. “We are still at the beginning. When the web really gets fast, there will be a wealth of new opportunities,” predicted media manager Prof. Dr. Helmut Thoma. “If you think outside the box, you can still write many a success story,” added the ex-RTL boss, who was the top speaker and shared anecdotes from his own success story with the private TV station. “We discovered a completely new target group – the viewer! Before, there was only the fee payer,” Thoma summed up the revolutionary changes in programme selection at the time.
But the revolution continues, as keynote speaker Florian Haller, Managing Director of the agency group Serviceplan, explained. Today, the range of digital media is exploding, newspapers are losing importance and among 14- to 19-year-olds, television, radio and the web are already on a par. But it is not only user behaviour that is changing, but also the new mass medium itself. “The internet is mutating into a media platform: there are IP papers, IP TV and more. The net is becoming the leading currency.” Haller also drew attention to megatrends that play a role in “Branding 2.0”. A challenge for advertisers, he said, is above all the tendency towards individualisation. “The target group is dead. We now have to think in terms of individual addresses,” said the experienced agency operator.
While 50 different ads in free TV or print would be unaffordable, precisely tailored offers for ever smaller target groups are sensible and feasible on the internet. In the process, static content would increasingly be replaced by moving images. “Audiovisual communication is the future. The demand is increasing very, very strongly,” confirmed Claudio Foser, Managing Director of unitec. Christian Borsi of TVNext Solutions gave an idea of the magnitude of the spread of moving images on the Internet. According to the survey, the majority of video users accept advertising to finance the online offer. “Video ads are very popular
There is also a noticeable trend towards participation in social networks. “Virtual village squares are experiencing a hype,” says Simon Künzler of the Lucerne University of Applied Sciences and Arts. For companies, it is advisable to be present in social networks, to stimulate interaction – for example by offering competitions – and to engage in conversation. “This gives them an innovative image and only requires a small investment The Twitter network is also experiencing a boom at the moment, which Daniel Ebneter from the University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland discussed in more detail. Twitter, a mixture of microblogging, public chat and text messaging, is certainly suitable as a PR and customer loyalty element, the speaker concluded – after all, companies meet a “tech-savvy, well-educated, affluent target group” here.
Not only the presence in social networks, but above all a top position in search queries helps companies to get many visitors on their website. “Anyone who thinks Google is a search engine is a technician. Entrepreneurs know that it is the best word-of-mouth on the planet,” said the very practical keynote speaker Sanjay Sauldie, explaining the high attention this tool deserves. In order to land in the first places on Google, marketing decision-makers have to understand the search engine, which works like a librarian: First of all, it examines the title, which should contain the keyword. Next, Google examines the blurb – the short description – and also checks the author, i.e. the web address. In this respect, it makes strategic sense to acquire domains in which the key term appears linked to the company name. Sauldie immediately worked out an example with the fascinated audience at the practical forum: the bookstore Thalia, for example, which is not listed among the first ten addresses for the search term “book” with its website www.thalia.ch, could create a better starting position for itself with the additional domain www.buch-thalia.ch.
But having many visitors alone is not enough: “The times are over when all we wanted was more traffic,” emphasised Wolfgang Schilling. The managing director of ad agents recommended his audience to think carefully about the context in which their ads should appear in search engine marketing. With non-specific “broad match”, which reacts to many search terms, all too great scattering losses are to be expected, the speaker pointed out. In order to be able to continuously optimise the marketing measures, tracking with the help of professional tools is necessary, which provides an overview of every movement. “We experience it more often that our clients initially do this themselves. But it is a full-time job that they are better off leaving to experts,” says Schilling, describing the relatively large effort involved. Beat Z’graggen also relies on the three-pronged approach of “test, measure, improve!” “Nowhere does this work as well as on the internet. Post a message and see what happens,” the managing director of Worldsites encouraged the audience.
Thomas Grolp had a solution for ensuring that online advertisements and mailings do not get lost in the bombardment of advertising messages: the marketing manager from the Schober Group recommended addressing customers who had expressly agreed to receive advertising. With so-called permission-based marketing, advertising messages are legally protected and do not automatically end up “in the bucket” – which otherwise easily happens.
“I am pleased about the spirit of optimism in the industry, which is noticeable even and especially in the economic crisis. The exhibitors were enthusiastic and are all planning to come back next year”, Alexander Petsch, Managing Director of spring Expositions SA, drew a positive balance from the organiser’s side. The date for the second edition of the new industry meeting place is 24 and 25 March 2010 in Zurich. Further information on the Swiss trade fair for digital marketing is available on the Internet at www.swiss-online-marketing.ch.
Press contact:
Petra Jauch
spring Messe Management GmbH & Co KG
Freight Hall Road 18a
D-68159 Mannheim
Phone: +49 621 70019-73
Fax: +49 621 70019-19
E-mail: p.jauch@messe.org
published on: 21.04.2009
Last updated on 12. February 2023
Originally posted 2009-04-21 23:32:33.
