DMi Partners had a very successful two days at adtech San Francisco (April 21 -22), meeting with clients, publishers, and agencies. From exhibiting as well as walking the floor, a few trends were noticeable in the search marketing and Internet advertising industry:
Targeted lead generation goes to School
Many of the networks and agencies are now focusing on targeted and specialized leads in order to drive more quality to their partners. In the education market especially, colleges and universities, looking for quality student contact information, are now pursuing direct marketing campaigns. In response, networks are now concentrating on generating leads through rich content and text links, and additionally through SEO portals. (DMi Partners has shown great success in doing this with its own flagship SEO portal called eCollegeFinder, generating leads for all the major education aggregators and direct schools.)
Where quality of leads is concerned, SEO education portals have been shown to generate the largest school application rates compared to leads generated through an affiliate network. The only drawback is that since potential students actively searching on the Internet drive these portals, the quantity of leads is significantly reduced.
Email – Still the One
Even though many conversations at adtech focused on either paid search or SEO, email marketing remains at the top when it comes to reaching and connecting end-users with products or services.
Messaging and deliverability seemed to remain the crucial factor to advertisers and marketers, with focus on the quality and deliverability of the email, not only the quantity of the email list. Having strong deliverability (improving the numbers of emails reaching your inbox) remains key to growing revenue and profits through your email marketing practices.
Being “Social”
Yes, networking in the old business sense is still necessary, but having online social media placements and solutions will certainly now give you some attention as well, and opportunities were present on both sides at adtech San Francisco.
Advertisers, in the room looking to generate traffic through social branding applications, met publishers introducing different and innovating ways to leverage social channels to reach their audiences.
As major social networks have announced plans to open their platforms to developers and brands, the new model is now focusing on not only buying click impressions, but also on consumers, buying engagement, and customer loyalty.
If you missed us this time around, we will be present at LeadsCon and Affiliate Summit in New York over the summer. Make sure to stop by, or give us a call before hand to set something up on the calendar! Please contact Helene Seydoux 215-279-9862