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A few weeks ago I attended the first annual Inverge Interactive Convergence Conference (IICC) here in Portland. Usually a skeptic of local conferences and networking events, I was reluctant to accept my invitation to attend the two-day interactive extravaganza. It wasn’t until after researching the scheduled speakers that the excitement set in. After all, it takes something truly special to pull me away from my home-ten-blocks-from-home, the Modern Media Building.

All that being said, my expectations were met and exceeded by Inverge 2007 and relevant knowledge was gained from each of the conference’s guest speakers. Of the eight or nine speakers, with backgrounds primarily rooted in marketing and advertising, there were four whose lessons I found particularly interesting. So, in no particular order, here are just a few Inverge 2007 moments worth mentioning:

Dr. Joshua Green of MIT’s Convergence Culture Consortium kicked off the conference with enough energy and insight to ignite a large new media fire on stage. Green’s approach of conveying the collision of old media with new was refreshing in the sense where he taught by example. In explaining the concept of bridging the gap between grassroots creativity and mainstream media, Green used the following:

• Trailer for a PG version of “300″

• Quentin Tarantino’s “Star Wars”

Later that day came Chris Van Dyke, who’s not just the offspring of Dick, but the President and CEO of Nau, the lifestyle clothing company that’s rethinking the way in which consumers shop. Nau is utilizing technology to minimize its ecological footprint while simultaneously creating a stellar shopping experience. Sure their price points are steep, but they’ve substantiated this with unparalleled design and quality. Nau is like Patagonia on steroids with Mother Teresa as the CEO.

Inverge’s second day boasted a number of great speakers, from MTV’s Jeff Yapp to Interpublic’s new media guru Lori Schwartz. But, arguably the most entertaining was Wieden + Kennedy’s Director of Global Digital Strategy Renny Gleeson. All product placement aside, Gleeson’s presentation provided a realistic outlook of how the web is evolving, and what W+K is doing to pioneer the ways in which brands can be built in the post-modern digital world.In summary, I’ll definitely be spreading the word about next year’s edition of Inverge as I believe it’s a great opportunity for Portland to stand out on the map of creativity. Like most first-time events, Inverge’s attendance was low; however, I’m confident the majority of attendees will spread the word and next year’s event will be even bigger and better.

One of the beautiful things about Respond2 is the guiding principal that if it doesn’t make financial sense, then it doesn’t makes sense at all. This mantra is carried throughout the company, including web development. When we start creating a website we want to know as much information about the campaign as possible. Starting with a projected media spend, we can then back out what the projected traffic and conversions to a site may be based on past experiences.

With this information we can then better determine what the front-end and back-end needs of the website will be. If you’re only going to spend $5,000 a week for 20 weeks on your campaign, spending $50,000 to develop a website probably doesn’t make sense. But there may be a lower cost option that will accomplish 90 percent of the necessary needs.

On the flip side, if you’re going to spend $1 million a week in media, you’d better make sure your website accomplishes 100 percent of the goals. And not only is it accomplishing the goals, but what can it do to accomplish them better? While an increase in conversions from 1-2 percent may not seem like a big jump, that small amount can double your revenue.

Most of our team members have personal blogs and we spend the majority of our days managing blogs and building web presences for our clients. Our r2morrow blog was created for the some of same reasons we believe that blogging is right for our clients, as well as some rather unique ones:

Here’s to many smart, insightful and blog entries to come; and to me not losing all my hair quite so quickly.

We build a lot of blogs around here at Respond2, most of which run on the fantastic and free Wordpress Content Management System. As a result of building a few Wordpress themes—and viewing even more—I’d say I’m pretty familiar with the visual style that is typical of most themes, and the structure of the information Wordpress spits out. It’s always refreshing to see CMS skins that escape the ‘look’ of their architecture, and there are plenty of impressive examples out there (http://www.welovewp.com).

My main qualm here is that blogging software tends to encourage linear display of content, so you end up with long pages, full of links and repetitive content across pages. This article will give some suggestions for escaping that linear structure, making your blog look less like a blog and more like an online publication, which may be a worthwhile goal both in terms of user-friendly navigation and the legitimization of your brand.

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A recent addition to the R2 team, I am most interested in the development of Internet Protocol Television (IPTV) and the ways that it will change both entertainment and advertising. For those of you who aren’t techno-geeks like I am, IPTV essentially is television that delivered to the home over a broadband computer network infrastructure, much like the way that DSL currently works. It differs from traditional broadcast, cable or satellite TV in a few ways. First is that the video signal is digitally compressed, most likely using the MPEG-4 codec (much like the audio MP3), and is then delivered to the set-top box via the IP Multicast protocol. This allows both push/pull functionality to TV, much like the experience of surfing the web. Traditional TV is entirely a push format, viewers are simply passive consumers of the video content with no ability at all to interact with what they are watching. Imagine the ability to look up a players stats during a live sporting event, to download the recipe for that yummy looking chocolate mousse or to purchase that absolutely fabulous pair of shoes Jessica Alba is wearing on the red carpet, all without having to get up off the couch. The implications that interactive television will have on traditional push advertising are tremendous.

Second, IPTV is relatively lightweight, from a network resource point-of-view. Unlike cable television, which sends all 300 channels of video content to the set-top box simultaneous, requiring tremendous amounts of bandwidth, IPTV only sends the content that the viewer is currently watching, creating a system that is more energy efficient and less complex technologically. In the long run, IPTV will be much cheaper for the providers to maintain which should result in cost savings for the consumer.

Additionally, IPTV can offer triple and even quadruple play—TV, Internet access, VoIP and in some cases, cell phone. While some cable companies have been moving into these services as well, save cell phone service, IPTV providers again will be able to leverage their lower operating costs to provide lower fees to consumers.

While it is still early days in the world of IPTV, I truly believe that it will come to dominate the marketplace much as cable TV came to displace broadcast TV over the past couple of decades.

From the start it has always been top to bottom, left to right. When we read a book, website, or even pan across a beautiful bit of scenery, our natural reaction is to pan left to right, and top to bottom. That’s just how we live and how we’re coded.

Think you’re not like me? Think you’re unique? Try this on for size. The next time you’re crossing the street notice which way you look first - left>right>left. How about driving through an intersection? Reading a website? Are you Catholic? Ever play Contra? Well it’s all the same, “top to bottom, left to right.”

The Horizontal Way is a showcase site for all the great horizontally laid out sites on the web. While, it still follows the old adage of left to right, these sites take it to the extreme. When you’re done viewing what’s laid out on the site you scroll to the right to see more. No more conventional top to bottom browsing.

I don’t think this style of viewing a site will ever become the norm, though it’s design and execution are excellent. It’s definitely a breath of fresh air in a world of conformity. The concept of horizontal scrolling through javascript compelled me to implement it into this very blog. The logic was the basis for our portfolio strip.

And on that note, I’m off to get me 99 more lives. (up up down down left right left right a b select start)

When I open my RSS feeds or read the latest AdWeek column, I constantly stumble upon yet another new social network. The new sites all have the same promises; easy to use, innovating, exciting, resourceful and free! I would agree that these new sites deliver content; however, I would also argue that the consumer does not have the motivation or perceived payoff for using these start up sites. The problem is that marketers are not thinking about people’s most valuable asset… our time!

Corporations such as Wal-mart and Coca-Cola have both tried recreating the wheel by generating their own social network sites. They have all fallen for, what I call “If you build it they will come” syndrome. Their intentions are understandable; build a site that’s fun, interactive and social. The result will be positive buzz about the company and an increase in sales will follow.

The problem, however, is that the modern consumer does not have the time to adapt to a new site, participate in the features, and then tell all of their peers. Steve Rubel from the blog “Micro Persuasion” calls this problem “The attention clash.” Like most people, I work full-time, have many friends, partake in hobbies and already participate in three social network sites. For the time being, adding another network to my portfolio of bookmarks and “must check” websites would not be an efficient way to allocate my time.

On the positive side, there are ways for marketers to participate in the blogosphere without cloning other sites such as Facebook, Myspace and Technorati. Instead of competing for peoples’ time, they should start adding value to existing popular networks— to add value is to comment on the site, build friends, use the features and participate in the network. Further, generating exciting features and making the sites more user-friendly will increase chances of consumers noticing your company. So forget, “If you build it they will come.” Try, “If you help build, participate, and create, they will recognize and respect you!”

I have a crush on Social Media Marketing.

Social media marketing is that cool artsy chick from ceramics who you ran into at the Deathcab concert because she totally digs Deathcab and you totally dig Deathcab and it was totally a coincidence and there are sparks. Her name is Sally, and man, is she chill. Traditional advertising, on the other hand, can be characterized as that girl from P.E. who had a crush on you in high school: always kicking or pinching you just so you would notice her and hopefully, someday, buy in. We’ll call her Vicky.

Ladies, feel free to relate this to men.

Vicky interrupts your life. She’s obnoxious. You could be busy zoning out to some tunes on the radio, but that doesn’t disrupt her agenda. She’ll still try to get your attention. Most of the time you’ll ignore her, but there’s a good chance that you’ll respond, because hey, you’re human.

Sally complements your life. She never interrupts, but always gets your attention because what she has to say is relevant and interesting. She’s engaging. She’s all content, man; the number one ingredient to a long-lasting relationship. Let’s drop the names; I’m starting to sound like Dr. Phil.

Traditional advertising is built around this platform that interrupts your life. Be it full-page ads segmenting the article you’re reading in Maxim, or GoDaddy.com’s senseless, half-nude TV spots dismembering your Joanie Loves Chachi reruns, neither is relevant nor welcome even if they do get your attention. Social media marketing utilizes social forums to create a buzz about products. In the form of viral videos on YouTube.com, blogs devoted to gadgets, politics, or Cheez Wiz, to music sharing via MySpace.com and Pandora (and a number of other media), consumers are able to build emotional attachments to products by talking about them, reading about them, listening, watching, etc. It’s word-of-mouth for the digital age.

Sally, I love you.

Here’s a strange job interview question:

“If you were told by your supervisor that you couldn’t use a certain piece of software due to license restrictions, what would your response be?”

I’ve actually been asked this question twice in two different interviews. It’s a question formulated to weed out anybody who might be disappointed that they can’t do their job with the best and most familiar tools available. It’s a sign of a company’s past agreements with software vendors, agreements that are limiting the company’s agility when it comes to technological decisions. Sounds awful.

Happily, Respond2’s Web presence doesn’t have that problem. Our customers don’t have that problem, either. On the Web front, we are largely unencumbered by software licensing issues. While many companies
pay people full-time to resolve software licensing issues, at Respond2, we’re simply free to get the job done.

That’s one reason why we tend to gravitate toward open licenses for the software we use. I don’t want to sound religious about this, but this tendency eliminates entire steps in the project’s planning and
implementation phase. In the world of DRTV, we have to move extremely quickly, serving the needs of a demanding media schedule. Why spend time figuring out if we can legally use a piece of software, determining the purchase price, how many licenses to buy, whether that applies to each server, each server’s CPU, or each site visitor? It’s better for our customers if we can just immediately start designing a system for them.

Of course, there are parts of our system that used closed licenses, too. “Whatever gets the job done,” an old UNIX systems administrator told me, and I think it’s true.

It truly is an exciting time to be entering the world of online PR.  Not everyone is quite sure what they’re doing, or the most effective way to do it, which amounts to a lot of slip-ups.  On the flip side, there are a lot of triumphs as well.

When a company succeeds in the online PR game, the response is immediate.  Due to the speed with which a blogger can post, when a campaign takes off, someone, somewhere is writing about it.  Be it AdWeek or your Uncle Ed, when the fingers start typing they don’t stop, and if it’s good news you better believe you’ve hit the online jackpot.

But if it’s bad news… watch out.  A downside to the aforementioned speed with which things can post is that before people even research a single word, they have already posted their opinion on the matter. With no editorial hierarchy in place to check for those silly little things called ‘slander’ and ‘libel,’ its been extremely easy—and common—for reputations to be ruined in a single afternoon.

So be careful out there–the world wide web can be a dangerous place indeed.