This Week in Relevance

Attention Economics in Online Advertising
Online marketing gets 28% of your time but only 13% of advertising dollars while TV still garners 39% of spend for only 31% of your time – What gives?! It’s all about the economics of attention. Matt Shanahan, SVP of Strategy for Scout Analytics (a behavioral analytics platform for publishers) examines the quality vs quantity of the display ad impression and how user engagement with display ads compares with traditional television advertising. Joe Marchese, the President of socialvibe, further addresses the flawed practice of prescribing equal value to all display ad impressions. While Shanahan and Marchese make very valid points about the value of attention they may be overlooking the power of relevant messaging – regardless of external influences and distractions of the medium. Television ads are designed and trafficked against the lowest common denominator of an audience while technology enables the marketer to tailor the message of a digital ad to its recipient. Shanahan does note “In Q1 2010, 5% of all impressions were search ads garnering nearly 50% of the online advertising spend. Searchers are willing to give their attentions to the ads because intent data and ad integration is useful.” Is it possible that a relevant display ad can overpower the distractions of web page viewer encounters – even if that “distraction” is the very content they came to see? If so, as Shanahan outlines, online advertisers and publishers have a $50B opportunity.

The future of retailing is here
Lucy Handley of MarketingWeek examines the retail revolution and the opportunity at hand for retailers aiming to capitalize on increased consumer spending. The notion of a retail “experience” is intriguing and, if done well, can provide compelling differentiation for retailers aiming to penetrate a given market. Handley the following rules for operating in the new retail world:
1 Smart service
2 Testing technologies
3 Feeling the future through experience
4 Community clout
5 Seal of approval
Ultimately, Handley summarizes that “the customer has to come first,” which, from a marketing perspective, means that a retail experience must attract a customer before they enter the door. Interested in experiencing the new retail experience? Handley references American Girl and the inaugural Barbie store in Shanghai, among others, as examples of the retail revolution. Almost makes us want to check out 6 stories of Barbie. Almost.

Facebook Hits New Traffic Record
Adam Ostro, Editor in Chief of MAshable, reported that Facebook seems to have moved passed recent privacy woes and has hit new traffic peaks according to ComScore . With Facebook approaching Google’s most visited web property in the US status and increased focus on viability in the search space (note TWIR week 2 topic Search Meet Social, Social Meet Search) it is clear marketers will need to be prepared to engage consumers via Social Search. The targeting capabilities of a platform combining the explicit intention of a search query with demo and psychographic data is more than enough to send our collective head spinning with opportunity.

Can Organic Cannibalization Actually Be A Good Thing?
Janel (Landis) Laravie, co-founder of Chacka Marketing, alerts SEO focused organizations… if you’re not doing it, someone else is – particularly given the search results page evolution. Google purports to serve up what is the best experience for the user, but with recent paid search innovations, organic results are sometimes being pushed completely off the page (or below the fold if you like). When this happens, marketers with a strong organic presence suffer. How does a marketer stay relevant to searchers when their organic listings disappear? By efficiently purchasing paid search and controlling their message through paid search products such as plus boxes and site links. For those weary of cannibalizing their organic search presence via paid search, Laravie notes: if you don’t, your competitors will.

And last, but definitely not least… Did anyone else see that The Old Spice Guy is Now Making Custom Videos for Fans via Social Media? This is awesome! If a customized video isn’t relevant – then WHAT is?” Brenna Ehrlich, senior staff assistant at Mashable, brought this to our attention via Mashable’s tweets.