Internet Mistakes to Avoid

THE THIRD MISTAKE BUSINESSES ARE MAKING REGARDING THE INTERNET
Traditional marketing mavens still think they are buying demographics. This is easy to understand. When someone makes a meaningful ad buy with a CBS or ABC affiliate or even on a national buy, they are targeting people who are most likely to buy their product, right? That should make sense to most anyone. Take for example a homebuilder. They are targeting a woman age 25 to 54 with their media dollars because their research shows that females dominate the decision matrix for a home purchase.

In the non traditional media world, the Internet world, your ad buy is based on words. All traffic moves on the Internet based on words. The same homebuilder buys advertising based on floor plans, not on a female demographic. If someone visits their site as a result of moving on the Internet based on the word set floor plans you have to see right away how that visit to their website is so much more valuable than a woman 25 to 54 who just saw their TV commercial or their print ad in the daily newspaper. In fact, look at it this way, with most companies, the goal of their advertising in traditional media is to get people to visit their website?

Smart Internet marketing is about knowing the words of your industry. It is really no more difficult than that. It is about knowing how to move traffic around the Internet based on the principles of connectivity and the principles of word ownership.
MISTAKE NUMBER 3 SUMMARY: It is not about the demographics.

THE FOURTH MISTAKE BUSINESSES ARE MAKING REGARDING THE INTERNET
The fourth mistake being made regarding the Internet is one of brand versus technology. There are only two parts to marketing: Brand and Technology. The problem is that traditional brand people too often do not integrate technology properly into their marketing approach; usually because they do not understand the Internet but they do understand newspapers, television and radio. On the other hand, the new media people believe it is all about the Internet and their technology so they forego the potential of branding because they think brandings role ends with all traditional media. Smart Internet Marketing combines both brand and technology. Brand is nothing more than perception and perception is measured in words; the words people use to describe your business and its product and service offerings.

MISTAKE NUMBER 4 SUMMARY: It is not about brand or technology. It is about both! And the new video explosion on the Internet is going to steal the remaining ad agency mystery away from the big agencies and give it back to the people. Branding is about word of mouth and where word of mouth is today is where sales will be tomorrow. That will never be truer than it will be in about 3 years when the video take over of the Internet is in full bloom. Will your marketing on the Internet be lean forward or lean backward? Will you wait to find out what that means? Will you do some research and find out why CBS and WPP, the largest ad agency holding company in the world, have just funded a project with others to the tune of 60 million dollars? Would it surprise you to find out that project is about producing and place video on both tv stations and the Internet? Would it further surprise you to find out that you will very shortly be able to produce your own TV commercial on the Internet for just 500 dollar flat fee? And then place that commercial with whatever budget on sites and TV stations either of your choosing or through a computed program that both maximizes the dollars you spend and gives you complete control over both the placement on the front end and the metrics on the back end? The times, they are a changing. Right Bob Zimmerman?!

CONCLUSION
So, smart Internet marketing in 2006 and 2007 is simple to understand if you understand the four mistakes being made regarding marketing in this fast changing world. Recognize that the Internet has a non linear side that is 3 times the side that is owned by the Search Engines.

Moving to mine and redirect traffic is not a technology; it is a process based on sound mathematical and branding principles.
MATHEMATICAL PRINCIPLE: The economies of scale for the group are always more powerful than those of the individual.
BRAND PRINCIPLE: The brand for your business is about owning words on the Internet and those words should form the basis of what people say about you and your business.