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About AniBlurbs | Anibal do Rosario in English (Wie is Anibal do Rosario | Over AniBlurbs in het Engels)

Anibal do Rosario (1981), is een Digital Strategist die van zijn passie zijn beroep heeft weten te maken en continue op zoek is naar de ideale balans tussen creativiteit, gut-feeling en meetbare resultaten.

Heeft hierbij altijd zowel de eindgebruiker als de business doelstellingen scherp in het vizier. Creatieve strateeg, die als generalist goed op de hoogte is van de technische (on)mogelijkheden van alles wat interactief is, en daardoor een bruggenbouwer tussen diverse disciplines zoals Web Development & Design, Vormgeven, Customer Service, Marketing en Sales.

Anibal heeft samen met andere ervaren professionals mooie resultaten weten te boeken op diverse (Online) Marketing projecten voor zowel kleinere partijen uit het MKB, als diverse Triple A merken.

Achtergrond

Ervaring heeft Anibal de afgelopen twaalf jaar opgedaan met:

• Retail
• Direct Sales & Promotie
• Webdesign
• Entertainment (Dance)
• Webshops / e-Commerce
• Identity & Branding
• (Online) Marketing Strategieën

Ervaring Bureau- en Opdrachtgeverszijde

Anibal heeft zijn expertise opgedaan door samen te werken met en te leren van andere ervaren professionals, in projecten aan bureauzijde voor o.a. diverse overheidsorganisaties en Triple A-merken, zoals de Koninklijke Marine, Shell, UWV, Rabobank, Vodafone Nederland en meer.

Daarnaast is hij aan opdrachtgeverszijde actief geweest, zoals bij Tech start-ups Dance-Tunes.com (een dochter van ID&T en Q-dance) en GAMcard.

Ontwikkelen van (Online) Marketing Strategieën

Anibal is tevens verantwoordelijk geweest voor het ontwikkelen van de Marketing Strategie en Corporate Identity / Rebranding voor Persoonlijk Zorgnetwerk – het bedrijf achter onder andere Factuurdesk.nl, ePGB.nl & ZoekPgbZorg.nl.

Hij heeft deel uitgemaakt van het Online Marketing team bij “eFocus Strategy & Webdesign”. eFocus is recentelijk eind 2009 uitgeroepen tot het #1 full-service internetbureau door Emerce.

Neem direct contact op met Anibal »

Leg contact met Anibal

• About.me: http://about.me/anibaldorosario
• Twitter: http://twitter.com/AnibalDoRosario
• Google+: Anibal do Rosario op Google+
• LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/anibaldorosario
• @AnibalDoRosario Online Cases: http://www.anibaldorosario.com/

Pagina verzorgd door Anibal do Rosario

“The truth is, advertisers and brand marketers are entering a brave new world — one where code is on par with content. The 21st-century ad isn’t something to be looked at, it’s something to be used… …”Consumers” are now “Users.” So are “Marketers” now “Developers”?”

“…having someone who at least can help a creative team understanding how the software should look is very helpful. “I think having somebody like that, even if they are not the ones coding the app, helps bridge the gap between the technical and the creative…”

Source: AdAge – Agencies Need to Think Like Software Companies

Business Value = Subscribers * Demographics
Business Value = Eyeballs + relevance * intent

Last week’s talk of the town among media in crowd and digerati was that spending on Online Marketing in the UK finally has taken pole position from Offline Advertising.

Make no mistake: this is significant. (Remember this is BBC territory!)

For years eyeballs, attention and now -as predicted and long overdue- budget weight have shifted from TV, Radio and Print to Interactive Media, culminating in this milestone.

Why this change from spending budget on Offline Advertising to investing in Online Marketing Strategies?

And why this plea to repurpose the inner workings of agencies (and ASAP at that)?

Well, to answer the first question, here’s a list of activities people in general are currently undertaking (online) instead of massively tuning in on prime-time (or, indeed, instead of buying and reading newspapers) like they used to:

• Checking news anytime, online, for free;
• Discovering and consuming online content, via “Social Distribution”, for free;
• Shopping online, any time they like;
• Spending days on end playing videogames;
• Spending evenings (cocooning with friends or family) watching TiVo or DVD’s;
• Leaving comments and reviewing products on that very same e-commerce site;
• Discussing and reviewing artists, movies, products and brands on niche online communities;
• Logging in daily to update their status in social networks like LinkedIn and Facebook (or even several times a day – thanks to mobile flat-rate data plans and apt mobile devices and smart phones such as Apple’s iPhone, RIM’s BlackBerry and the Nokia N series, to name but a few).

Okay, I’m bound to have missed many, many more, yet even the online media consumption / activities I’ve inevitably missed, share core characteristics with the ones mentioned above, which, when indentified and aligned next to each other, should underline my statement that agencies need some unadulterated tech DNA should they hope to help their clients connect online with their audience.

“Creatives need to be specialists in the spaces where consumers live that are defined by new technology.”

“If agencies are to continue to offer the highest value to their clients, and realize the full potential of new media on behalf of their clients, they need to make sure every department is as technology literate as consumers” -Simon Mainwaring

So, why the need for new fresh Silicon Valley Blood for agencies in this post-Madison Avenue MarCom ecosystem? Well, for starters, all the activities mentioned above:

- are On Demand;
- are personalized;
- are ubiquitous;
- are interactive (vs. passive content consumption);
- put the user in control;

-And… they’ve become a habit.

Habits slowly but steadily ingraining themselves in modern culture on a global scale.

All of these activities have replaced, or are in the process of replacing, the habit of, say, going home after school or work, watching the same mass orientated, one-size-fits-all TV shows like the rest of the populous, within timeslots deemed fit by a few network coordinators, all the while zapping away the interruption marketed ads…

(On a side note, what has also been replaced is blindly following the opinion of a select few elitists, or opinion leaders, so you will. You don’t need (trust?) one or more reporters from the New York Times to tell you that The Dark Knight or District 9 are movies worth an evening out to the multiplex, what book is a must-read or which restaurant should be on your shortlist, as even more so than usual, nowadays people are forming their own opinion by reading online peer reviews or discussing their customer care experience online, no holds barred.

Internet killed the middleman.

And the platforms facilitating this have a reach of millions and sometimes even billions, globally.

This continuous two-way online dialogue is another reason why the one-way message sending, branding specialists need to acquire interactive skill- and mindsets…)

It’s The Internet, Stupid

“Why doesn’t the traditional model work online? In short, the web is too fragmented (millions of videos, millions of web sites), too loosely coupled (countless hyperlinks, embed codes, APIs), and too nascent (too few revenue models, too little clarity about the future) to fit comfortably into a media conglomerate as they exist today.”

“The challenge is that the scarce resources are different: while the media business continues to rely on “talent,” today’s talent may be writing code rather than screenplays. Distribution still creates value, but it can mean a quickly passed link on Twitter or Facebook instead of an 8 p.m. slot on a broadcast network”.

Source: Giga Om – New Media Demands a New Kind of Media Company

But these factors are not the only causes for this disruptive re-allocating of budget.

Sure, everyone agrees that you should “fish where the fish are”, but the main reason that budgets are finally being freed up from political unwillingness or irrational conservatism, is that in these times of crises, true accountability in marketing and advertising has finally become key.

There’s no need for (hiding behind) second guessing or causality in MarCom anymore: Plausible effective advertising maybe was “fine” yesterday, today proven effectiveness by conversion is vast becoming the golden standard.

The current recession has acted as a catalyst for this silk media revolution, merely accelerating the inevitable.

Now the marketer finally knows which half of her marketing euro, dollar, yen or what have you, is wasted on naught and which half is an investment; generating leads or spurring your core hyper targeted audience into action. All in real-time, if necessary, meaning you can act real-time.

“It’s to no fault that many account teams have no concept of what web development entails in terms of budget and time. Too many times there are promises made that cannot be fulfilled. Having a cross functional, technically savvy professional on hand to lay out accurate budget and time frames in real time ensures that the client is not mislead by a traditional account person reliant on third party estimates.”

It’s no longer about the clever award winning Creative Director and his team of witty art-director/copywriter duo’s.

This also means that the sole focus in marketing and advertising isn’t about “sending content” anymore, but it’s about the underlying technologies that facilitate dialogue between brand and stakeholders, and empowers them both.

It’s about, for example, creating branded tools that might prove useful in everyday mundane tasks for the user: Apps-as-a-Brand-Utility. Eyeballs. Attention.

Now it’s about the pragmatic award winning Managing Director and her team of developers and creative technologists.

“Code” and “(meta)data” have earned their rightful place next to “design” and “gut-feeling”, thus switching the demand from pure creative output to actionable insights based on real-time data; apps and open platforms for effective communication, feedback and co-creation. All of this fundamentally challenging the very raison d’être and modus operandi of traditional agencies.

“Various models have evolved over the years but the successful ones have at their core a few talented individuals who “get it” when it comes to the nuts and bolts of technology, the subtleties of strategic brand building and the figures that justify an ROI…

…the more multidisciplinary people an agency can employ without forcing generalists into specialized silos, the better equipped they’ll be to provide true integration.”

As it is becoming increasingly clear that consumers are changing their daily work-, leisure- and decision-making(!) systematic from Analogue- to Digital based; brands/advertisers and traditional MarCom specialists will have to adapt & change their Tech know-how (what vs. why), their thought patterns (creative top-down factories vs. embracing digital natives and co-creating), and their priorities (branding vs. true empirical accountability) to match this new reality or ultimately end up like that frog in the slow-boiling pan.

The long-term solution however, is not going to be purely a technological one, but rather an anthropological and sociological one; the real challenge lies in the cultural change and organizational restructuring needed to save traditional agencies from the same dark fate (or worse) as the music industry and newspaper & magazine publishers. Out with the old…

[Yes, the very fact that it’s 2009 and I’m posting this rant as being new(s), means that somehow there’s still a need for summaries and musings like this, however obvious and stale it might seem to fellow digital natives and digerati in-crowd alike. Yet, I believe that this needs to be heard and echoed. I’m merely trying to add a drip in the quite -possible very pretentious- hope all the accumulated drips will eventually flood the ivory tower of cognitive dissonance that some board rooms and CEO’s (across all traditional agencies and entertainment outlets) dwell in.]

Read more thoughts about Apps-as-a-Brand-Utility, the future of advertising, “Creative Technologists” and the ideal DNA composition for successful marketers and agencies in the 21st Century in this excellent article by Allison Mooney on Advertising Age.

Cutting deep in your Marketing budget (and thereby seeing it on default as a cost instead of an investment) is a short term tactic that isn’t going to help your company weather these uncertain times ahead of all of us. Instead it would be more sustainable to take a long term approach; a more critical look at what channels your spending this budget on and whether the story you’re telling is in line with the quality of your services or products.

And though your Marketing Department may stop talking about your company, products or service, the consumers are not: Au contraire; their conversations (in the Social Media space) are increasing exponentially!

Furthermore don’t forget to also take into account that most of your competitors are probably not as comfortable with such a progressive world view and will focus instead on the short term outcome. This means that by keeping your budget stable, but spending it more wisely, you could seriously gain competitive advantage.

“So, then since online has the reputation for being measurable, we’ll just cut back in our offline efforts.”

Contrary to popular belief among some of my peers, right now is NOT the time to cut in offline Ad spending: If there’s one thing we’ve learned so far, it’s that in times of Crisis there is a peak in the amount of readers, visitors, viewers and listeners to (in this particular case financial) news papers & websites, TV and radio. People are looking for guidance and a steady rock to cling on to. This means that if you have a relevant story to tell there’s never been a better time to reach out to your customers and core audiences than right now!

The core thing to keep in mind here is of course that the Old Media are by their very nature geared towards Branding, and thus, -though it’s not really scientifically-rock solid-proven-effective in generating revenue- it is a perfect instrument to instill customer thrust in your brand, if handled the right way and in conjunction with Social Media Marketing and other forms of Online Marketing.

The key challenge would be timing, as you wouldn’t want to have a multi-million dollar tagline -Here Today, Where Tomorrow?- proven meaningless overnight…

One way to manage your Marketing budget would be to higher or lower it every Financial Quarter, in a wave as it were, analyzing the results and reacting accordingly. Moreover reallocate the money spent on different channels based on campaign directive. So, depending on the field or sector your operating in, decrease the amount of money spend on Branding through offline channels and shift the resulting saved money towards Online Results Based Marketing, such as SEA and in optimizing the Task Completion Rate by Primary Purpose on your website…

Yep, I’m not advising you to plainly look at Conversion Rates, I’m suggesting to take a more holistic approach ;) Back in 2006 Google’s visionairy Web Analytics Evangelist Avinash Kaushik already foresaw that the Focus (should be) Shifting from Conversion to Task Completion Rate by Primary Purpose.

Upcoming Interactive Channels that haven´t quite fully lived up to their potential yet like Social Media and Mobile are likely to be confronted with closed wallets and plummeting ad spending, not just because of advertisers cutting back in costs and investments, but also because the consumers themselves are being hesitant to spend money on luxury products and services including Mobile Internet and Mobile Wireless Internet Devices.

Yet again here it would be wise to be wary of and avoid the FUD; for example here in the Netherlands the mobile version of the largest news website Nu.nl (translated: Now.nl) is also the largest mobile news site. It is known that CTR’s in mobile enhanced sites are up to 7% or even higher, putting Display efforts on the desktop internet to shame; so though it’s understandable to make a Pavlov Reaction and eschew Mobile altogether, the contrary might be a better move. Whether your campaign is geared towards gaining a high CTR in the first place is of course a different thing altogether (I’d beg to differ, basing a campaign on CTR alone isn’t the most cost-effective way of spending your Marketing Euro).

As for Social Media, as I’ve pointed out at the beginning of this post: Your target audience, consumers and people in general aren’t going to be less critical, or dependent of peer advice and ratings and they’ll definitely be looking for bargain deals on price comparison communities, so keep joining that conversation!

Opvallend, lekker actueel, grappig, authentiek, direct, ik zou erop klikken.

(PS het gaat om de banner hierboven) Bonus: De kwinkslag naar “Wat vertel jij je vrienden?” als campagne insteek is een schot in de roos, want zeer herkenbaar.

Volgens een onderzoek gedaan door Metrix Lab in opdracht van Microsoft Advertising dien je voor een optimale online brand awareness tussen de 3 en 7 contactmomenten te hebben.

Het staat mij nog helder voor de geest dat ik een aantal weken geleden in een korte periode echt doodgegooid werd met AMC banners van, ik meen, Rabobank Connect.

Dit kwam overigens niet door het ontbreken van een frequency cap, maar gewoon doordat er in het mediaplan goede overlap was met het inzetten van de creative. Zelf ben ik overigens net als het overgrote deel van de internetpopulatie bannerblind, al moet ik toegeven dat ik -door beroepsdeformatie- nog wel eens een banner de volle aandacht geef, zoals dus in dit geval.

I had no choice: Het maakte werkelijk waar totaal niet uit op welke Nederlandse ICT/Online Marketing gerelateerde vaksite of blog ik keek, ik ontkwam gewoon niet aan de banner, vraag me alleen niet wat de precieze strekking was. Uiteraard speelt voor het resultaat van een degelijke display advertising campagne niet alleen het aantal contactmomenten zelf een rol, maar vooral ook de creative zelf en of deze in lijn is met je corporate communicatie en het umfelt.

Destijds was de betreffende rectangle echter niet zo sterk als deze, maar wel onvermijdelijk, dus als men weer een beetje kien heeft ingekocht op alle relevante online kanalen, dan zou dit wel eens een zeer effectieve AMC display-campagne kunnen worden. Of toch niet?

Want wat dan weer wel jammer is, is dat er niet direct een Adwords-campagne bij opgestart is,  zodat de displayadvertising- en de CPC-campagnes, tezamen met een goed gesegmenteerde e-mailing en RSS-vertising, elkaar ondersteunen in het genereren van kwalitatief bezoek naar de werkenbij website, temeer daar de praktijk uitwijst dat het gecombineerd inzetten van diverse uitingen in de communicatiemix conversie verhogend werkt en de (Employer)Brand Awareness kan versterken (Tip: in de organische resultaten bij watverteljijjevrienden.nl word geen juiste content omschrijving weergegeven, maar de gebruikte webanalyse tool: “OneStat.com Web Analytics”).

Dit gaat al helemaal op voor de ICT-doelgroep die de Rabobank hiermee wenst te bereiken, want die gebruiken over het algemeen Firefox als internetbrowser, hebben -net als ik- grotendeels Adblock Plus en No Script aanstaan en zien dus los van bannerblindheid zelfs een prachtige banner als deze helaas sowieso niet staan…

[Disclosure:
Begin dit jaar ben ik via ACA/JES Communicatie (zijdelings) betrokken geweest bij online AMC projecten/advies voor de Rabobank Nederland, ik ben enige tijd geleden vertrokken bij ACA/JES en momenteel heb ik geen betrokkenheid bij deze of andere projecten van de Rabobank Groep of haar (in)directe concurrenten. Los daarvan: zoals aangegeven in de disclaimer rechtsonder in de Navigation Bay^TM: deze Online Column is volledig onafhankelijk; de hier door mij weergegeven persoonlijke visie, opinie of snelle gedachtespinsels zijn derhalve niet die van de genoemde organisaties en/of aan hen gelieerde partijen en dus ook niet noodzakelijkerwijs vooraf door hen ingezien, dan wel beïnvloed. Amen. Verdorie, mooie banner ;)]

Over 30 examples of single-page portfolio sites.

Nowadays the general notion of Marketing, Communication, PR and HR(!) is that it’s not just about branding and influencing the attitudes of your core audience by connecting with them.

It’s about the big picture, about adding value to their -shared- experiences, or even better still, the big story you create together with your customers, empowering them to become your ambassadors. Your Corporate EQ if you will. All this undoubtedly requires a lot of hard smart work, but it can be as fun and as fulfilling as you’re willing to make it.

From the quality of your product/the service itself and the way you communicate about it with your consumers (and handle their feedback), up to the way you give out, say, a profile-customized receipt after a successful transaction took place. It ranges from cold-calling to After Sales, all the way up to Customer Services and helpdesks. Offline and online, back and forth. And also the core-values you hold, portray to, and share with your employees.

So, if all of the above is true, then why this post?

Because when we take all these facts and zoom in on your Online Marketing/Strategy in general and your online corporate presence in particular; than somehow in spite of all the research, proven best practices and cases of how it can and should be done, some of us still tend to forget (or rather just plainly fail to see) that your company’s online presence doesn’t just end with the mandatory neatly SEO’d corporate website, banner campaigns and the use of Google AdWords and the like.

It’s about the Search Engine Results Page (SERP): For many prospects and consumers indeed Google is the context-sensitive corporate homepage and this  article by Mr. Owyang from Forrester outlines the strategic considerations to take into account when sharing your story online. Once again essential reading by Jeremiah. Amen.

“Zeven op de tien managers en professionals zoeken via internet naar informatie over leveranciers. De helft gebruikt internet voor het opvragen van offertes, het plaatsen van orders en het vergelijken van leveranciers.”

Bron: Ernst & Young ICT Barometer (PDF)

70% van de beslissers in B2B: Rendeert jouw website?

Mashable has a sweet and short hand-out on how to communicate with your customers using social media. As usual don’t overlook the complementing links and tips in the comments.

Hoewel het gebruik van CTR alleen als een KPI om het succes of falen van een (Online) campagne aan op te hangen inmiddels achterhaald is; blijft het desondanks wel een meeteenheid waarmee je -indien het samen met de juiste data en veel common sense ter hand genomen wordt- effectief een campagne/project/website kunt bijsturen, dan wel aanpassen.

De voorhoede schuift gelukkig en eindelijk steeds meer af op een Cost-per-Lead model en het waarderen van kwaliteit  t.o.v. kwantiteit. Online Marketing maakt veel zaken meetbaar en dus accountable, maar hoe wij vervolgens uit al die data (ondubbel)zinnige feiten trachten te filteren, blijft meestal een black box voor buitenstaanders en marketeers van de oude stempel.

In navolging van het artikel waarin ik, verwijs naar een aantal inspirerende voorbeelden van Guerilla Marketing & Advertising, nu dan een zeer toegankelijke artikel op Marketing Facts welke, zeer helder en correct de basics uiteenzet van een onderdeel van Online Marketing, zonder open deuren in te trappen.

In dit geval gaat het over het analyseren van traffic en het meten van conversie op je website, waarbij puntsgewijs de gebruikte technieken en de voor- en nadelen daarvan op een heldere wijze uiteen worden gezet. In de reacties onderaan de post worden gelukkig nog wel een aantal kanttekeningen en waardevolle toevoegingen geplaatst, aangezien het stuk zelf niet helemaal volledig was over de werking (en de merites van het toepassen) van bepaalde meetmethodes  en technieken.

Bonus: Het kost minder dan zeven minuten om het door te nemen en je leert niet alleen direct en concreet iets meer over de werking van het internet, maar vooral ook wat de toegevoegde waard kan zijn van Online / Nieuwe Marketing.

“Statistiek: de wetenschap waarmee verschillende experts met dezelfde cijfers tot heel verschillende conclusies kunnen komen.”
- Evan Esar (1899-1995), Amerikaans humorist

[ Mind you, e.e.a. heb ik gepost mede naar aanleiding van het Marketing Onnline onderzoek dat bevestigd heeft dat marketeers over het algemeen niet bekend zijn met de ins en outs van Online Marketing. ]

Anibal do Rosario is a Digital Strategist with practical experience with / and theoretical knowledge of most aspects of the Consumer Life Cycle: Service Design, Sales, (Online) Marketing Strategy and Interactive Project Management.

A curious generalist, constantly in search of striking the ideal balance between creativity (gut feeling) and measurable results (data). But always with a strong focus on the end-user as Anibal is a follower and evangelist of “The Product Is The Marketing”, Customer Intimacy and Service Design schools of thought.

His goal is to use his knowledge, experience and skills to help create and develop digital services which will delight end-users and -hopefully- help create a real, meaningful difference in the world.

Anibal is the author of @AnibalDoRosario, an online repository for Internet Marketing & Online Strategy Cases, Facts and Figures.

“As a Digital Strategist, I’ve learned to approach any situation with Questions instead of with Answers: Success is all about “The Why”, Analysis, Discussion and Creativity in my opinion.”

Professional Background

In the past twelve years Anibal has built experience in:

• Retail
• Direct Sales & Canvassing
• Web Design
• Entertainment (Dance)
• Web Shops / E-commerce
• Identity & Branding
• (Online) Marketing Strategies

Agency and Client-side Experience

Anibal has gained his expertise working and learning together with experienced professionals in projects on Agency side for governmental agencies and various Triple A brands such as: The Royal Dutch Navy, Royal Dutch Shell, UWV, Rabobank, Vodafone The Netherlands and more.

Next to that, he’s been active on the Client side working at Tech start-ups Dance-Tunes.com (a subsidiary of Dutch entertainment giants ID&T and Q-dance) and GAMcard.

Developing (Online) Marketing Strategies

Anibal has also been responsible for developing the (Online) Marketing Strategy and a new Corporate Identity at Persoonlijk Zorgnetwerk, the holding company behind -amongst others- Factuurdesk.nl, ePGB.nl & ZoekPgbZorg.nl.

He was a member of the Online Marketing team at Top 10 Dutch Interactive Agency “eFocus Strategy & Webdesign”. In december 2009 eFocus has been proclaimed as the #1 full-service interactive agency in the Netherlands by Emerce Magazine, a Dutch E-commerce & New Media Industry magazine.

Feel free to contact Anibal »

Connect with Anibal

• About.me: http://about.me/anibaldorosario
• Twitter: http://twitter.com/AnibalDoRosario
• Google+: https://plus.google.com/100871007103232803068/about?rel=author
• LinkedIn: http://www.linkedin.com/in/anibaldorosario
• @AnibalDoRosario Online Cases: http://www.anibaldorosario.com/

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