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“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?

Repeat after me: In connecting with the consumer there are no shortcuts. PR Week reports on Web ‘fakery’ law change.

In a nutshell it finally puts an end to sock-puppeting and astro-turfing, in the UK. Now the following is wishful thinking on my part, but wouldn’t it be nice if this law could be instated as a standard all across the world?

The only negative point I can raise regarding this new regulation, is the very fact that’s it’s a law and thus that the industry failed to be self-regulatory: Aside from the moral stance we can take in this as honest, progressive thinking digerati AND as a consumer -e.g. that it’s wrong for a company or organization to lie and deceive or manipulate the very people that they’d want to sustainably connect with- I find it actually almost unbelievable that there are still marketers/strategists and indeed organizations out there today who are willing to use such methods! Forgotten how for example Sony’s attempt to do so with a PSP-Blog backfired immensely on them a few years back?

Question: Do you enjoy it when you find out that someone you trust has cheated or lied to you and that they did this just because they thought they could and to selfishly further their own good? Thought so. As a human being you don’t like being cheated, nobody does, and since you’re trying -on behalf of your organization- to connect with other human beings, act concordantly. You’re the professional who knows what he or she is talking about when it comes to connecting with the consumers, so convince PR, Branding, Strategy, The Board, the CEO… Whoever gave out the order, why this is akin to shooting yourself in the foot with a bazooka and then show them the alternatives that do work.

“Oh so now it’s about 2.0 and connecting, and we’re a bit low on budget, so I have this great idea: Weblogs and forums are considered 2.0 and those flashy sites are about communicating, but people are posting all kinds of negative comments about our customer service and all, so why don’t we start a conversation there? The catch is; we’re the only participants and by “we” I actually mean “me”: I’ll post a topic and then I’ll post all the comments! This way we’re on the cutting edge of communication in the middle of our target audience AND we’re still in control of our brand.”
Sorry pal, but you’re not in control of your brand. You never have been actually, only now with the advent of the internet and social media this wisdom has become more apparent, a commodity.

“I’m talking zero investment here: Only a few man-hours to write the script and post it and maybe a little monitoring afterwards, the remaining budget can go to banner placements in context with the posts; surefire traffic I’m telling ya!”</Insert Sly Wink here>
Dude this is going to cost you and your brand more than just the low budget, especially in the mid- and long-term, you’re going to look at a negative ROI.

“Huh? B-but… We’re connecting right? We’re not just “sending” anymore and -and hey we’re broadcasting on the Social Media! …Err Right?”

Newsflash: It’s about communicating and connecting with your target audience in an authentic way and hopefully conquering their minds and hearts leading to the possibility that they may become, over time, your ambassador, so you can then empower them to do so in ways that they deem most fit. In all honesty and openness.

But of course to do that, you’d need at least two crucial things: First; an open minded, progressive thinking marketer/strategist and second; a product or service that doesn’t suck. And though you may not see the effects or end results immediately, if either of these two key components is missing, than your organization is in deep serious trouble. Thing is, the trouble doesn’t always come as a bang, but could just as well creep up as a whisper and no cheap postings on user-forum and blogs is going to silence or stop either of them…

As always a sense of urgency always comes when it’s either too late or unnecessary damage has already been done. A real shame, more so because thinking about authentic ways to enthuse the consumer is actually a lot of fun and, if it works, worth a whole lot more to brag about at birthday parties afterwards ;)

Eén van de grotere IT-hypes van 2008 is toch wel SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) ofwel cloud computing. De vraag is of en in welke mate deze manier van outsourcen daadwerkelijk voet aan de grond zal krijgen, ondanks de schijnbare voordelen. Dit artikel geeft maar weer eens aan dat ook software in the cloud geen one-size-fits-all oplossing is die overal op toepasbaar is en dat je als organisatie niet zomaar achter iedere buzz (web2.0, widgets, online video, mobiel en nu dus Saas) aan moet rennen. Open deur voor sommigen, maar helaas nog niet voor de meerderheid. Stay tuned.

Anibal do Rosario is a Digital Strategist with over 14 years of practical experience with -and theoretical knowledge of- most Costumer Touchpoints within the Customer Life Cycle.

This includes Consultative Sales, Service Design, Graphic Design and (Online) Marketing Strategy.

He’s an online generalist who strongly believes in the power of branding, and has experienced 7 years of interacting face-to-face with consumers on a daily basis (see the extended profile here).

Having a creative (Web) Design background, Anibal’s constantly in search of striking the ideal balance between gut feeling and hard data. He believes that organisations need to look beyond targets or clinical analytics and amaze their customers with excellent Service & User Experience.

Core values: Always Be Testing, “The Product Is The Marketing”, Customer Intimacy, Service Design and last but not least: End-users rule!

Above all, he tries to learn new stuff, every single day.

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

Professional Background

In the past 14 years Anibal has built experience in:

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

Agency and Client-side Experience

Anibal has gained his expertise working 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 and 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.

Anibal currently works as an Online Product Manager at DTG; a new media company formerly known as the “De Telefoongids” Directory (Dutch Yellow Pages & White Pages).

More details? Visit Anibal’s Extended Online Résumé here »

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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