11 Essential Skills for Digital Marketing

I was sent a link to Ian Lurie's post, 11 Internet Marketing Skills That Must Be Second Nature, yesterday by a friend. Not only do I agree with everything Ian says, but he made me laugh. So I thought that I should share his insights with you.

1. XHTML and CSS. You don't have to be a god(dess) of web programming. But so help me God the next 'internet marketer' who gives me a blank stare when I mention CSS gets an atomic wedgie. And by the way, web standards have nothing to do with the metric system.
2. Search engine optimization. Search engine results are the starting point for at least 70% of all online behavior. How on earth will you help someone market themselves online if you don't even know what moves a site up and down in the rankings? Quick hint: Saying "SEO? Oh, we optimize your meta tags" is the same as saying "I am a severely impaired nubwit".
3. Pay per click marketing. Nothing sucks money out of a marketing budget faster than undisciplined PPC marketing. Assuming you care about your clients, you need to know a lot about PPC. Knowing where PPC ads show up doesn't count, by the way. You need to know and understand concepts like negative keywords, quality scoring, dynamic keywords and content networks. Another hint: "Negative keyword" doesn't mean "Keywords that make you feel bad".
4. Analysis. Let me make this clear: A bar chart is not analytics. If I ask for analysis and you e-mail me a bar chart I will so kick your behind. Analysis/analytics is the practice of turning data (the bar chart) into action steps and conclusions like "Wow, our ROI on this keyword is great. We need to build a landing page."
5. Usability. Please, please read Don't Make Me Think. Just for starters. Then start keeping an eye on Jakob Nielsen's site and other resources. Usability is a non-stop learning process. So get going.
6. Complete sentences. Write every day. Every day. I don't care what you write about. But you need to be able to write a post like this in 30-40 minutes, and it needs to be readable.
   
7. RSS and feeds. I shouldn't even have to say this. But you do know how to use Google Reader, right? Right?!
8. Blogging and social media. Write at least one blog. See 'Complete Sentences', above. And know what people mean when they say 'social media'. They really mean media. Understand what makes it all tick, and how you can help someone interact with their audience in a meaningful way.
9. E-mail marketing. Learn to build a house e-mail list. Learn why most rental e-mail lists suck eggs. Know what makes an e-mail work or fail.
10. Statistics 101. If you don't know what a rolling average is, don't even talk to me.
11. Marketing. Oh, did I mention? You need to be good at, you know, making people understand why something is The Product For Them.

The House That Ogilvy Built

Great document by Kennth Roman, about David Ogilvy and his timeless understanding of business and advertising. Worth a read by anyone who has ever worked a job!

Male Copywriter

There are very few people not effected by the current global economic situation. Whatever sector you work in, you probably know people who have been laid off. But what if you are one of those people. What if, following 15 years of hard grift, you find yourself 'let go'?

Hope and pray that it all gets better? Pretend you know anything about coffee other then how to drink it and become a barista in the local Starbucks?

As Carlsberg would have us think, it's not always A or B, there's probably a C. And sure enough, if you're Lawson Clarke, there definitely is. It might be a little 'out there' but at the very least, it's a way to get known.

After his 15 years of copywriting for clients like Ocean Spray, Carnival and Strongbow, Lawson was another casualty of 'uncertain times' and found himself without work. Not willing to let his unemployment stop him, he created his site: Male Copywriter.

This is essential viewing.

In some sort of crazy cross between Ron Burgandy and Dirk Diggler, Lawson demonstrates him impressive work profile against a backdrop of 70's style porn shoot, with Lawson atop a bear skin rug, hair cheast cascading down his front, and the Star Spangled Banner belting through your speakers. Hopefully the tongue is firmly in the cheek, as if this is anything other then SNL style humour we should all be very scared. None-the-less, this is still must see digital and a potential 'how-to' for anyone else out of work with a bit of creative ability.

T-Moblie Trafalgar Square Event

Here's a great look behind the scenes of the recent T-Moblie Trafalgar Square Event, by Campaign.tv. The event, produced by Saatchi and Saatchi, is the latest T-Moblie ad and features a mass karaoke in Trafalgar Square of over 13k people.

i-Mashup Vodafone

It's become fairly regular to see individuals or even small companies posting blogs or Tweeting to find developers to work on iPhone apps (or java etc.), but this has to be one of the largest companies I've seen to date using a competition mechanic to drive development.

Vodafone Malta have just launched their i-Mashup competition, which calls on developers to submit innovative and useable applications that offer real customer value. Although the prize structure isn't huge (1st place €2,500, 2nd place €1,000 and 3rd place €500) it's bound to drive interest. Considering the current economic climate, I'm sure there are plenty of developers who'd be willing to spend a bit of their own time to try and win two and a half grand. Of course on Vodafone's end, they spent €4,000 on prizes and perhaps another €500/€1,00 on admin and advertising, and they potentially have hundreds of mobile apps at their disposal.

Will it be long before we see similar here in Ireland?