Bill Thomas
An Accomplished Web Developer
Specializing in E-marketing

E-marketing works best when the right content is placed in front of the right audience at the right time. It starts with knowing your consumer – who they are - what they need – where they are looking for it – and what action they are likely to take once they find it.

If you focus on consumer needs/wants rather than focusing only on what you want the consumer to know, you will begin to understand the difference between online marketing methods vs. traditional marketing methods. For instance, just take a look at some of the more popular tools of the Web 2.0 Internet – recognize a pattern?

- Social networks like MySpace, Facebook, and YouTube.
- Blogs.
- Interactive personalized web sites.
- Message Boards.
- Community-based "common topic" forums.
- Permission based email.
- Keyword managed search engine campaigns.
- Product reviews, customer comments, and consumer feedback forms.

They all serve the user. From uploading videos, submitting a product review, engaging in a topical debate, to choosing which information to receive, it is the user that controls the experience. And users are consumers.

This is what many traditional marketers miss when trying to market online. Many marketers fail to realize how e-marketing requires the use of new tools, ideas, and technologies vs. the mass-market methods of TV, print, and radio.

Not that traditional methods online can't be successful, rather that a one-way broadcasted message alone is no longer enough to engage the consumer. Consumer’s want - and more importantly- expect more involvement.

To reach the consumer you must be one of them.

According to a recent study published by Forrester - consumers have a better understanding of social networking, cell phone web surfing, blogging, and community-based web forums than the average traditional marketer.

Consumers are posting videos, product reviews, consumer comments and opinions equally as fast as they are viewing and sharing them. A behavior that is likely to only increase. This is a whole other world than the one just a few years ago.

E-marketing today requires:

• A whole new understanding of the modern consumer's online motivations and expectations.
• An acceptance of new tools and technologies that are now part of marketing - not separate functions anymore.
• The knowledge that the Internet must be a part of the broader plan, not an isolated after-thought.
• True partnership with functional areas beyond marketing like sales, consumer affairs, technology, public relations, and research.
• A concentrated effort to know how to determine and report success.
• An acceptance that to be competitive, marketers must relinquish some control of their brand's message to the consumer.

It's all about the consumer.