Is Direct Marketing a Dying Breed?

Thanks to the kind organizers of the New England Direct Marketing Association’s annual conference, I’ve been granted a press badge. While some all-day workshops were held today, I’ll attend tomorrow.

I plan to take notes, do some live-tweeting (with the #nedma tag), interview assorted presenters, and write a post-conference review. By the end, I hope to answer the question if direct marketing is dying.

With four sets of concurrent sessions throughout the day, I will skip the first and attend the next three. Here’s what I’m thinking…

The Road to Sustainability – A Green Panel
“Green” or “Sustainable Marketing” is getting hotter and hotter. Are you ready to find out if it makes sense for your business? In this exciting 60-minute panel discussion, you’ll learn about two different companies (one B2B and one B2C), how they became “corporately sustainable” and how they took advantage of “green marketing” to drive sales. Both Sappi Fine Paper and Hotel Chocolat will share their secret recipes for becoming – and marketing themselves as – “environmentally, economically and socially sustainable.”

You’ll learn:
• Why and how a business gets started in being “sustainable.”
• How you can take advantage of being “sustainable” and “green” to drive marketing and sales.
• What “sustainable/green marketing” tactics you should leverage in today’s economy.

Speakers:
Ray Chang is Director of Business Development at Envisa, a boutique consultancy that designs, builds and optimizes e-business solutions for multi-channel merchants to help make a positive impact on sales, operations and customer experience. Ray’s broad experience stems primarily from the Personal Computing and Mobile Telecommunications industries, including Lenovo’s Embedded Mobile Broadband ThinkPad notebooks, IBM’s Microelectronics, Technology Group and Personal Computing divisions.

Nicki Doggart left high tech to pursue a sweeter existence in the world of gourmet chocolate. She is the Chief Operating Officer for Hotel Chocolat Inc., having launched the company in July 2007. At Hotel Chocolat, she combines her entrepreneurial skills and spirit, passion for good food, and commitment to corporate social responsibility and sustainability. Doggart received her MBA from Cranfield School of Management, a European business school, where she was a founding member of the Corporate Responsibility & Sustainability board.

Laura Thompson is the Director of Technical Marketing and Sustainable Development for Sappi Fine Paper North America. Laura has a B.S. in Chemical Engineering and an M.S. and PhD in Paper Science. Since 1995, she has held a variety of positions within the paper industry including R&D, mill environmental, product development for specialties and coated fine paper, and most recently sustainability. Since joining Sappi in 2006, Laura has quickly emerged as an industry leader in the field of sustainable development.

That will be followed by the NEDMA Foundation’s scholarship award presentation and a keynote address by Mary Ann Marsh of the Dewey Square Group and a Fox News commentator on “Yes, You Can! What Marketers Can Learn From President Obama’s Campaign.”

While there are many parallels between his campaign and direct marketing, I wonder what she’ll say.

Next up:

Effective Email Marketing – Deliverability, Tracking & Compliance
In this session you’ll learn more about email marketing, one of the most effective media to generate new business and increase sales. You’ll learn how to evaluate the key components for an ESP, review how to measure results of your campaigns, and much more. You’ll also gain knowledge of spam filter triggers – and steps you can take to avoid them and increase deliverability. If you still have questions once the session is over, an Abuse, Compliance & Delivery Specialist will be on hand for Q&A.

You’ll learn:
• Key components your ESP should provide.
• How to measure campaigns and use reporting features.
• How to avoid spam filter triggers.

Speaker:
Shane McCarthy’s sales and marketing career spans over many industries and multiple continents. His experience is in the telecomm, software, audio visual, and Software as a Service (SAS) arena. He has spent time in the US and Australia overseeing as many as 450 people, mostly focusing on sales and marketing efforts.

I don’t know about you, but I’d rather receive less email than more; so I’m very curious what Shane says and the audience asks.

The final session I’m thinking, which ought to be more fun, is:

Social Media is About Socializing!
Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Blogs … what’s it all about? Social Media Marketing is not just about advertising, it’s about Socializing! It’s about creating robust, interconnected platforms and channels that embed high-quality content into the social Web, building a community of “friends”, and communicating with those friends in a way that encourages meaningful and measurable online and offline behaviors. In this session, you’ll hear how leading organizations and companies you know are using social media to make genuine and lasting connections with their target audiences.

You’ll learn:

• What Social Media Marketing is and how the Social Media landscape fits together
• How to weave your content into the social Web to create relationships with “friends” and “fans.”
• How to measure social media success and report meaningful metrics.

Speaker:
Harry Gold is the architect and conductor behind Overdrive’s ROI-driven programs. Overdrive has been at the forefront of online branding and channel creation, developing successful Web and search engine–based marketing programs for various agencies and top companies such as Harley-Davidson, John Hancock, Dow Jones, EMC, Progress Software, The Princeton Review and Cognos. Harry started his career in 1995 when he founded online marketing firm Interactive Promotions, serving such clients as Microsoft, The Financial Times, the Hard Rock Café and the City of Boston. He is a frequent lecturer on Search Engine Marketing and online media for NEDMA, the Ad Club, UMass Boston, Harvard, and BU. Harry is also an expert columnist for ClickZ.

Related posts:

1. Why Email Marketing Still Sucks
2. Lifting Social Media Marketing with Gravity
3. Explain Marketing Functions with Silverware

Tagged as: events, marketing

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