If there is anyone that likes to talk marketing!!

[mediaadvantages]

I would love to exchange information or just chat in general about marketing mobi sites.

My background:
Have been in the advertising agency business for 15 years now. Worked at a small agency with various tasks in highschool and college. Went to work for another small agency after college in another city. Then spent a few years at Best Buys Corp. Offices in Minneapolis. Started my own business about 3 years ago. Have had the opportunity to learn all aspects of marketing. I specialize in media planning and buying.

Many of my clients have been asking what is the future of advertising. I took it upon myself to find the answer for them. Of course I believe .mobi is part of that answer.

[acc]

Have been in the advertising agency business for 15 years now. .... Many of my clients have been asking what is the future of advertising. I took it upon myself to find the answer for them. Of course I believe .mobi is part of that answer.This is something that I have been thinking a lot about the last couple of years. Being active in the .US domains and now also in the .mobi namespace, I am surprised how absent the advertising industry has been from using, recommending, and taking advantage of the inherent brandability of the .US extension. Now we have the .mobi extension and am anxious to see if they do any better with it. So far it appears that businesses are adopting it, whether or not their advertising companies have anything to do with this is a question.

In addition to the obvious use of their own company's name as a domain, businesses should be using as many appropriate generic domain names as possible to extend and expand their marketing reach.

Some have opined that using anything other than a dot com is not good enough for many larger companies especially. However there is only one .com variation of a single keyword and that covers just ONE company (if they can pry it from the parked page owner) in the niche. What about the 100's or 1000's of similar businesses in the same business segment or niche?

Then there's the .net. After that the use of other good, relevant extensions (their ccTLD should be the first step - see the wise folks in .de and .co.uk) is the next obvious frontier. With the advent and undeniable future growth of the mobile web, the dot mobi extension seems like a no brainer. I believe that it is just a matter of introducing and explaining it to businesses.

Advertising agencies seem to be reluctant or at least slow in adapting to new extensions, the use of generic term domains, and anything outside of the status quo. With your presence and postings here , you seem to get it. Do your colleagues get it? What can be done to educate or expose them to the possibilities of .mobi (and .us)?

[coast]

MediaAdvantages, I am very involved with marketing and websites. It would be fun to pick each others' brains.

[mediaadvantages]

I can tell you that most people don't get it. But, I have helped agencies to understand a little better. One thing we have to understand is that advertisers are fickle about spending money on anything. And agencies are held responsible by the clients for the dollars spent. It's considered high risk at this point for advertisers to spend money on the internet. They have used television, radio, print and outdoor for years because they have seen results. It's all still new. I don't have the numbers in front me but if you look at the past 10 years advertising expenditures on television, radio, print and internet, you will understand. It was just over a year ago when we started seeing corporations really invest a specific amount of money to internet marketing. Last year 2 auto companies and a beverage company shifted 20% of their advertising budget to internet. We are talking about .com advertising. It will all come in time. Internet advertising is showing huge growth spurts while traditional mediums are taking the hit.