Advertising Perceptions Inc, released the first in a series of bi-monthly polls tracking confidence of top advertising executives called Advertiser Optimism Reports.

Here’s the surprise.  Cable TV is rising amid the economic uncertainty in the general economy.  While execs are still optimistic about online advertising, significantly fewer of them are predicting increases in spending than the previous survey.  In fact, intentions to increase spend online are declining faster than any other medium.

The report suggests that advertisers are retreating to the safe harbor of TV advertising…particularly cable TV advertising.

Our suspicion is that while all the hype for the past couple of years has focused on online advertising, results haven’t followed as expected.  It’s a truism in today’s society whether you’re talking about Wall Street or Madison Avenue, that bandwagons start fast and drive hard, only to slow when faced with a hill.

If you view marketing as an investment, and we hope you do, then you hold your investment accountable for a return.  Marketers race to the newest best thing, only to come back to the reality that there is no silver bullet.  Only creativity, persistance and intelligence.

The time of silo interactive activities is over.  The time for integrated interactive strategies is now.

Integrated interactive planning is about producing measurable results for less.  This economy demands the reinvention of your marketing plan.  Most companies can no longer rely on a fat media budget to drive business.  Now is the time to look differently at your interactive strategy because it may provide a way for you get through this recession and come out stronger on the other side.

The first thing you have to do is forget about silos and remember that all of your interactive, traditional and non-traditional marketing activities must work together.

The first thing to do is to realize that your web site is the most efficient sales tool/retail location you have.  It’s open 24/7, you don’t have to feed it, clothe it, move it, pay it(much), or insure it.  It won’t call in sick, argue with you or goof off on the computer.  That’s why we’ve put it in the center of the Interactive Integration Wheel.

Second, forget about silos.  Forget about branding being separate from web development.  Forget about search being separate from online media.  Instead, consider how they all can fit together.  Duh?  Maybe it seems like I’m pointing out the obvious, but we see all too many marketers who keep everything separate.

Specialists often find it difficult to think about the interaction all the different marketing activities that go into a successful integrated plan and prefer to work only in their comfort zone.  So, the danger is that one activity will receive more attention than another, creating an imbalanced marketing plan.  It would be like spending 90 percent of the budget on a beautiful website and only 10 percent driving people to it….or vice versa.

Third, think of every circle outside the hub as being a hub of its own wheel.  For instance, social networking would be surrounded by Facebook, Myspace, twitter, YouTube, blogs  and a few hundred others. It’s kind of like a never ending galaxy of opportunity and much of it is in the economy of free except for the labor required to make it happen.

Fourth, some activities on the wheel are one way communications and some encourage a dialog with your customers or sales force.  Dialog that makes or saves money should receive top priority.  Customer service is a prime example.  You can provide customer service online with FAQs, chats, e-mails and as a last resort, phone support.  If you’re successful in supporting your customer without a phone call, you’ll save money and return more to the bottom line.  The best part is you can document the ROI.  If you have a call center, imagine the savings if you could cut 10 percent of the cost of phone support.  Think you could find something else to do with that money?

Fifth, somethings won’t fit.  Just as some media won’t fit your target audience, some interactive activities won’t fit your marketing needs.  For instance, if you’re marketing to teens, twitter is not a good choice.  Myspace might be.  On the same hand, don’t discount an activity until you’ve thought about it.

The more you want to prove ROI, the more attractive integrated interactive strategies become.  You can see the results.  Your CEO can see the results.  And you can soften the blow of a draconian budget cut by redirecting a little of the money into a highly effective arena.

We’ll be the first to admit that on the surface, integrated interactive strategies can look a little intimidating.  But there’s gold here.  If you’re interested we’d love to talk to you about how we can move your business forward with a comprehensive interactive plan.  Not just a website, not just an e-mail campaign, but an overall plan of attack to make your marketing budget more effective.

There’s a balance between functionality on the web and creativity on the web.  You can bore a visitor with no creativity but plenty of functionality, or you can annoy a visitor with plenty of creativity but not much functionality.  The magic of the web doesn’t come from magic tricks, it comes from fulfilling the needs of the visitor.

We are a branding firm that does interactive, not an interactive firm that does branding.  Our business in the interactive area has grown rapidly over the past few years.  Here are a few things we’ve learned along the way.

1.  Start with a clear objective–What do you want the site to do for your business.  Sell, inform, entertain, create a following, all of the above?

2.  Be realistic about expectations–We would all like to have a web site that has millions of visitors a day.  Business would be good.  But that’s not reality for most businesses.  If you’re selling bearings from China, you’re likely not going to make the top twenty five.  The important thing is that the right people visit your site.

3.  What does the visitor want from the visit--They have taken the time to search you out.  They obviously want something from you.  Do they want quick information, or a total product demonstration?  Do they look to you for the latest information in your category?  Do they want a price and if they do are you going to make them call to get it?  I hate that.

4.  Make the website brand rich–Your web site should be the best representative of your brand in your organization.  You control it. Think of it as the center of your marketing programs.  Make everything point to it.

5.  Promote it–Buy AdWords.  Maximize SEO.  Include the URL prominently in everything you do promotionally and otherwise.

6.  Just because you can, doesn’t mean you should–Web sites become information dumping grounds.  Less is more.  The other point to this learning is just because you can do magic, make things appear, disappear, move, dance and sing, doesn’t mean you should.  But if you determine you should and your visitors will love it, swing for the fences.

7.  Don’t be awed by the technology–If you can think it, you can do it and you can find somebody that knows how.  We have yet to meet anyone who knows everything about the web and programming.  But we’ve developed a deep network of people who know how to make our sometimes crazy ideas work.

8.  Monitor results frequently–Your web site is real time marketing.  You can see when promotions are working, and when they’re not working.  You can use visitor habits to finely tune your site to reap the biges rewards.

From a marketer’s standpoint, Google Analytics is more fun than just about anything I can think of…well maybe not but it’s pretty fun.  We have been working with it for sometime now tracking web traffic and AdWord results.  I must admit, I’m addicted.

It’s a perverse thrill to make an AdWord tweak and see the click through rate for one of our clients go up.  Or to watch the web visit trend line spike the same day a new television commercial breaks and then watch it continue to climb as the media plan kicks in to full fury.  Or to know that someone you don’t know in Middletown is reading your blog.

Google Analytics gives marketers the ability to work real time and that ability is tremendously powerful.  The metrics in provides allow us to track, refine and report real results.  We know when we do something that works and when something doesn’t work.  That saves time and more importantly makes every dollar our clients spend more effective.