Unica Marketing Innovation Summit 2010

Just back from three days at the Unica Customer Conference which SimpleFeed was pleased to sponsor. Some highlights from 3 days in Orlando.

Shar VanBoskirk of Forrester introduced her concept of the “SplinterNet” – basically the Apple and Facebook silos/walled gardens where people increasingly spend time and money. She argued that the SplinterNet requires a new set of marketing skills.  Campaigns give way to relationships and media buying is becoming less important than developing interactive experiences for the SplinterNet. Matt Smith of Best Buy amplified these ideas – “You have to be in market when customers are willing to listen, not when you want to start a campaign.” “Social is not a marketing change, but a business change – don’t just change your campaign, change the way you do business.” For example, Best Buy is putting 2-D bar codes on products in its stores. Customers can scan the codes and can read reviews in store on their phone.

In the mobile/social panel, Fidipidi demoed their Facebook application which allows user to create personalized greeting cards which are printed and mailed. Their app integrates with your Facebook photo album as a content source for the cards as well as with your friends list to remind you of birthdays. Akin Arikan of Unica finished the session with a great outline of the key social media metrics based on business objective – branding, lead generation, market research or engagement.

Finally in the Social Media Case Study session, our mutual customer, Rich Reich of Citrix, outlined his framework for content, behavior, technology, logistics and measurement of Social Media. Attendees leaned forward and took notes on how to get a handle on social media and sell it to senior management. Looking forward to lots of cool things coming down the road from Citrix.