As you know, MediaPost recently conducted a quick survey of our members to find out how we can better serve their needs. A total of 2,713 member participated and it goes without saying that we sincerely appreciate each and every response. The winners of the DVD player and RichMediaRoadShow planning kit giveaway were selected this morning and will be announced publicly on Monday, after we notify them all personally, so stay tuned. Until then, as promised, we wanted to share with you some of the results of the survey. Here's a breakdown: out of the total number of …

Dot-coms seeking to become profitable should focus on cutting operating costs instead of sales and marketing costs, according to a new study released today by Getzler & Company Inc., a New York-based firm specializing in turnarounds and corporate restructuring. The study, which included 190 tech companies, compared the second and third quarter performance of 46 firms that cut marketing costs with 25 firms that cut operations costs. "While sales growth among the two groups remained approximately the same, there was a dramatic difference in profitability," said Brian Mittman, VP at Getzler & Company. From the second to the …

Speaking of association, the Wireless Advertising Association unveiled a comprehensive set of standards for mobile and wireless devices. The guidelines cover three key platform areas: Short Message Service (SMS, also known as text messaging), Wireless Application Protocol (WAP, or the wireless web), and Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs, such as the Palm Pilot and PocketPC). The draft standards will be reviewed by the full membership for thirty days before being adopted throughout the industry. According to the announcement, the standards create a common set of formats and sizes so that ad creative executions and inventory will be interchangeable. Just as …

Since the Interactive Advertising Bureau has been doing such a stupendous job helping the industry through this crunch we're in, twelve of the Internet's leading content brands have taken matters into their own hands, establishing their own Online Publishers Association (OPA). The mission of this one is to represent the interests of high-quality online publishers before the advertising community, the press, the government and the public. Michael Zimbalist, former EVP of ePod, an advertising technology company, will serve as acting executive director. Whether these guys will stay true to their mission remains to be seen, of course, …

Here's some good news for your client meeting tomorrow morning: new research from Jupiter reveals that the actual return on investment (ROI) from online advertising is at least 25-35% higher than most marketers believe. According to an Executive Survey, most online marketers continue to favor direct response metrics like click-through rates (60%) and cost per conversion (75%), while only 15% are conducting formal online branding measurement on a regular basis. Hence, Jupiter thinks that marketers who begin measuring the value of online branding will find a significant increase in the ROI of their digital marketing initiatives. "Jupiter case …

Not that we needed a research house to tell us this, but instant messaging services like AOL Instant Messenger have officially become a staple of teen-age life. According to a study released earlier this week by Pew Internet and American Life Project, 13 million American middle and high school students, nearly 60% of the population between 12 and 17 years of age, just can't live without IM. The study found that most of the 754 teen-agers surveyed said the Internet was helpful with friendships and class work, and 87% of their parents agreed that the Internet helped their …

With all this talk about email usage exploding in the future with gazillions of marketing messages, I was particularly surprised by this piece of research out of Europe. It looks like in Britain, interest in email is waning. According to research just published by the Consumer's Association (CA), 36% of Brits (16 million) now surf the Net compared to 27% just a year ago, but despite that surge, the percentages of email users is actually falling. This year's CA survey found that only 5% of Internet users in the U.K. consider email to be their preferred means of …

If you're toying around with the idea of wireless advertising, here's something to consider: a new study published today by Taylor Nelson Sofres Telecoms in Europe reveals that awareness of Universal Mobile Telecommunications Systems (UMTS or '3G') remains low among potential users of services in the US, even though the technology to deliver wireless web services is close to being implemented. The study, which covered 13 countries including the US, shows that around 89% of mobile phone or Internet users in the US are 'unaware' of or feel 'poorly informed' about wireless Internet technology. In addition, there appears …

It's a chain reaction. In the last few days, three different researchers came out with different ad spending projections for the next few months and it's beginning to get confusing. Last week it was Bob Coen, who dramatically downgraded his 2001 projections for several media from his original December forecast. Coen now predicts a growth rate of 2.5% for the full year 2001 - that translates into $249.8 billion that will be spent on advertising this year, compared with $243 billion last year. That also means ad spending growth will slow down to its lowest level since the …

Don't know about you, but I still remember writing a few columns last year on the topic of interstitials vs. Superstitials. I also remember making sure to point out that very few sites accepted either format so advertisers wouldn't waste their time planning campaigns not every site would be able to run. Soon after things got really complicated. I don't mean to reminisce. I'm simply happy to point out that amidst the gloom, things are getting better in the online ad industry in terms of the variety of certain ad formats being readily available to advertisers. Unicast announced …