At yesterday’s “Interactive Marketing Workshop” held in McLean, VA by Potomac Tech Wire several leading digital executives shared their views of the current state of online media.

Ernie Mosteller, VP, Creative Director/Emerging Media for Brunner Digital asserted that, “most advertising is bad” and that the “formula I see emerging is people looking for a formula. He cautioned that “mobile is an extremely personal space that is opt-in and you have to give people a reason to want to interact.”

Ann Hunter is comScore’s VP in charge of advertising effectiveness product suite and noted that most failed campaigns miss the mark because clients focused on trial metrics versus product benefits. She advised that when digital marketing is targeted, creative and engaging, it works. Trialing metrics don’t deliver results, she noted. “Less than 10% of web users generate about 85% of click-throughs. These are not necessarily the people you want. Click-throughs are not an appropriate goal for most campaigns.”

GenuisRocket’s founder, Mark Walsh challenged that ads should act like the consumer knows something. They should be customized, personalized and place in an appropriate context.” He also emphasized the value of interactivity. “Brand managers fall in love with tools and statistics. But interactive campaigns offer a stunningly rich opportunity to hear directly from customers.” Hunter agreed, “You lose 50% off your opportunity if you don’t listen!”

With increasing bandwidth available to users, video is a natural outcome. In fact, Mark Zaneis, Interactive Advertising Bureau’s VP of Public Policy said that with the standards IAB helped foster for formatting and serving Internet video and increasing inventory, this is a growth area. He argued that it’s a misconception that doing web video is too complicated.

Rochelle Sanchirico, Washington Post Digital’s senior director of acquisition marketing, answered the question, “how would you spend $5 million for a GAP campaign on a new jacket” said she would consider the creative elements, campaign goals and how to leverage these across channels. She emphasized that media allocations need to be optimized through-out the campaign by reassessing relevant performance metrics. She’d split the budget equally into four categories: display ads for exposure; social networks for presence and engagement; search for conversion (i.e., consumers who want to buy just need to find out where); and the final 25% into “experimental” channels like mobile or blogs.

When moderator Paul Sherman asked each panelist to name what will be hot for 2010, the answers came back as video, social, targeting and consumer control. Earlier the panelists had also called 2010 “the year of mobile.” When asked why mobile wasn’t on anybody’s “what’s hot” list the panelists said that interactive marketing has evolved beyond focusing on individual channels and that campaigns must be cross platform to fully leverage marketing and advertising opportunities.

Rick Ducey is the Chief Strategy Officer of BIA/Kelsey.

Tags: Ann Hunter, Brunner Digital, comScore, consumer control, Ernie Mosteller, GenuisRocket, IAB, Interactive Advertising Bureau, interactive marketing, Mark Walsh, Mark Zaneis, mobile, Paul Sherman, Potomac Tech Wire, Rochelle Sanchirico, social, video, Washington Post, web video

No Comment