Instead, the NAA’s big meeting this week was all about traditional vs. new forms of media. The association griped about aggregators and third-party sites–which at least know how to leverage their stories. Sure, Google chief Eric Schmidt pointed out that his company helps drive traffic to news organizations’ sites, offering a way for those companies to charge a premium for online ads. But what NAA members really should have discussed is, ”How to get to the consumer first?”

And I’ll answer: Digital distribution. Papers are never, ever going to get print subscriptions up to what they once were. But they can obtain subscribers who want their news delivered digitally, like through text message/SMS, email, or RSS. (By the way, the mobileStorm 4.0 digital marketing platform lets clients send all of these types of messages.)

The benefits are many.  Consumers can rest assured that they’ll get the news straight from the source as soon as it’s ready to read. They can even pick and choose which kind of news they want, if they like–”politics,” “local crime,” “arts and entertainment,” etc. And organizations can make money by either charging consumers a subscription fee, or by using an ad-supported model (like other websites using their copy already do).

Will they get it? I’m hoping that after NNA chief John Sturm’s absolutely clueless appearance on the Colbet Report, they realize that they have to start thinking way, way outside the box.

Key benefits:

• 100% deliverability. If you offer your email and newsletter content via RSS, subscribers to your feed enjoy guaranteed delivery of your content.
• Pull, not push. By signing up to receive your feed, your subscriber is actively requesting your content and updates. This tends to indicate a higher level of customer loyalty and differs from the push strategy sometimes associated with email.

RSS is a great compliment to other digital marketing programs. It’s versatile and can be used in many unique ways. How can you apply RSS technology to your business? Check out ten examples of how companies currently use RSS:

• Orbitz.com, a comprehensive travel website, offers an abundance of services via RSS including airport updates, vacation deals, car rentals, and hotel specials.
  http://www.orbitz.com/App/ViewRSSHelpPage
  
• Amplify, a credit union based in Texas, uses a secure RSS feeder connection to keep customers up to date on what’s happening with their accounts.
  http://www.goamplify.com/products/services/onlinebanking/rss.cfm
• Boston’s Hidden Restaurants, a site showcasing lesser-known restaurants in the New England area, uses RSS feeds to update subscribers on new reviews. Similarly, Creative Loafing—an alternative newspaper and guide to happenings in the metropolitan Atlanta area—uses RSS feeds to update users on various categories including events and restaurants.
  http://atlanta.creativeloafing.com/gyrobase/Syndication
• An Italian restaurant in Red Bank, New Jersey uses an RSS feed to keep patrons updated on specials, menu items, and other promotions.
  http://www.2senza.com/rssfeed.xml
• Cabela’s, an online retailer of sporting and outdoors goods, hosts an RSS feed that informs customers about new products and specials in its “Bargain Cave.”
  http://www.cabelas.com/cabelas/en/templates/category/category.jsp?id=cat21404&navAction=jump&cmCat=MainCatcat21404&cm_re=store*topnav*bc
• Vinfolio, an online wine retailer based in San Francisco, allow users to create custom feeds or subscribe to existing feeds to find out when new wines come in, or to read wine reviews and scores. http://www.vinfolio.com/customerService-rss.jsp
• Indeed.com, a job search aggregator, allows you to subscribe to custom job feeds and notifies you when new classifieds are added.
  http://www.indeed.com
• Belief.net, a multi-faith based website, uses RSS to deliver daily inspiration, faith-based news, and other information relevant to cultivating spiritual growth.
  http://www.beliefnet.com/services/rss/index.html
• UNICEF features RSS feeds to update subscribers on news, current features, and photo essays.
  http://www.unicef.org/rss/index.html

Shaneli Ramratan, Marketing Manager

As a result, companies trying to establish their particular format as the standard tend to dismiss the other proposed suggestions. So-called “early adopters’ are used to such shifts but by the time a particular technology reaches the mass consumer audience, normally one standard is established… hopefully.

Digital marketing channels are no different when it comes to standards, both good and bad. Some communication vehicles are more or less uniform in their standards but others offer digital marketers a sometimes bewildering array of options, causing many to go with the less common denominator approach. To help sort through the mess, here’s a quick guide on how various digital marketing communications deal with standards, from the easiest to the most contentious.

RSS

RSS or Really Simple Syndication has been around for years but has only just started to reach beyond the techies thanks to applications like Firefox and Outlook which now the incorporate the technology. RSS was born out of several failed attempts to syndicate online content and has the most stable set of standards among digital marketing channels. Yet, there is a competing version of RSS called Atom, which was created by a group of developers who felt the standard RSS format was too limiting. Fortunately most RSS readers are able to interpret both formats, making a digital marketer’s job a whole lot easier when deploying RSS campaigns.

Online Video

Just a few years ago, online video was probably the most dysfunctional of all when it came to standards with such incompatible formats as QuickTime, Audio Video Interleave (AVI), RealVideo, etc. etc. While these formats all do still exist, the explosion of such sites as YouTube have made it all a bit more tolerable by more or less standardizing on Adobe’s Flash Video. This was important because the Flash player was already practically a default install for the vast majority of online consumers.

Still, many marketers prefer to use the other, more high quality (but not as universal) format like QuickTime and Microsoft’s AVI. This usually results in sites having to list 2 or 3 different options to view the video, which can be a pain for the consumer but is still considered to be fairly nominal.

Email

As one of the older forms of digital marketing, you would probably assume that email would be one type of communication that would have a true set of standards in place… and you would be wrong. While it’s true that all email uses a standard protocol – Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) to manage transmission, when it comes to the actual successful delivery of email campaigns, the variety of methods can be maddening.

I won’t go into detail about the various forms of email authentication as I have already written about this in a previous blog entry. However, just as a quick overview, there are currently 4 main “standards” (obviously I use that term loosely here) that are being used by the ISPs.

The Sender Policy Framework (SPF) was the first attempt and is still widely supported but was quickly adapted into a more secure option backed by Microsoft called Sender ID. Not to be outdone, Yahoo! developed yet another format called Domain Keys, and Cisco created their own called Identified Mail. Mercifully, the two companies agreed to merge their respective protocols into a single format, known as DKIM. It looks like it could be years before a true standard is decided (if ever) so digital marketers should be aware that all of these formats need to be implemented in order to reach as many potential inboxes as possible.

Mobile

When it comes to text messaging, like email, mobile marketing does at the very least have a standard protocol for the transmission of such messages. The Short Message Service (SMS) has a limit of 160 characters per message and is supported by all cell phone carriers. Unfortunately, that is the only true standard. Everything else when it comes to mobile marketing is fractious at best.

As previously noted, one of the main reasons standards take so long to be established is because of the desire for companies to maintain a competitive advantage over each other. This is especially true when it comes to the cell carriers. Some of this is due to the unique nature of mobile marketing as the only form of digital messaging that has a cost to the consumer (either as part of their cell plan or individually via premium campaigns.) The Mobile Marketing Association has published a set of guidelines that should be followed, but some carriers have additional requirements.

This is especially true when it comes to premium SMS campaigns. Recently, AT&T and Verizon increased their requirements to approve such campaigns, and more carriers are expected to follow suit soon. Individual submissions must be made to each carrier, which can cause the entire process to be bogged down, so be prepared to wait awhile for certification.

Mobile content is even more contentious as each major provider in the US has their own preferred format to use – from BREW or J2ME for Web applications to a variety of mobile video options. To make matters worse, each major carrier has their own portal, called a “deck” which can only be accessed by their subscribers. Marketers therefore have no choice but to work with each carrier individually to get placement on these decks.

All told, when it comes to digital marketing, standards are few and far between. Marketers need to be constantly aware as various standards evolve and new ones are created. The consequences for not doing so can prevent their digital marketing initiatives from being as successful as planned.

Steve Chipman
COO
mobileStorm
Analog thoughts in a digital world

RSS, which stands for Really Simple Syndication, is a relatively new web technology that is used to publish frequently updated content such as blogs and news. The first version of RSS was created in March of 1999 for use on the my.netscape.com portal. A 2004 Pew study found that 1 out of 20 people online said they used an RSS aggregator to read content online. So, I can only image how big that number is today. RSS was also the 3rd most searched for “what is” term on Google last year.

All major online portals use RSS to push content to their sites. MyYahoo, for example, is basically just a bunch of RSS feeds. Yahoo lets you customize which news you do and do not want to see. Additionally, Firefox and even Outlook 2007 now have RSS readers built into their applications. This allows you to subscribe to a feed by simply clicking an icon, and the feed is added to your RSS reader.

Marketers are now getting into RSS to keep consumers informed in real-time of their news and activities, and even using it as an additional marketing channel for advertising and commerce. Here are 10 reasons why marketers should use RSS:

1. Your content can be syndicated: You can have many different websites picking up your feeds and distributing your content.

2. It is 100% double opt in: Someone has to add your feed to their RSS reader. With 100% double opt in, your response and open rates will go through the roof. Also, nobody can subscribe you without your permission, which brings me to the next point.

3. It’s private: You don’t have to give out personal info or an email address to sign up, which makes people more likely to subscribe to your feed.

4. There is NO spam: It’s not possible to subscribe to an RSS feed and get spam. This means that your message will not be cluttered, and your subscribers will be able to read each message.

5. There is 100% deliverability: Your campaign will not be blocked by a spam filter. It will always end up in their reader, giving you higher response rates.

6. It’s updated in real-time: If your content is constantly changing, such as a stock quote, sports score, product sale etc., you can use RSS to update your subscribers in real-time, ensuring that everyone stays up to date.

7. It can be accessed anywhere: Nowadays, a lot of mobile phones have RSS readers so your content can be accessed on the go. We are even seeing convergence with televisions. Samsung’s new Touch HDV for example, includes RSS feeds which are displayed on the screen.

8. You can include Google Adsense: A lot of publishers are including their Adsense ads in their RSS feeds. Currently this is not possible with email. See this example by uncreate.com:



9. There are no laws: Because RSS is 100% opt in and there is no spam, there are no laws or regulations surrounding this message type that you need to be aware of. Feed away my friend, feed away.

10. It’s fast: The minute you launch your feed, it’s your subscribers’ readers. RSS is great to reach a large group of people instantly and with 100% deliverability.

Now, I am sure a few of you are thinking: what’s the point of email? RSS sounds so much better! There are still a number of reasons why email isn’t going away. First off, even though a lot of trendsetters know and use RSS, the majority of people don’t. There are a lot of people who feel RSS will never become main stream, especially since currently there are over a billion email inboxes worldwide. However, even if RSS does become mainstream, email is about relationships and conversations. You can create a two-way dialogue with email that you cannot have with RSS. The key is to complement email with RSS, and I encourage you to explore ways in which you can use both.

Jared Reitzin
CEO – mobileStorm
Small Business Funding