MoreOver, Haburi, J Walter Thompson, UKODA

*** MarketingSherpa.co.uk ***
Practical News, Gossip & Tips for
Internet Marketers in the UK
June 19, 2000 - Vol. I, Issue 5

1. NEWS & GOSSIP: Haburi.com, UKODA, Nationwide

2. CASE STUDY: J. Walter Thompson’s Famous Tim

3. EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: MoreOver.com Leaders

4. EVENTS: Spain, Cash and eTailing

** Please forward to your friends & colleagues.
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NEWS & GOSSIP
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* Haburi.com: Nice Ads, Shame About the Name
Virtual factory outlet Haburi.com is taking a lot of
stick at the moment because nobody can suss out how to
spell the domain name; especially since it’s pronounced
a few different ways in their radio ads. Weird name
aside, though, somebody at Haburi.com is making the
right decisions. Don't believe us? Check out their
advert at the very top of Yahoo's UK and Ireland site.
'25-70% off designer gear'. Rather clever of them, we
think, to go for a straight text ad rather than a button
with lush graphics. 'Cause design tests show time and
time again that online punters prefer text to banners...

By the way, if you want to chat about site and banner
design, join Audette Media’s new discussion group i-design
at http://www.audettemedia.com/i-design/
Haburi.com: http://www.haburi.com

* New UK Internet Association OKed by Department
of Trade & Industry: UKODA

Did you know that HTML has still not made it
onto the National Curriculum?

Enter the UK Online Development Association (UKODA),
newly formed by a group of leading UK Web development
agencies to establish standards and represent industry
interests by, among other things, providing Web design
guidelines and lobbying for state education in Web
design and development. James Casey, MD of Absolute
Internet, one of UKODA’s founder companies, believes
that many new media companies are currently guilty
of selling their clients short. So, prospective
members must fulfil a stringent set of criteria
before gaining accreditation.

UKODA has received the official blessing of Patricia
Hewitt, E-Minister, Dept. of Trade and Industry.
DTI officials will be taking steps to ‘build a
useful working relationship’ with UKODA.

UKODA haven’t got their site up yet (tisk, tisk)
so for further info you’ll need to email acting
chair Richard Dinnick at rdinnick@rroom.net


* Yea/Nay: [www.]Nationwide[.co.uk]

Almost three years to the day since Nationwide
Building Society launched the UK’s first retail
internet banking service (still ‘one of the most
comprehensive packages’ of its kind, according to
Chief Executive Brian Davis) comes their e-Savings
account with its already legendary 7% Interest Rate.
Apparently, it’s all part of an ‘ongoing programme
to remain a leading provider in the rapidly evolving
electronic age’. All very impressive.

You can hear a ‘but’ coming, can’t you? Nationwide
clearly put a lot of effort into their Internet
presence, and you’d think, wouldn’t you, that they’d
promote it using every possible method at every
given opportunity? You’d be wrong. They’ve recently
produced a set of postcards which ties in with the
current broadcast media campaign. Bold, bright,
and kept with its brothers and sisters in a nice
little sleeve, each card (there are 10 in all)
advertises a different financial product. At
MarketingSherpa.co.uk we’re very fond of postcard-
based marketing. But Nationwide still gets a ‘Nay’,
we’re afraid. Because one rather crucial piece of
information is missing from both cards and sleeve.
This: www.nationwide.co.uk

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CASE STUDY: J Walter Thompson
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* Ranting and Raving: J. Walter Thompson Seeks Partners
Via Discussion Groups.

You’ve probably never heard of Tim Hayward but, thanks
to a posted "rant" on the UK-Netmarketing (UKNM) email
discussion group run by Chinwag.com last week, he’s
become rather an icon in some circles.

BACKGROUND: Tim’s company, J. Walter Thompson (JWT) needs
a few extra pairs of hands to help with a new digital
brand consultancy unit (digital@jwt), and they’re also
desperate to talk tactical alliances with the right people.

MEDIA BUY: A plea for help posted to the UKNM group -
not really a buy as such, since email discussion groups
are free to join. And as long as they don’t offend the
moderator, or breach the rules and regs of the group,
postings are emailed directly to the entire list of
subscribers. They’re usually posted at the group Web
site too. That’s a lot of potential readers.

CREATIVE: It’s not what you say, it’s the way that you
say it. There were 30 postings to UKNM on Friday June
9th – Tim Hayward’s was sharp, amusing, different. It
was a shameless piece of self-promotion disguised as a
rant – ‘I hate sounding like a total New Meeja w**ker
and sounding off about how busy we are, so I usually lie
and say that I get paid tall dollars to lie around in my
garden, sipping Negronis... Unfortunately, circumstances
are now forcing me to be honest’. Why the rant?
Discussion groups can be ‘terrifically effective,’ says
Tim. As with any marketing communication, though,
you’ve somehow got to achieve ‘cut-through’.

RESULTS
It got read, it got forwarded ten-fold, well
beyond the UKNM list of subscribers, and now it’s
getting responses for JWT - 40 so far, including at
least 20 worth following up with a meeting, Tim tells
us. He also expects 50 – 70 useable responses from a
submission in a similar vein to the UKNM-Jobs list.

COST: Nigh on nothing! A well-written and well-placed
posting costs a few minutes of a person’s time, but it’s
amazing what it can do. Just remember – if you use your
sig-file (and we suggest you do as a matter of course)
you’re representing your company. So don’t say anything
you’ll regret!

J. Walter Thompson: http://www.jwt.co.uk
UK-Netmarketing: http://www.chinwag.com/uk-netmarketing

-------
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW
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Practically nobody knew who Moreover.com were when they
launched last December after several months of beta
testing. Today, more than 50,000 Internet sites,
including NetMarketMakers, a division of Jupiter (one of
the most influential US companies on the Net), rely upon
them daily for customisable news feeds that link in near
real-time to full text articles from over 1,500 sources
around the Net.

Interested to hear how Moreover.com, who have just
closed $21 million in second round funding, got
themselves on the path to world domination so quickly,
we rang Nick Denton, CEO and Thomas Korte, Head of
Interactive Marketing, at their office in San
Francisco where, apparently, it was very, very hot...

Q: You’ve gone from nought to a million miles per hour
in six months. How, exactly?

ND: It’s a bit of a ‘no-brainer’ really. Firstly, when
we say we provide a free headline service, we mean just
that. We do not sell news content: we generate our
revenue by providing links to it and keeping tracking
traffic across our network. And we offer a targeted,
high quality service, which saves webmasters time and
effort. If you offer a quality service for free, people
are bound to subscribe to it. Secondly, each site that
takes our webfeeds displays a link back to Moreover saying
‘Free headlines – click here’ – so far we’ve grown virally
without having to make too much effort. Currently we have
50,000 customers – that means 50,000 salespeople - and our
network doubles in size every 45 to 60 days.

Q: What marketing strategies do you find work best for
you?

TK: We have avoided splashing out money on traditional
media – banner campaigns and so on – we don’t find them
cost-effective. Working with Commission Junction, a
Web-based commission management service, we came up with
an affiliate program. Registered affiliates include a
button, text link, or news feed on their site which
guides visitors to our Webfeed Wizard. Affiliates are
paid $1.30 for each unique visitor who completes the
Wizard and signs up for our service - $2 if the link is
on their front page. It’s a pretty easy way for people
to make commission, and it currently accounts for about
20% of new sign-ups.

Q: Links to your site are very unobtrusive. Why is that?

TK: Moreover.com isn’t looking to build a brand - that’s
a major plus point, and it earns us more subscribers.
Our service is designed to enhance our customers’ sites,
not pull traffic away from them. The Webfeed Wizard
allows webmasters to customise the news feeds to blend
in with their own pages. It takes about a minute. Our
high-end clients pay upwards of $1,500 per month for us
to tailor feeds specifically for them – in these cases
there isn’t even a Moreover.com button to interfere with
their branding.

Q: How much are you having to adapt your operation as
you expand?

ND: Very little. Back in November we had 16 people on
the team. Now there are 34. The key to success is the
efficiency of your operation, not the size of it. I’ve
always taken care to employ the most determined people,
who are able to offer long-term commitment. The
technology we have is unique, and incredibly smart –
it’s designed to sift out all the rubbish for us. All
of that makes for a highly efficient model. And if you
can demonstrate an efficient model, you’ll find it
easier to make partners and alliances.

Q: You are a British company but your operations are
based in America. Why?

ND: The partnership deals we make need to happen
physically, face-to-face - not by email. So while our
technology is in the UK, we’ve made a base for ourselves
in the US. And we intend to use this new funding to
extend our presence in the US even further. We expect
to be featured on at least 400,000 sites by the end of
the year, and we want to start diversifying and
distributing other types of dynamic content – audio,
video, book reviews, last-minute special offers. I
believe that, in this day and age, being pan-European
isn’t enough – you need to be a global player just to be
taken seriously.

http://www.moreover.com

Publisher’s Note: MarketingSherpa.co.uk’s sister
newsletter ContentBiz.com will be throwing a cocktail
party in Greenwich Village when the MoreOver New York
office opens this Fall. (Any excuse for a party.)
Watch this space for your invitation!

------
EVENTS
------

* eTail2000 - The Premiere European Online Retail Event
Develop Marketing, Branding and Fulfilment Strategies
that Fully Integrate your Online and Offline Sales.
22nd & 23rd June 2000, The Cumberland Hotel, London
Call WBR on +44 (0)20 7759 9000 or visit
http://www.wbr.co.uk/etail00 for a complete agenda.

* Raising Capital for dot-com Ventures
June 26th – 27th 2000, Marble Arch Marriott, London
http://www.iir-conferences.com/internet

* Electronic Retailing Association (ERA)
June 27th – 30th 2000, The Hotel Arts, Barcelona
Highly recommended for e-retail and direct response
television (DRTV) executives.
http://www.retailing.org
+1 (703) 841-1751

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MarketingSherpa.co.uk INFO
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