zu attends AIM Conference 2009

Ryan and I attended The Atlantic Internet Marketing Conference in Halifax, April 22-24, 2009. The AIM Conference was a new learning and networking venue for us in the interactive space. Ryan was invited to the conference as a Speaker and delivered this presentation:

Case Study: Selling the Stampeders Online

Can a great website fill a football stadium? Our numbers show it helped. This case study will show how we combined a unique audience expansion strategy with the smart use of social media and rich media elements to increase fan support for the Calgary Stampeders football team online. The example highlights how having a client daring enough to explore new ideas (even the players got on board) helps open the door to a major win online. As the old saying goes, “Offense sells tickets, but good websites win championships!”

I attended some excellent e-marketing seminars during the two-day event; here are some of the highlights I captured:

Design principles for non-designers – presented by Jeff White
Web is limited to five fonts: Verdana, Georgia, Helvetica, Trebuchet MS, Arial

• Georgia looks best when it is scaled big (headlines)
• Verdana looks best when it is scaled for small copy (body text)
• Helvetica is the preference of designers
• Trebuchet MS is the typeface of Web 2.0; it’s a modern font but does not bold well

Build your brand through online public relations – presented by Savior Young
Best practices for engagement:

• Be honest
• Be authentic
• Be mindful of tone
• Be timely and responsive
• Be providing relevant information
• Be willing to engage in meaningful conversation

Secrets of search engine optimization – presented by Rob Swick

• Do not try to trick the search engines; play by the rules and develop for standards
• Be consistent with page titles, content and meta data
• Concentrate on Google, Yahoo and MSN (Google is the hardest to please due to monthly updates to their formula)

FAIL! – Embracing an iterative design process – presented by Daniel Burke (Digg!)
Don’t be afraid of failure; take chances and don’t be afraid of things going wrong. Don’t try to make it perfect; release it and gather feedback. Repeat and listen to your users. User feedback and experience is important in order to improve and modify to meet their needs; however, don’t get overly concerned with the vocal minority.

• Step 1: Get it out there
• Step 2: Add sophistication
• Step 3: Gather feedback
• Step 4: Start revising (based on goals and priority) and measure success