After another week of receiving many invitations to ‘free’ conferences, and reading Seth’s posts on conferences, I thought this would be a good time to share an idea: the only good conference is one you have to pay for in money (that is if you’re not Seth Godin and don’t get invited to everything for free).

I love marketing events. The best part for me is to meet peers and end up in interesting conversations. Second best – experiencing new, innovative ways to reach a target audience. I’ve been to a few in the past and on both accounts, these ‘free’ conferences always disappoint me.

I see two business models in the conference market: those where the guests pay with money and those where they pay with their attention (and therefore time and energy). The first ones work, the second ones don’t. Take the DME (Digital Marketing Event) in Amsterdam: visitors for free, participants pay a steep fee to present themselves. I went there in 2007 and all I remember is a blur of media agencies, search optimizers and webanalytics providers asking for my attention. Nothing innovative, just sales. This is highly frustrating and I do not get out of my visit what I want. Guess more people felt that way as the DME 2008 got canceled. No surprise there. It felt like hard work. Conferences like these are far more expensive than the good ones you pay for with cash. Here you pay with your attention and you get nothing out of it.

This week I registered for the 2008 edition of PICNIC and paid the high early-bird rate. I don’t mind paying 1200 euros for a 3-day conference I know I will love and bring everything I want: interesting conversations and inspiration.

They did it again. Why is it always the usual suspects that surprise with stunning ads, powerful artwork and messaging loaded with stopping power? Why do I not throw this email away immediately? Not because I like running so much, trust me.

The latest from Nike Running. Powerrrrrrrful.

A beautiful windmill in Ouderkerk aan de Amstel (next to Amsterdam). Why not make something remarkable out of it when it’s in pain….

A day in brands, initialy posted on Dumpert.

This ad definitely has stopping power, although the look & feel is like many other luxury watch ads. With the gorgeous Teri Hatcher looking right at you, there’s no turning the page. But then comes the message (it’s in Dutch, here’s the English campaign).

It is time to make the difference. Is you wish to know more about how Baume & Mercier and TERI HATCHER help education to become more accessible for our children and are active in the struggle against cancer and protect the environment, you can visit the website: www.baume-et-mercier.com.

First of all – I miss the link between visual and copy here big time. Looking at this expensive, luxurious picture the leap to corporate citizenship is awfully big. But more importantly – what’s your message? You are doing a lot on csr? I have a hard time believing you’re making a difference on one csr topic and Teri Hatcher and you look like you’re saving the world.

Focus focus focus. Especially when delivering a csr message. People are skeptical on csr. But when you can show you’re serious on a certain social objective, we want to believe you. And a good fit with your company (eg Starbucks and the small local farmers, bringing technology to small villages in Africa for Accenture) it makes the message even more powerful. No matter how good the objective, Teri and I don’t connect.

Note: I work for Accenture

This post might sound arrogant and might offend some colleagues in the business.

I always feel there are two kinds of people in this marketing business. There is the one group which is passionate about the art of marketing, about its cause and sees it as a true specialty. Than there’s the group of people that might as well have been an executive assistant, a bartender or a sales rep. The people in this group see marketing as a fun gig that is not that difficult to master and takes a lot of smiles and social skills. They are helped by the fact that being a marketer is not like being a heart surgeon: the first steps in marketing take common sense and it’s therefore quite a small step from nobody to the label of marketer. However, the next steps take a lot of hard work, passion and a feel for the craft. Not that many people can call themselves master of marketing.

I thought about this notion when I read this months Emerce and was stunned by the part Movers & Shakers: Sonja Silva, famous in Holland for her VJ days on TMF and her Playboy shoots, is now a Senior Account Manager at Adlink Internet Media…….

I don’t know Sonja. I know she was famous for quite a while and then nobody heard from her for some time. Now she rises to be a Senior Account Manager at an Internet company. I can’t find any credentials or even the smallest link in her personal history to the art of marketing or the internet for that matter. Is this a publicity stunt? A way for Adlink to get a foot in the door with corporate marketers who dream of talking to Sonja?

Maybe I’m wrong about her specifically, but my point stands. I for one know I won’t be discussing my marketing plans with Sonja Silva anytime soon. It’s time we get our house in order.

This week’s edition of adformatie shows us how tourist agencies don’t take any effort for disctinctive positioning.

Are they all done by the same art director? No diversity in typography and color and all seem to be the product of a passion for painting. 

Investigating further, Italy turns out to have a new logo and visual identity. Brand New has this great story.

Nrc.Next pointed me to some great (new) online destinations this week:

Every person in New York

Jason Polan has a mission. He is going to make a drawing of every person in NYC. He moves unnoticable throughout the city and draws people in the subway, in musea, restaurants. etc. Whenever he has a new stack of drawings he uploads them. Since there are about 8 million people to be drawn – more fun to come!

Evite 2.0

A true web 2.0 invitation service. The user submits her details and receives invites based on the events that match her profile. Going and Facebook are following with their own invitation services.

Grandma’s socks

This is a great idea, it has everything: old meets new, truly unique and cult power waiting to be unleashed. On netgranny.ch you pick a Grandma, a design and Granny starts knitting. Soon you’ll have your granny-generated socks delivered to your home.

Note: the idea sounds better than the actual destination. Which brave entrepreneurial soul will help make this a professional enterprise with a site to match?

Re-usability

Green e-commerce – a place for old things to get a new life. Fun to look at the ingredients label on each product that tells you what rubbish went into making it. Anyone looking for shoes from old car tires?

The grey album

A video where DJ Dangermouse mixed The White Album of the Beatles with The Black Album of Jay-Z. The results: The Grey Album, downloaded a million times on one day.

This morning in the Dutch news – citizen journalism website SKOEPS.nl is no more. The joint initiative from PcM Uitgevers and the digital part of Talpa Media did not make it past 1,5 years.

Visiting SKOEPS now gives us a placeholder, explaining the decision, sort of. It basically states that SKOEPS is/was a success, with 7500 registered Skoepers posting 1,000 to 1,500 news items montly. So why unplug the ‘largest citizen journalism website’? The statement reads that although the citizens did their part, the company was unable to turn this into a sound financial future.

Does this mean there is no place for citizen journalism in the Netherlands? Or does it need more than active citizens?