Revolution articles from June 2003

Revolution archives from June 2003

Letter from the editor.
June 11, 2003... Business and marketing people thrive on challenge, or, at least, the successful ones do. Those making their way in the digital world are no exception, but it is not just technological advances or a tough economic environment that can boost...

Department of Education to pour pounds 1m into new web site.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... The Department of Education and Skills is investing some pounds 1 million to revamp and promote its Parents Online initiative. The site (www.parentsonline. gov.uk), which aims to help parents understand the internet's educational benefits,...

Revolution to sponsor award at BIMA 2003.
June 11, 2003... Revolution is taking part in the British Interactive Media Association Awards as a sponsor for the first time. The annual event, held in October, recognises creative thinking and tangible business benefits in new media. Revolution is...

Diageo closes down Nightfly after review.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Drinks giant Diageo has closed its mobile marketing division, Nightfly, after failing to find a partner to 'take the business to the next stage'. Nightfly, launched in 2000 as part of Diageo New Business Ventures, was closed following a...

DEALS: Handbag.com signs deal.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Handbag.com has signed a two-month sponsorship deal with beauty brand Clinique. The first activity sees Clinique sponsoring handbag's dedicated 'Cannes Film Festival' feature content and supports the launch of Colour Surge, the new addition to...

DEALS: Air France and WWTE join forces.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Air France has joined forces with Worldwide Travel Exchange (WWTE). The Air France web site (www.airfrance.com/uk) will feature a search engine and booking facility, which is powered by WWTE. This will be available to customers who want to book...

DEALS: Confetti enters into agreement.
June 11, 2003... Confetti has entered into a new agreement with HSS Event Hire. The aim is to make it simple for consumers to rent anything they might need for a celebration, from chairs and marquees to bouncy castles, at Confetti's web site...

DEALS: DatingDirect.com signs partnership.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... DatingDirect.com has signed a white-label partnership with ManchesterOnline, the city's web-based news and city guide, which is powered by Manchester Evening News. The web site has also developed its own dating directory and provides...

DEALS: Espotting Media and Exhibitions.com strike deal.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Espotting Media and Exhibitions.com have struck a pan-European marketing deal. Espotting will promote its service to the 120,000 exhibitors and suppliers that are represented by Exhibitions.com through email campaigns and an online presence....

DEALS: Media Guardian and NOP Research form partnership.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Media Guardian and NOP Research UK have formed a long-term partnership to develop joint research projects. A panel of media professionals will be questioned each quarter, to provide an industry confidence barometer and a 'brands reputation'...

DEALS: Insurancewide.com signs agreement.
June 11, 2003... Insurancewide.com has signed an agreement to provide its insurance service to MSN.co.uk. It will be available to users of the www.msn.co.uk/money web site. Insurancewide.com provides services to other sites such as Freeserve, BTopenworld,...

DEALS: Conchango and Tridion partner.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Conchango, the retail technology specialist, and content management company Tridion are partnering to help other firms manage and reuse content across various customer channels. The strategic tie-in has already signed its first customer, MFI.

DEALS: One.Tel and Amserve extend partnership.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... One.Tel and Amserve, the Amstrad subsidiary, have agreed to extend their partnership. Under the new agreement, Amserve will advertise One.Tel's services on the screens of its e-m@ilerplus telephone and email service. One.Tel will pay Amserve...

DEALS: Maporama signs agreement.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Maporama, the provider of online location-centric services, has signed an agreement with Hotels.com, the provider of discount lodging worldwide, to provide its map search tool within the reservation web site (www.hotels.com).

UpMyStreet to stay as uSwitch swoops.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... UpMyStreet.com, which went into administration in April, will continue to operate as a separate brand and business, says its new owner, uSwitch.com. The service, which compares household bills and suppliers, bought UpMyStreet.com for under...

Audi drives sales of new A8 via digital.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Car manufacturer Audi UK is using digital to promote the launch of its new A8 model. Digital agency Good Technology has created Flash-based formats including Overlayz and banners. These are appearing on the car and finance sections of...

SCA Hygiene uses online game to push new Bodyform offering.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... SCA Hygiene Products UK is targeting women with email and direct mail as part of a pounds 2.5 million drive to launch its Bodyform Invisible Wings product. The firm aims to raise awareness, drive sales and collect data through a viral...

Good month/bad month.(briefs)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... It was a good month for online publishing, which saw The Independent launching a comprehensive subscription and micropayments service for its web site, while The Times announced plans for an e-paper, available outside the UK for pounds 49.99...

United Biscuits launches online drive for new Penguin variants.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... United Biscuits is running online activity to promote new launches Penguin Chukka and Penguin Splatz. Digital agency XM London has created a nw web site for the Chukka brand (www.chukkagrind. co.uk), which aims to target 11-year-old boys...

Center Parcs hires Nucleus for new look.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Center Parcs has appointed brand experience consultancy Nucleus to create an ecommerce site for its UK operations. The new site, to be launched in September, will be the first step in Center Parcs' plan to increase its volume of online...

Mars advertises on new Lycos IM site.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Confectionery giant Mars and technology company AMD are the first advertisers on portal Lycos UK's new instant messenger service. Mars is advertising Chocollect (www.chocollect.com), its on-pack SMS promotion, with a miniature Pacman-style...

JUST BREAKING: Top 10 breaking banners by impressions (1-30 April 2003).(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... 1 British Telecommunications BTopenworld 2 Capital One Bank 5.9 per cent balance transfer for life 3 Rover Group Bring us any genuine offer and ...

Glamour and GQ to offer online dating.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Glamour.com and GQ.com are launching dating services in partnership with DatingDirect.com. Set to go live in June, the two-year deal with CondeNet.UK will see DatingDirect.com provide an online dating service for the two magazine brands....

Account wins.(briefs)
June 11, 2003... New Car Net has appointed AdLINK Internet Media (www.adlink.net/uk/) to sell ad space and sponsorship on its web site. The car site aims to cover a wider market base in order to attract more lifestyle advertisers. Yo! Sushi has appointed...

OWEN ON DIGITAL MEDIA: A standard trading currency could win hearts and minds.
June 11, 2003... According to a definitive IAB/Price Waterhouse study, the online advertising market grew by more than 20 per cent last year. While some are predicting that 2003 will outstrip this, the big question is whether these levels of growth can really...

Ikea creates game of 'shlomping' idea.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Ikea has launched a new game to let consumers know about 'shlomping', the relaxed way to sit that is part of its Live Unltd initiative. The game, called 'shlomp-a-plompa', extends the above-the-line 'Shlomping' campaign online, and was...

Polydor reveals site for Girls Aloud stars.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Polydor Records has unveiled a site for popstars Girls Aloud at www.girlsaloud.co.uk. Featuring exclusive news, diaries, biography, band fact files, downloads and community tools, the site will aim to be the main point of contact for all...

Orient-Express sites analyse behaviour.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Orient-Express Hotels has appointed RedEye, the eCRM specialist, to analyse visitor behaviour across the group's 30 English-language hotel web sites. As part of its bid to encourage loyalty and repeat buying from its customers,...

Abbey National runs web mortgage push.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Abbey National is running online and iTV advertising as part of an integrated campaign to promote its mortgages. A two-pronged six-week online advertising campaign created by digital agency Euro RSCG Wnek Gosper Interaction aims to target...

Holsten plans first UK site with NetInfo.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Brewer and distributor Holsten aims to launch its first UK-focused corporate web site in the summer. The site (www.holsten.co.uk) has been created by digital agency NetInfo and will target both consumers and trade with information on...

BBC brings interactivity to Eurovision.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... The BBC has introduced interactivity to its coverage of the Eurovision song contest, which takes place at the end of May, for cable, Sky digital and Freeview viewers. Sky digital viewers were able to access footage of the Eurovision Green...

GRIFFITHS ON MOBILE: Will games and pics be a hit of the same order as ringtones?(Editorial)
June 11, 2003... This month saw the announcement that Big Brother 4, produced by Endemol and broadcast by Channel 4, is set to hit our TV screens in the early summer, bringing with it a host of interactive mobile services, thanks to O2. A number of the most...

More Th>n backs TV ads with competition web site.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... More Th>n, the direct financial services arm of Royal & Sun-Alliance, has launched a competition microsite to support its national TV, cinema and outdoor ad campaign. Morethanmoments.com is offering a range of prizes based on the 'less...

Dairy Council targets parents with its first online campaign.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... The Dairy Council has launched its first online ad campaign to raise awareness of why 'The White Stuff' is good for you. The drive, jointly funded by the European Community and Milk Development Council, emphasises that the drink helps build...

Littlewoods in game launch on Sky Active.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Littlewoods Game On, the entertainment-based interactive gaming company, has launched an iDTV game on Sky Active. Users can win pounds 30 to pounds 6,000 every day on Hot Spots, a fixed-odds game based on the Spanish Daily Lotto. Daily...

TIME THIEF: Darren Richards, DatingDirect.com.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Darren Richards, chief executive, DatingDirect.com explains how his time is spent 35% Meetings We create a lot of white-label dating services. I spend a lot of time liaising with partners like GMTV and handbag.com, along with...

Cheapflights refits and looks to the US.
June 11, 2003... Online travel firm Cheapflights (www.cheapflights.co.uk) has revamped its UK site and is to open another in the US. Launched in 1996, the firm gathers information from 500 firms, including airlines like BA and web sites such as Opodo. ...

PERFORMANCE INDEX: 1 April - 30 April 2003, 8am - 8pm.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... The Revolution Keynote Performance Index measures the performance of 20 representative sites from across the digital economy in terms of speed of loading and site availability. The top 10 are featured each week, and the worst performing web...

GAFFNEY ON AMERICA: Hype takes a back seat, but can sales really drive the car?(Editorial)
June 11, 2003... Let's just consider this thing called internet marketing for a minute. We've been though thick and thin. Hell and hype. Boom and bust Shock and awe. We've seen profits followed by big losses, followed by profits, and now we're standing here....

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at Associated New Media.(Andrew Hart named managing director)(Brief Article)(Interview)
June 11, 2003... Andrew Hart has been appointed managing director of Associated New Media, the digital publishing division of Associated Newspapers, which publishes web sites This is London, This is Money, This is Travel and femail.co.uk. Hart has worked with...

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at Young & Rubicam/Wunderman Alliance EMEA.(Pru Parkinson)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Young & Rubicam/Wunderman Alliance EMEA has appointed former Universal McCann chief executive Pru Parkinson as its first managing director, digital. Parkinson has held top-level roles in a number of agencies, including Ammirati Puris Lintas...

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at Friends Reunited.(Friends Reunited)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Tim Ward joins Friends Reunited as marketing director, from the Financial Times where he was marketing director. He was responsible for the relaunch of the newspaper and introduction of FT.com subscription services.

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at Opodo.(Karen Richardson)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Opodo, the online travel service, has made Karen Richardson commercial director, responsible for overseeing the firm's commercial sales strategy. She brings wide experience from travel, telecoms and customer service industries, most recently as...

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at Espotting Media.(Nick Hajdu, Mike Carter, Jas Brach)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Espotting Media has three new appointments. Nick Hajdu has been chosen as syndication specialist in the affiliate solutions team and brings five years' experience at News International. Mike Carter, who spent three years at DoubleClick, is the...

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at 12snap.(Martin Copus)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... 12snap, the interactive marketing agency specialising in mobile campaigns, has appointed Martin Copus as managing director of UK business. Copus has held both national and international roles at global ad agency Leo Burnett, including managing...

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at Conchango.(John O'Reilly)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Internet consultancy Conchango has made John O'Reilly senior .Net developer. His role will involve delivering advice to clients such as Tesco and supporting the development team. He previously worked at KPMG.

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at LookSmart UK.(Rob Pearson)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Search-targeted marketing firm LookSmart UK has made Rob Pearson sales director, to develop and manage all aspects of its sales operations. Previously, he worked at BTLookSmart, the international joint-venture between LookSmart and BT.

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at itraffic.(Paul Banham)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Paul Banham becomes creative director at interactive marketing and ad agency itraffic, a subsidiary of Agency.com, responsible for creative standards. His previous roles include art director at agencies such as AMV Brann before becoming...

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at.(Agency Republic)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Agency Republic, the integrated agency, has hired two creatives James Cooper and Pierre Odendaal join as interactive creative directors from Ogilvy Interactive where they were creative directors working on campaigns for clients such as Jaguar....

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at Domino Systems.(Nick Mayhew)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Domino Systems, the independent internet services agency whose clients include BP and Kall Kwik, has a new managing director. Nick Mayhew has been at the company for five years and will look to further develop the business. After seven years as...

MOVING ON UP: Appointment at OgilvyInteractive.(Stephanie Schmidt)(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... At OgilvyInteractive London, Stefanie Schmidt has been promoted to group director, heading up the interactive team on the Nestle Purina business. Schmidt, who joined the agency in 2000, worked on both the Royal Mail and American Express...

Lucozade Energy in Lara digital promo.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... GlaxoSmithKline has launched a site (www.loaditlikelara.com) for drink brand Lucozade Energy as part of its third Lara Croft-themed integrated campaign. Designed by integrated marketing agency Billington Cartmell and built by digital...

VisitBritain includes web in pounds 4m drive.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Tourism organisation VisitBritain has launched a site as part of a pounds 4 million drive to promote English tourism to the British, the first such push in a decade. The site (www.visitengland. com), created by Euro RSCG Circle, part of...

Skipton aims at first-time buyers online.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Skipton Building Society has launched its first topic-specific microsite (www.firsttimenerves. co.uk) aimed at first-time buyers. Skipton's in-house team created the site, with consultancy from online PR and marketing firm iJack...

PANKHURST ON DOTCOM LIFE: Personal touch will help to make new friends besides old.
June 11, 2003... Another month and another new face at Friends Reunited. We have, I am pleased to say, managed to snap up Tim Ward, the former marketing director of the Financial Times, to run our new marketing strategy. We're very close to completing the...

Clearasil drives Total Control in web push.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Clearasil has launched an online campaign to promote its Total Control skincare range for young women. Youtakecontrol.co.uk is based on the range's proposition to meet five needs of clear, healthy looking skin. Users are invited to...

Teletext gives users pure hotel channel.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Teletext Holidays has unveiled a dedicated Hotels channel on teletextholidays.co.uk. The channel features a quick-search function and will be run with partners Hotel Connect, Med Hotels, Essential Hotels and Alpha Beds. It is aimed at...

MY INBOX: James Hilton, MGM Mirage Online.(Interview)
June 11, 2003... James Hilton director of online marketing at MGM Mirage Online, says email marketing, which makes up a fifth of all his emails, should be opt-in What percentage of the emails you receive each week are marketing related or commercial...

Monster sends job email to HR bosses.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Recruitment site Monster.co.uk is running an email and online promotion targeting HR directors and managers in the UK. Monster's 'One' push aims to promote its Monster Starter Pack and raise awareness of the site's products and services....

Port of London puts terminal map online.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Port of London has launched an online map as part of a campaign to boost its appeal as a commercial gateway to the UK and Europe. The map (www.portoflondon. co.uk/rivermap) stores information on more than 70 terminals along 93 miles of the...

VITAL STATISTICS: Commercial emails.
June 11, 2003... This month - There are certain demographic groups that are more receptive to commercial emails than others, finds Charlotte Goddard In a world of digital spam and intrusive online advertising, it's not surprising that when you ask people if...

ANALYSIS: Spam could cost marketers dear.
June 11, 2003... Email users who don't want to lose a stone or boost the size of the most sensitive parts of their anatomy will not be surprised to learn that almost half of email traffic is believed to be spam. BTopenworld reports that almost 11 million...

ANALYSIS: Brands ask for direct interaction.
June 11, 2003... With the nation gripped by voting for Granada's I'm A Celebrity... Get Me Out Of Here!, it seems direct consumer interaction with brands, be it via polls, competitions or playing games, is becoming more popular. Take airplane giant Boeing...

ANALYSIS: Big music labels take digital route.
June 11, 2003... Forget Bruce Springsteen. The music industry has finally acknowledged that it has seen the future of rock 'n roll and it's digital. It appears that the dam has broken. It isn't just that an artist as established as Madonna has had to issue...

VOX POP: Do spend figures signify landmark for online ads?
June 11, 2003... Are the business and pricing models right for digital growth? Online advertising is holding its own in a tough media market. Total online ad spend increased to pounds 196.7 million in 2002, up 18.7 per cent year-on-year from pounds 165.7m,...

EDITORIAL: Digital has reasons to be cheerful.(Editorial)
June 11, 2003... Crystal ball-gazers, silver-lining hunters and those searching for light at the end of the digital tunnel will have had a good few months, despite the crises in Iraq and Asia that have affected the wider economy. Digital has the power to...

COMMENT: McDonald's move out of mobile shouldn't alarm.
June 11, 2003... The decision by McDonald's to abandon its mobile marketing strategy has caused a few ripples of concern in the community. On first impression it would seem that the exit of one of the largest global brands, with extensive experience of mobile,...

SHOPPING: Review - All shook up on a trip of nostalgia.(Editorial)
June 11, 2003... When you're about to scoot off for a few days from work, especially when it's a bank holiday or a break like Easter, a certain feeling embraces the office. It's much like the last day of school before a long holiday where all you've got planned...

SHOPPING STATS: Beauty site users attracted by freebies.
June 11, 2003... Free samples and special promotions are attracting users online, rather than the chance to buy something, finds Charlotte Goddard To a great extent, selling cosmetics is about face-to-face contact. Wander into any department store and...

SECTOR CHECKER: Alfa Romeo's site is big on style, less on personality.
June 11, 2003... Handbag.com's Nancy Cruickshank finds her emotions stirred by Alfa Romeo's site, but feels that it lacks the personal touch of the brand's advertising Web: www.alfaromeo.co.uk Developer: Internationally designed by Inferentia Red Cell;...

Putting the house in order.
June 11, 2003... News that the COI was creating a dedicated online creative roster for the government created a buzz. Jamie Galloway reveals how they did it. News that the Central Office of Information, the UK's second-biggest advertiser after FMCG giant...

DIGITAL PEOPLE: 40 people you should know.
June 11, 2003... We've brought together a group of people who are using their experience in digital to contribute to the growth of the sector. The digital industry may be relatively young, but it has spread fast and absorbed a whole lot of disciplines on...

INTERNET WORLD 2003: The essential Internet World.
June 11, 2003... Exhibitors at this month's Internet World show have much to offer the digital marketer Like a Russian doll, Internet World 2003, which takes place on 3-5 June at Earls Court, London, has a whole bunch of other events tucked up inside it....

EDITORIAL: A dynamic sector that's set to grow.(Editorial)
June 11, 2003... As we reach the halfway point of the year, nothing in the digital world has been quite as dynamic as the search sector. It has seen older, established and respected players such as Yahoo! up their game with relaunches and new ideas. It has seen...

CONTEXTUAL SEARCH: A place for everything.
June 11, 2003... Tamsin Bishton finds out how contextual advertising can help sites match content to ads and serve only relevant ones to users What is contextual advertising? It's the next step in keyword advertising. In the same way that search sites...

SEARCH ENGINE VIEW: Why some clicks are more equal than others.
June 11, 2003... As contextual advertising becomes more common, advertisers need to take note of the conversion rates and if they can opt out, Danny Sullivan, editor of SearchEngineWatch.com, tells Charlotte Goddard Search engines are busier than ever as...

MULTIMEDIA SEARCH: More than words.
June 11, 2003... Web users now look for pictures, products and video as well as text. Caspar van Vark sees what search engines offer them As internet usage continues to rise, so does the volume of searches being made. This year, April was a busy month for...

Make the mobile connection.
June 11, 2003... Savvy marketers are integrating mobile into their marketing mix, not leaving it to stand alone, as Sue Norris discovers Like a general planning details for a war campaign, so marketers have both strategic and tactical tools at their...

COMMUNITIES MASTERCLASS: The Revolution Masterclass on Online communities.
June 11, 2003... Online communities can add to a web site's appeal and they don't just build themselves. Philip Smith examines the ways of attracting and keeping users The importance of online communities can be either under- or overestimated, depending on...

TRAILBLAZER: Look who's talking.(Marcus Hutton)
June 11, 2003... Marcus Hutton, the voice behind many a television ad, can provide voiceovers for web sites. If you've flown with Britannia airlines or seen the TV ads for Kellogg's Cornflakes or Mars bars, then chances are that you've heard the voice of...

CAMPAIGN OF THE MONTH: Movie Rewind.
June 11, 2003... Five benefited from using SMS with its email and online executions in a competition for its Movie Rewind campaign. Campaign: Movie Rewind Client: Five Agency: Flytxt Aim of campaign: There were four objectives: to add value to...

TERMINATOR 1: Swap shovels for a mouse and trace your family history.
June 11, 2003... How did you spend your bank holiday weekend? I bet there weren't many of you who spent it wandering round Suffolk graveyards, armed with a trowel and a digital camera, like I did. My uncle has been researching his family tree, so we decided to...

TERMINATOR 2: Every dog has its day as tongues are set wagging.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... BT Broadband has gone to the dogs - Walthamstow dog track, to be precise. The ISP sponsored a night of racing at the East-end venue, with the greyhounds looking snazzy in their little BTbranded coats. A good evening was had by all,...

TERMINATOR 2: Don't honk me for stalling, I'm busy thinking.(Brief Article)
June 11, 2003... Spurious 'we asked three penguins and a chickpea' surveys, part 2,379... A press release landed on our desk bearing the Vauxhall marque and telling us that 33 per cent of marketing and media types have their brightest ideas in the bath....