Just finished up at the Online Marketing Show at the Olympia and there wasn’t really a lot to report, there was certainly an abundance of SEO and PPC firms but a worrying dearth of analytics firms there.  The only name I spotted was Webtrends which is a shame considering the number of interesting analytics toolsets out there, perhaps they’ve appeared there in past years and haven’t generated much business from it. If that’s the case then it’s a worrying scenario when we work on the most accountable sales channel – with powerful metrics showing where your sales come from and where you are simply throwing money down the toilet. Interesting…

The most interesting stuff in a very mixed bag was a demonstration of ‘augmented reality’, a term I’d heard of but didn’t understand.  Basically a webcam was focused on a piece of white paper which had something that looked like a large QR code on it, instantly a 3d rendered model of a car appeared on an adjacent monitor which was relaying the footage from the webcam. As I moved the paper around in my hand the car rotated as well.  While I couldn’t think of any use of this technology on any websites I currently work with, I can certainly see some creative implementations from very large brands over the next couple of years.

Pure 360 gave an interesting presentation about some do’s and dont’s of email marketing (unsurprising considering they’re an email marketing agency) and pleasingly encouraged the audience to test as much as possible. Man after my own heart.