My last blog was written on an iPad hooked up to my friends mifi on a train whilst  on my way to Internet World 2011 at Earls Court.  The blog described the anticipation of Internet World, the keynotes I looked forward to and the types of agencies I would allow access to my barcoded badge so they could contact me afterwards.

So, did the show live up to my expectation?  Or was it a squid that had only just ventured out of the water?

On entry to the show it struck me that some of the more lavish stands of recent years had been scaled down in an obvious cost cutting excersise.  In fact, I would say the show as a whole had a feeling of being hit by cut backs.  This wasn’t suprising and lets face it, measurement and ROI is bread and butter to these exhibitors so they will be ensuring they spend wisely on their set-up.

The blend of exhibitors is more important than how the stands look and I certainly thought the mix was good.  There didn’t seem to be an overwhealming number of the same type of supplier and the organisers should be congratulated on the floor plan which grouped similar suppliers together.  This meant if you wanted a particular service, such as e-mail marketing tools, then you could compare and contrast easily within just a few steps.

Compared to two/three years ago there was a noticable shift from the majority of stands providing services to help you gain more traffic to your site, to now providing servces and tools to improve content engagement ensuring visitors stay on your site.  I think this mirrored the way the internet is now shaping.  It’s an old saying, but “Content is King”  and we’re seeing more and more that by having good quality unique engaging content on your website is the key to success.  Link farms, sites with shallow content and providers of random syndicated content stuffed with affiliate links is exactly what we want to move away from.  Google’s “Panda” update is certainly looking at these aspects to improve their ranking of sites.

One key aspect of the new Panda update is bounce rate so we need to engage visitors.  Not easy for a site that simply wants you to click on an affiliate link.

I’m sure like many other visitors to the show, I was looking for inspiration and insight into the latest innovations the industry had to offer.  While I wasn’t exactly blown away, I was happy to see some neat kit for 3d model imaging and a growth in mobile commerce agencies which again reflects the advancements in this area.

All in all, I was pleased with the suppliers exhibiting.  I even offered up my badge several times for scanning.

Even though I have a premier club pass, the keynotes were as always difficult to get in to.  The Linked In presentation from Laurence Bret-Stern was on the Tuesday so I unfortunately missed what I’m sure was a really interesting presentation.

Many of the Keynotes such as Yann Depoys from ebay, James Kent from Google and Amanda Rosenberg also from the search giant were primarily focused on advertising.  How we can successfully market our websites, products and services online and in the mobile space is important.  However, by now we all know how to set-up campaigns, track their success and measure their ROI.  We know about the real-time tools that are available and the multi-varient testing that’s required.  What we really want to know is about the most successful case studies that have that secret ingredient we’re missing.  I’m not sure if I missed it, but I certainly didn’t see it revealed.

Yahoo’s Jon Myers looked at the future innovations of search.  Although I’m sure there wasn’t a visitor in the keynote that didn’t think this was a bit strange as Yahoo’s future in terms of search can be summed up in one word, “Bing”.  The social aspects pulled in to the presentation were expected and the indexing of quality content a given.  The real “innovations” of search were more down to how we would be searching rather than the way in which we search or how search is presented.  Mobile search is where the real “innovations” will happen.

I found several of the smaller keynotes were actually more interesting and less of a sales pitch for the platforms of the big boys.
The smaller keynotes concentrated on the quality content angle and how we can offer that more unique expereince that will encourage repeat vists.  These keynotes were essential for any new internet start-up or newbie.

Overall Internet World 2011 provided access to some very impressive suppliers that showed how the industry is thriving with new developments that can help content providers make their online offering that bit more special.

When you see how fast this industry is moving compared to others, it’s no wonder online sales and useage is increasing so rapidly.  From 2000-2011 the global use of the internet has grown by 444%.   Internet World showed us why.

I’m currently sitting on the train from Leicester to London on my way to Internet world 2011 at earls court. Fortunately a friend has a mifi connection to enable me to while away the time blogging rather than looking over the shoulder of the bloke next to me on his Samsung q330 laptop (ok I did look over his shoulder to check out the model).

I thought I would fire up a quick post on the anticipation of the show and then follow this up over the weekend to see how the actual experience matched. I missed out last year so I’m expecting things to have changed a tad in the time I’ve been away. After all we do work in the fastest moving industry-type there is, don’t we?

The blurb says there’s “Over 300 solution providers and 12,000 visitors, combining five shows in one event, Internet World is the event for digital marketing and online business!”

All very well and good. But as we all know, the fact that suppliers are paying a hefty fee to exhibit at the earls court venue, means we attend these shows armed with the knowledge we are about to be pitched to harder than if we were Peter Jones.

That said some very good contacts can be found. This year I’m especially interested in mobile advertising having launched a new app for the company I work for. I’m also interested in any search providers who can offer up something a little different in terms of trending, profiling and customisation of the end user experience.

The main reason to attend however, is the keynotes. This year Internet world have certainly pulled in some big guns, so it’s worth having a look at a few.

Keynotes:

Brian Mc Bride, UK Managing Director of Amazon’s will be talking about their many successes!
This will certainly be of interest. I’m a loyal amazon customer and have always been impressed with their innovations over the years. They always seem to approach web design and development from the customer angle and as a result have never over complicated things. I’m also an amazon associate, so it will be interesting to see if anything on affiliate marketing is covered.

Semir Mahjoub, President of Ericsson Mobile Services at Ericsson is appearing, so I’m wondering if anything will be mentioned of the recent joint ventures with Microsoft. Something of which I have blogged about in the past.

Rick Kelley , Director for Inside Sales EMEA at Facebook will be presenting. He helps oversee expanding advertising efforts with an emphasis on emerging brands. While I would always look forward to hearing from anyone at Facebook, it’s just a question if will this be a sales pitch?
If I see a live ad published with real-time stats being displayed on click-throughs, I’ll be tempted to walk out. I saw that 2 years ago.

Two more possible sales pitches may come in the form of James Kent, Analytics Research Specialist at Google who measures the impact of display advertising and
Amanda Rosenberg, Business Development Manager at Google who works specifically with mobile ads. As mentioned I am interested in how mobile advertising is developing so I’m hoping this produces some useful insight and isn’t just a pitch for more business.

The one keynote that i am disappointed I wont be able to attend is that from Laurence Bret-Stern, Marketing Director EMEA at LinkedIn. Laurence covered Social Media and the Talent Economy. I’m a real advocate of LinkedIn and believe while many social platforms may come and go, LinkedIn will continue to grow. I just hope the presentation will be made available.

Anyway, here’s hoping it will be a good show!