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Direct to You from Connections 07 in Indianapolis

The ExactTarget User Conference unveils the dawning of a new technological day, and re-inspires the market with email.

I attended Day 1 of the ExactTarget user conference (Connections 07) today and ... Wow... is the best way to describe the event. With over 650 people in attendance (some were turned away), including over 75 agencies, the conference was a big hit.

Eec member Chip House, from ExactTarget, can do a much better job than me of giving you the details of the event, but I will say this: The commentary on ExactTarget’s new partnerships, technological features and approach to email was inspiring.

I was personally involved in a panel on deliverability, which Chip moderated, and he deserves a big bottle of gin for dealing with all of us. After a fantastic opening, the panel was turned over to Craig Spiezle from Microsoft, David Daniels from JupiterResearch and me. We discussed the key issues everyone needed to know regarding the technical side of deliverability and reputation, the marketers’ view of relevance, list hygiene and reputation, and the agency/consumer side of how to take all the knowledge and do something productive with it (like increase funding for email in your organization, or integrate delivery into the planning process). The content was top notch and even included, at no additional cost, a very nice improv from the three of us. Let’s see, there were jokes about how Craig just never stops talking :-P, how David Daniels not only loves his Bloody Mary Deliverability cocktails, but how he is also God and controls the lights, just to emphasize his points. This was probably the most fun I have had on a panel in awhile—and the content was good too.

I’ve asked a few of the conference attendees to write me on Facebook and let me know how the next two days go. And I’d like to shout out to the ET team and ask them to share as much as they can from the conference with the eec community. It’s great stuff!

—Jeanniey Mullen

Posted on October 1, 2007 8:19 PM | Permalink

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Comments (2)

Tim Norris:

Jeanniey,

The panel was GREAT! I have heard both you and Craig at other email events speak, specifically the DMA Policy Summit here in DC. There was a lot of great information and I think the audience appreciated the banter as well as the content from industry experts.

On a side note, as a speaker from day 2, and attendee, this was one of the best email marketing programs I've seen or attended in a while. Since my company is an ET user, I'm not sure how other ESP user conferences go, but this was top notch!

Posted by Tim Norris | October 4, 2007 10:06 AM

Posted on October 4, 2007 10:06

Chip House:

Jeanniey,

Thanks for your comments on the show, as well as contributing your expertise (and humor) to my deliverability panel! I had a lot of fun playing Ryan Seacrest with the Paula-Simon-Randy style banter displayed by you and the dawgs (aka Craig and David).

I think what made this conference really special was hearing first hand how our clients are using our application to do very cool things. We had over 25 client speakers, sharing real-world case studies and showcasing the best in one-to-one marketing. Tim Norris, in fact, lent his unique knowledge to our session on rolling out email across an enterprise. Thanks you Tim!

Of particular note were our agency clients who have done a number of "mash-ups" with different applications using our API. One client shared their leveraging an SMS tool to capture email signups directly to a list in our system. This way fans could use their text messaging on their cell phones to subscribe to a band's email newsletter while rocking out! I asked him for a case-study, so more to come...

See you in San Diego at the EEC event in Feb '08!

Posted by Chip House | October 5, 2007 3:19 PM

Posted on October 5, 2007 15:19

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the voices of email

The Email Experience Council's membership includes many of the brightest and most committed email marketing experts. We're pleased to have some of them share their insights here on these pages. Our blog contributors include:

Elie Ashery is the president and CEO of Gold Lasso, and is responsible for the company’s vision and strategy execution. Before joining Gold Lasso, he co-founded Newsletters.com in 1997, selling it to The Tribune Cos. in 2000. He then worked for IncenSoft, focusing on email marketing while there. Read more.

Amy Bills is the senior manager of field marketing at lead optimization company Bulldog Solutions. She is responsible for lead generation and the go-to-market execution of Bulldog's new products and initiatives. Amy was previously the editorial team leader of Freescale Semiconductor’s internal creative agency and a senior editor at Hoover’s Online. Read more.

Nicholas Einstein is director of strategic and analytic services at Datran Media. Specializing in email and CRM strategy, he helps some of America’s top brands leverage online channels to communicate more effectively with their customers and prospects.

Lisa Harmon is a principal at Smith-Harmon, a creative services consultancy dedicated to email marketing strategy and production. She works with marketers to increase clickthrough, maximize revenue, and infuse delight into their email creative. Lisa is also the blogger behind edm.smith-harmon.com, an ongoing commentary on the best (and worst!) in email marketing creative. Read more.

Chip House is ExactTarget's VP of marketing services, leading the teams responsible for client success. He was named to BtoB Magazine’s 2005 “Who’s Who in B-To-B,” for being a vocal proponent of legitimate commercial email and an active lobbyist regarding spam and privacy issues. Read more.

Spencer Kollas is the director of delivery services at StrongMail, helping maximize customers’ email deliverability rates. He was previously director of deliverability services for Premiere Global Services. Spencer is an active member in the Email Sender & Provider Coalition, Messaging Anti-Abuse Work Group, the Anti-Phishing Work Group and, of course, the eec. Read more.

Stephanie Miller is VP of strategic services for Return Path, the leading email performance company. She works with marketers to earn a higher ROI and response from their acquisition and retention email programs—developing content, contact and segmentation strategies, along with testing, measurement and production programs. Read more.

Erick Mott is the director of marketing and corporate communications for Habeas, the leader in email reputation management services. He has a rich background in marketing and communications strategy and execution for such companies as Nokia, MarkMonitor, GlobalFluency, Cisco Systems, Creator Connection, Sun Microsystems, Philips NV, Elm Products and CBS Television. Read more.

Jeanniey Mullen is the Email Experiene Council's founder and the global EVP and CMO of global online publishing company Zinio. She is a thought leader and visionary in the email and digital marketing field. A columnist for ClickZ, she has published numerous papers and is a frequent speaker. Read more.

Charles Stiles is the VP of worldwide business development at Goodmail Systems. In his role, Charles is focused on helping generate a better understanding of the email environment and potential solutions for a better consumer experience. He currently serves as the chairman for the Messaging Anti-Abuse Work Group. Read more.

Jeremy Swift is director of client relations for email service provider BlueHornet. He helped form BlueHornet’s founding team in 2000 and has been responsible for client services and marketing strategy since the company’s inception. Jeremy is known for his ability to articulate technical information in ways that clearly resonate with today’s online marketer.

DJ Waldow is an account manager at Bronto Software. He works with Bronto’s largest clients to help them achieve and surpass their marketing goals. An active member of the email marketing community, DJ posts regularly on the Email Marketer’s Club, publishes a bi-weekly email marketing best practices newsletter, and films BrontoFire.

Chad White is the Email Experience Council’s director of retail insights and editor-at-large. He founded and is the author of the Retail Email Blog, a blog dedicated to tracking the email marketing practices of the largest online retailers. Chad regularly writes major research reports on email marketing and is an Email Insider columnist for MediaPost. Read more.