Jennifer Barbee’s Hot or Not: 2009 Digital Marketing

Whew! 2008 was a crazy year in digital marketing. Just as sites are starting to crawl to Web 2.0, the web community threw fuel on the fire and Social was on everyone’s lips. In 2008, over 5,700 books were published on the topics of communicating in the new media, social marketing and word-of-mouth brands. Every major ad journal and sales magazine supports daily articles and research to new/open branding and over 38 million websites compete for the readers of the same topic. With 2008 came a tsunami of social networks and research that said “Do This!”, “Be Here!”…yet we barely had time to read the last article before the next one exploded on Google!


As a company and a group of professionals in this amazingly large industry we are excited for what 2009 will unveil. It’s a new land of possibilities and we all need to grab as many as we can hold and run fast…real fast..fast as a speeding internet connection.


So, here it is -- a “geek chic” list of what we have found to be the hottest opportunities for 2009. Let the trending begin.

What’s Out and What’s In

OUT = Developed Proprietary Software
IN = Open Source Software

OUT = Flogging
IN = Inspired Influencers

OUT = Finding Friends
IN = Becoming a Fan

OUT = eNewsletters
IN = Blogs & Feeds

OUT = Receptionists
IN = PhoneVite

OUT = Banner Advertisements
IN = Video Advertisements

OUT = MySpace
IN = FaceBook

OUT = MapQuest
IN = Google Mapplets

OUT = Portals
IN = Partner Blogs

OUT = Outsourcing
IN = Empowering

OUT = B2B
IN = U2B (User to Business)

OUT = Brand Management
IN = Brand Evangelism

OUT = Counting Web Visits
IN = Measuring Popularity and Impact