Dodgy Online Stats Part 73

Yesterday, they revised the statistic to 4% down year on year - a miscalculation apparently...

Dodgy Online Stats Part 72

Everyone in our industry has rightly been getting very excited about recent IAB/PwC market stats . The most exciting top line figure being Internet has overtaken TV as biggest single ad sector.
However less trumpeted but possibly more remarkable is the following
"Online classified advertising grew by 10.6% year on year to £385m" - this figure relates to H1 2009 (vs H1 2008)
I just don't believe that stat.
Lets assume online classifieds consist of listings (banners/MPUs etc are counted as display) for
Jobs, cars, homes, travel
Which of these sectors was up year on year in 2009?
Most media owner MDs i speak to say that they are down +20% year on year (and i think that is a decent performance - there is much worse out there)

I think we need some clarification from IAB/PwC as it would be a hell of a performance to out perform the UK economy in such a startling way

State of the OME Nation - Sep 2009

Just had biggest gap in my blogging career of 1 month - due to
- nothing much to say
- writing tweets is quicker and easier
- first decent foreign holiday in too long a time

But back in the chair now and just an update on us - the market and places in between

First the good stuff
1. May June July 2009 - was OME's best ever quarter in our 3 years of trading. That is more a testament to the hard work of our staff - the good performance of our clients and client acquisition (and retention) than any macro economic factors.
2. It is clear that any upturn will be in digital rather than non digital recruitment. The ROI argument has been largely won.
3. We are expanding - added one person to team (details to follow) with one more to follow in Jan i think now - lets be cautious...
4. Some dormant clients are re-emerging blinking from the dark recesses of recruitment freezes and lay offs and wanting to get some jobs out there and wanting to at least talk about social/bus networks etc
5. Really pleased with how we seem to be positioned in the market as results oriented - innovative - practical - no bull shit - great customer service ( i realise that this may be rather biased but it seems to be true)

The not so good stuff

1. What a hard year - it really has been running like a nutter in order to stand still - only on holiday did i realise how bone tired i was. Its good for the soul and nothing wrong with hard work but ideally it would be great if that work paid off in similar amounts of revenue and profit
2. The last 5-6 weeks have been quiet - perhaps a punishment for thinking we were doing so well and soon i would be lighting my cigars with £20 notes. The truth is as we all know deep down its going to be a long hard slog back to UK Plc prosperity.
3. I still know a number of people out of work and i really feel for them in current market - it is not easy getting back in to our business sector at moment - and i imagine a down ward pressure of remuneration has accompanied this.

Finally - 3 houses on my road have sold in last month - so housing market is back or i should close the curtains when performing naked yoga at night

Social Media - Recruitment - Sep 2009

Speaking at a Business Forum in next few weeks and have landed topic of social media and recruitment.
Now here is the issue - we have case studies, we have read 1000s of words on topic, attended many seminars and advised numerous organisations (some even got good advice). The audience is a mix of experienced recruiters, with wildly varying levels of experience in digital and social/business networks. Time slot - 20 mins (+ questions).
So, i sit here pondering - where to start/end? - what to include? - what to to exclude? - keep it to UK or look at US too? while keeping it engaging and pitched at right level.
Clearly as i am lazy - my starting point will be a couple of other presentations i have done on topic that can be updated and then i have a fantastic recent piece of research that i can source/make reference to/ rip off (delete as appropriate)

I often think that the true skill in advising companies on emerging technologies/media is not to know everything and show how clever and expert you are but in translating it into bite size chunks of interesting and useful info that they can go away and use or at least tell their boss and impress him/her.

So in terms of structure - i tend to always revert to "Golden Rules" Top Tips" "Dos and Don'ts" and finish with "Do the following 5 things tomorrow" - its worked ok so far...

Come and Work with OME

We are going to recruit at 2 different levels - this is the more junior post

Account Manager

Central London

Competitive salary


“Making Online Recruitment Work”

OnlineMediaExperts(OME) was the UK's first advertising agency specialising exclusively in online recruitment. In our three years of existence, we have helped our clients plan, optimize, and develop their online candidate sourcing activity. We have remained at the cutting edge of digital innovation while priding ourselves on “cutting the crap” and delivering solutions and services to our clients that really work not are merely clever or new! This approach has helped us to blossom and grow as a business in 2009 – hence our need to grow the team.
We look after some of the UK’s biggest digital recruitment accounts such as Carphone Warehouse, Odgers Berndtson, Game Stores Group, TheTrainline, Doosan Babcock and Verizon. We are now looking to expand the team by looking for an ambitious Account Manager with a background in recruitment advertising (in media or agency) and an enthusiasm for digital to help us manage our expanding client base.
You need
· To be diligent and have a great customer service ethic
· To be able to communicate the complexity of the digital world that makes your client understand while not boring them to death
· to be open minded to new solutions/products with a healthy cynicism that means you want some evidence that it may actually work for our clients money
If you are interested, please email your CV to our MD at dominic@omexperts.co.uk or call him in confidence on 07973 865 637

To recruit or not to recruit

that is the question for OME right now. And probably a little microcosm of what is going to be a long slow recovery for UK rec economy.
Our head count maxed out in June 2008 and we trimmed back by 2 over the next quarter (sounds a bit cold as these were real life good people) - we then had periods of high activity but also a couple of months when the phones did not ring and we wondered how bad was it going to get...
So we now have had a solid 5 months of growth - an increase in margin on that revenue and some very stressed people including the MD. Also my major concern that when things are busy the new business generation goes v quiet and we concentrate on looking after our current customers (which is 100% how it should be).
So we should recruit at account manager level - yes? freeing up Directors to grow the business.

But...do we want to increase our fixed cost base? do we want to put ourselves in a position that we have to look at numbers again -as the market is very delicate?

I think 1 thing - my fellow directors think something different - i am sure we will make the right decision - as long as we all ending up agreeing with me.

Penna/Barkers - bad times but what next

There is no point in try to summarise this story here - the Ri5 press releases and comments section gives the full picture but i really believe that it has long term seismic repercussions for the way the client/media/agency relationship works in the future. So my views and associated comments below

1. Its proof that the bad guys are not just the bankers/MPs etc. The actions of the Barkers board have to be highly questionable - the act of giving people redundancy payments and paying up notice when you had absolutely zero intention of fulfilling these promises takes some doing. I would like to think most of us would have struggled with those actions if we were ever in a similar position. Still they appear to have kept jobs/pay offs so that's OK then. Oh - and everyone has lost their pensions. Don't think its right to attach significant blame to Penna here but lets hope they can help.

2. The media have taken a bath - i have had figures quoted to me of £1million + from 2 media owners and many £100,000s with at least 10 others. The small media owners who have relied on this money coming in will be absolutely devastated - lets hope there is not a knock on effect. History tells us that there will be nothing left in the pot from the administrators when taxman/banks have had their money.

3. So why give agencies media commission? This is a little counter productive for OME (as we make income from this) but i am really not sure what the media get from offering agencies this discount. The reasons historically were
- Guarantee that you are going to be paid (NPA recognition and most agencies have insurance if clients go bust) - that guarantee is not looking too good after last week.
- Agencies are a channel sell - gives media the ability to sell to many clients via one point. OK - Stop Press - having worked on both media and agency side - i can confirm that most agencies cannot sell there way out a wet paper bag. Sure they could sell a Sunday Times advert for the last 20 years (but not now) but they have been useless at selling online or indeed any innovative launch - so i really do not believe the channel sell argument (unless you are must use/habit bought media).

4. The old agency model is dead. Media commissions wont ever again fund big teams of managers without revenue responsibility - everything an agency does and adds value to a client needs to be charged for and billed. The old model was horrible as it hid all the charges for the brilliant creative work/account mgmt/planning and buying and gave these away as free or nearly free as the cash could be made by over the table and under the table media deals.

The new model can work - sorry to blow our own trumpet but we are up year on year - our billing is completely transparent and i am proud that in some areas we are stupidly cheap and in some expensive to use (depending on how much work is involved).

But best to end this by sending best wishes to the ex Barkers staff and the media owners affected.