Skinner came back into the States this evening. I do not know why he would come back beyond announcing something. Otherwise, he should be in Europe getting business started. I will be looking for some news tomorrow.
Nothing else new to report at this time, since many of my questions are still pending answers. I know that the CFG has many questions for Skinner themselves. Even they have been unable to have contact with Skinner in the last week or so. I have no idea what has happened in the last week regarding demonstrating the system to various companies. Perhaps we may hear something tomorrow.
Miller
Well, there is this little nugget that I found: searchz.com
"In a previous article for ClickZ last March, I
talked about the "user penetration
percentage" as being an important indicator
of the relative maturity of national internet
markets.
My premise was based on two things: a
comparison between US and European data
and statistics from a free Jupiter
Communications report from last fall. That
report pointed out that it was when more than
10 percent of US households went online that
content sites began to attract significant ad
revenue.
Jupiter has recently come out with a second
report on Europe, which re-states that point for
the market here, as well. There is no doubt
that 10 percent of European households would
be an attractive market size for advertisers.
But waiting for all those households to go
online may be like waiting for a Paris snow in
July.
It might be better to look at the percentage of
users online, and to take a peek at their online
commerce experience. That's where you can
see the significant differences between
Europe and the US, and even between the
different European countries.
Think about it a bit. Most European users
spend more time accessing the internet from
work than from their home (except in France).
So it is a bit of a fallacy to base usage
predictions on households rather than users.
Here A Target, There A Target.
In my view, the consumer is just as valid a
target at the office as at home. But even user
populations aren't the deciding factor, I've
found.
Much of the analysis we have done for our
clients finds there is another element that
greatly affects an advertiser's online business
profitability - the population's experience with
online commerce.
If you are an international marketer looking at
Europe, waiting for 10 percent of European
households to get online might lead to a
serious loss of a lot of opportunity, learning,
mind-share and revenue.
A Very Attractive Market
Sure, 10 percent of households would be a
very attractive market. In fact, it would be a
pretty big market. If you were to include
Scandinavia, Ireland, the UK and Finland with
the European countries, you have about 150.4
million households, 10 percent of which would
represent about 33.8 million people. That's
almost 2 times the number of people online in
Europe today.
But that also assumes that you need so-many
users because the key driver of the internet is
advertiser-supported content; when, in fact, in
Europe, e-commerce is the key driver. The
Europeans aren't dumb - they've watched
American online publishers hemorrhage
money for a couple of years now. Most are far
more interested in making money on the web
through commerce rather than content.
The question might better be posed as, "At
what point can advertisers use the internet to
make money?" In the case of Europe, it
seems that clever companies don't have to
wait for 10 percent household penetration.
In fact, if they operate in countries with a long
history of online commerce activity -- like
France or Spain or Germany -- their payback
can come much sooner. And the sooner
companies are making money on the web --
or saving it through cost reductions, increased
customer retention or incremental margins --
the more they will be able to spend on online
advertising.
According to Nua , a survey conducted in May
by MORI (one of the larger UK-based market
research companies) found that nearly 25
percent of those companies who have access
to the web in Europe are making a profit in
online commerce. MORI surveyed 900
business directors from large, medium and
small businesses. Half of them said they were
confident that e-commerce was the best
option for their future business. Participants
included companies in Germany, Italy, Spain,
Holland, France and the UK.
The 900 respondent sample size, when
divided by six countries, is a bit small to be
completely accurate in reflecting the state of
e-commerce in each country. But MORI data
indicated that 46 percent of companies in
Spain are conducting commerce online, 33
percent in France, and 20 percent in
Germany. Companies in Italy, Holland and the
UK were relatively less advanced regarding
the number practicing e-commerce.
In Europe, 58 percent of all businesses online
in the countries surveyed told MORI that they
had made savings through investing in their
online sales team. And 60 percent of those
businesses with online access said they
expect to do more business online in the
future. Fully a quarter of them were already
profitable.
I'd say that's a good indication that many other
international internet marketers, whether they
are in the US, Europe or elsewhere, could be
doing a surprisingly profitable business on the
web in Europe today if they pay attention to
where and how to do so.
Suzan Nolan is President of bluesky international
marketing, whose mission is to help companies
understand and exploit the internet marketplace in
Europe. Bluesky performs competitive benchmarking
and analysis combined with cross-border marketing
expertise to help companies determine not only what
they need to do, and where they need to do it, but how
they can do it better than the competition.
An American, Suzan has extensive experience in
pan-European advertising, loyalty marketing and
communications. She has worked between the US
and Europe for more than ten years, and is dedicated
to helping her clients optimize their internet investment
in foreign markets." |
