Technology for Marketing, London, February 2006

Last month I was visiting the "Technology for Marketing" in London. As the name displays, its an area where providers and vendors of marketing systems, platforms and technologies meet together. At first sight it looks like a mess, just a bunch of vendors and providers that provides email marketing services, search engine optimization or just another content management system.

Looking closer at the event and conferences, I realize that there are a number of brands that are investing in multi-channel marketing technologies to maximise the effectiveness of campaigns. At this year's Technology for Marketing show, industry experts was debating the uses and benefits of such technology and will also be looking at the potential for multi-media contact centres.

After two days, after meeting professionals from the industry providers of technology and clients, i realized that most of the people I had meet was very confused about what the different vendors actually was providing and how the differentiated their products from their competition.

My impression was that people was mainly browsing for solutions on Search Engine Optimization, Email Marketing and Customer Relationship Management. This section of online marketing has been experiencing a fierce competition for several years and it is not easy to select a provider for your marketing needs without a comprehensive evaluation.

Despite the poor position among the different vendors, there are a handful exciting new technologies in the market, especially focusing on active consumer communication. I enjoyed seeing a couple of ASP (Application Service Provider) vendors focusing on complete campaigning solutions that allows marketers to create true multi-channel campaigns in just minutes. And guess what, I really believe that the future of marketing technology is hosted, on-demand – so marketers will only have to pay for the performance and generated results.

For more information about Technology for Marketing, please visit their website http://www.t-f-m.co.uk