Word up “Opportunity doesn’t knock, it vibrates”. Is that the significant difference between traditional media v’s new media, conventional v’s innovative, same v’s different? If only it was that simple.

The truth is traditional media and new media are co-dependent. Like any marriage in its early blossoming stages, its all about compromise. Debate is part of the process and it’s not always smooth sailing and champagne breakfasts but when it does work it’s marital bliss.

With harmonious conversion and digital knowledge on the brain I recently attended the AIMIA & IAB 7th Future of Digital Advertising conference at the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney.

To a packed auditorium at 8:30am on Jan 28, Paul Fisher CEO of IAB Australia elaborated about what will happen in the market from a commercial perspective. Fisher was primarily concerned with how Australia will stack up against other countries and what the industry will be worth in years to come?

Fisher doesn’t work in 5 year plans but prefers 3 year plans. Fisher notably pointed out that the only industry sectors to grow last year were online and Pay TV. Fisher however warned that it is no time for celebration but rather a time to work harder, stating “although some clients are spending approx 40% of their marketing budget online others are still spending nothing”. Concluding countries leading the world in online advertising spends are Denmark, the UK, Norway and Sweden.

Managing Director of Media Smart and Sensis, Mark Shaw was next to speak. Mark gave a brief overview about the direction of digital media and its acceleration into the world of catch up TV, 3D TV, jumbo-sized computers, Telstra’s T-Touch, mobility and the anywhere anytime proposition of digital media.

Shaw suggested the future of online video will be consumer driven rather than business driven. He also touched on precision targeting and how marketers should be taking advantage of geo-targeting capabilities and therefore making their marketing more relevant. For example, “Westpac is already doing this by geo-targeting banner activity via postcodes and serving up different creative”. Shaw believes the real opportunity lies in the possibility to rewrite the way buyers and sellers interact, “no longer is it large corporations talking to large groups of people”.

Shaw went on to predict that advertising as we know it may be redundant, he advised not to “undersell the web but instead reinvent the role marketing plays… get the basics right and don’t mix metrics to suit your own needs”.

Shaw also warned about the speed of change and touched upon American inventor and futurist Ray Kurzweil’s controversial article “Human life the next generation” Kurtwell predicts “Ultimately, we will merge with our technology. This will begin with nanobots in our bodies and brains. The nanobots will keep us healthy, provide full-immersion virtual reality from within the nervous system, provide direct brain-to-brain communication over the internet and greatly expand human intelligence”. View full technological determinism article here

Next up was UK born Digital Director Mac Walker from Hyro. Walker embelished upon how large corporations had to readjust their business practices due to the internet and two-way communication. Walker recognises that enterprise is a tough interface and made up of many facets. The major shift has been “product providers experiencing technical instability”.

Walker explained “today the enterprise is more interested in customer relationships, in the past businesses spent all their money on core systems and CRM with no value to customers, today the customer interface is far more important and today enterprises are competing on customer experiences”.

Walker went on to suggest “Digital reaches right into the heart of the enterprise” and due to this will naturally have huge implications for digital advertising, Walker predicts that the future of digital advertising is – growth in customer interfaces, building of trust and value and the opportunity to engage with enterprises.

Newly arrived Darwin Tomlinson, creative director from the White Agency also commented on how the “notion of shouting at people has now turned into listening to people”. This change in marketing philosophy is paramount to digital media. Tomlinson just two weeks into his new role believes this is an ethos shift and therefore within digital agencies everyone must be accountable, “the technologist needs to understand creative and creatives need to understand technology, accountability is key”. Before turning into an all out agency pitch, Tomlinson touched on the importance of media spend transparency between digital agency creatives and media buyers.

Speaking of transparency Clifford Rosenberg Managing director from linkedin was next to speak. If you haven’t heard about linkedin, well you must be new to online, linkedin is basically facebook for business professionals. Rosenberg gave an overview about the success of linkedin and highlighted that in the 6 years it took linkedin to create 55 million members it took radio the equivalent of 38 years to reach 50 million listeners and television 13 years to reach 50 million viewers. This exceleration in growth is phenomenal. Rosenberg also commented on how previously msn, google, AOL and yahoo dominated online publishing whereas today niche publishers are experiencing exponential growth. Astoundingly 100, 000 members join linkedin every day. It is the ultimate customer acqusition business model and therefore Rosenberg believes “opportunity doesn’t knock anymore, it vibrates”.

Pippa Leary Managing Director of Fairfax Digital touched upon the major trends from a content providers perspective. Leary highlighted the differences between reach v’s engagement, custom integration v’s standard display and niche v’s portal. Although Leary also discussed the autorefresh debate and the overuse of it to inflate page impressions leary explained how at Fairfax they set KPI’s by page impressions x page duration divided by unique browsers. Leary believes online video is “where search was in 1991”. Leary advocates that digital media is a sexy marketing channel offering creative immersion with cloud computing cabilities to send targeted messages. Leary also suggested numerous ecommerce solutions ie trailing commission, clipping the ticket and content syndication. Leary highlighted the importance of linking content to a transactional business model and concluded “advertising when done well can enhance the users experience”

Last to speak was Claudia Sagripanti, Director of Mobile Communications Group M. Sagripanti posed the question “Is 2010 the year of location?” and went on to discuss the difference between earned media i.e. twitter and facebook and owned media i.e. branded assets. Geo-fencing has meant you can now define your marketing campaigns by location and allow people to opt-in. Mobile coupons are the next installment, utilizing your mobile phone to pay for purchases by swiping your mobile coupon. Sagripanti admits there are roadblocks in mobile CRM and data availability although this is changing. It was fitting the last speaker was a mobile content guru and able to shed light on exactly when and where we might receive those good vibrations and new opportunities for success.