3q digital summit

I’m a huge fan of digital marketing conferences, and just attended the incomparable 3Q Digital Growth Summit last week. There are two main benefits of conferences: The amazing networking (covered in my last post) and actionable insights. Today, I’m thrilled to share my extensive notes, insights, and takeaways from the conference. I took a good 9-pages of notes at the conference, and am including the top highlights below. When you’re done reading, don’t forget to head on over to 3Q Digital, and make sure to check out the 3Q Blog.

Opening with David Rodnitzky (CEO of 3Q Digital)

Attendees:
- Average Market Cap $59 Billion
- 14 Public Companies
- Total Market Cap $823 Billion
- 18 Private Companies
- Average Funding $135 Million
- Total Funding 2.4 Billion
- 9 No data available
“World class people on our team, but we also have world class clients.”
Themes:
- Going beyond SEM, social, etc.
- Understand your data
- Use your 1st party data
- Expand beyond SEM
- Consider offline
- Take a holistic approach
- Get on the mobile bandwagon

Welcome From Top Sponsor, Ryan Gibson at Google

Customer Match announcement, truly a game changer
Use first party data to influence advertising on YouTube and Gmail

Evolution of Agencies and What Clients Should Expect

Scott Rayden (CMO at 3Q Digital), Mason Garrity (VP of Strategy at 3Q Digital), Ron Fusco (Director of Strategy and Analytics at 3Q Digital), and Marcy Strauss Axelrod (Consultant)

How has marketing changed?
- Behavior and expectations – devices, data, technology
- Consumer expectations of what digital (the Internet) can do for you has changed
- Average mobile user checks phone 1,500 times per week
- Look at Facebook as a data company, not just a social platform
- Speed and complexity has outpaced the advertising industry, and most marketers, and quite frankly many agencies
What does all of this mean for agencies?
- We have to change our mindset
- We have to get away from this channel fist mindset
- Customers come first, channels come second
- Marketing strategy and innovation needs to be at the core of sustained growth
- Growth is coming from areas outside of direct channels – technology, attribution
- Can’t just go with mindset that “we growth this channel”
- Marketers need to identify and solve the complexities that inhibit growth
3Q Digital is evolving as an agency
- 3Q Digital Strategy and Innovation Group
- 3Q Strategic Growth Assessment
- We are so much more than a campaign management shop, we are so much more than media buyers
- Future of performance agencies relies on these things
- Adding a ton of resources in these areas: strategy, mobile, creative, analytics, testing teams being built out
- 3Q has a proprietary framework, Digital Strategic Growth Assessment
3Q Built a diagnostic tool
- Rolled out to beta clients, being rolled out to more
- Fill out self-assessment
- Series of interviews
- Have our team assess you
- Output: Set of recommendations and prioritized roadmap
- 1. Customer journey – what process they go through
- 2. User experience across devices – creative, how we’re measuring
- Break them down: Strategy, execution, foundation
- Process takes about a month start-to-finish
Why do clients need this type of consultative work in our space?
- Everyone so focused on execution, partner with that external focus is essential
- Domain expertise, multiple clients, multiple industries and business models – we can share that knowledge
- Foundational work – enables clients and companies to keep growing
Strategy, Execution, Foundation framework – on surface seems like there might be an execution issue, however foundation is really often the issue (foundation is tough for marketers)
Parent company: Harte Hanks
- 3Q historically does not like holding companies
- Harte Hanks was so different – they were so strategic what they want out of 3Q
- Still operating independently, have autonomy
- Really helped with strategy work
How much will this strategic work cost?
- Some cases where it might be free
- Other cases where they might have to charge
- They look at it as a responsibility we have for our clients

Fine-Tune Your LPO (Landing Page Optimization)

Joe Kerschbaum (Account Director at 3Q Digital), Sean McEntee (Account Lead at 3Q Digital), Adrienne Abrams (Sr. Director of Creative at 3Q Digital), and Hudson Arnold (Strategy Consultant at Optimizely)

Curiosity Stream – Client at 3Q
- Nexflix for documentaries
- Lots of exclusives and originals
- Launched by John Hendricks (Discovery Channel)
- Plans start at $2.99 (great price for unlimited documentaries)
- $5.99 for HD
- Goal: Drive free trial sign-ups
Curiosity Stream Landing Page Testing:
- Test 1: Total redesign, didn’t want to do iterative from old page; Results: 31% CVR lift in first test; Accidental clicks on sign-in dropped; Background is less busy; Topic areas help explain the product
- Test 2: Including familiar publications will increase trust; 2.7% CVR lift
- Test 3: Copy and price; Didn’t work
- Test 4: Video; 6.4% CVR lift; Users who entered sign-in process decreased, but those that entered converted better; Video helped educate
- Test 5: Well-performing search copy; 21.8% CVR lift; Matching successful marketing copy across touch points
- They use Optimizely for the testing
- Pluto: temporary, event-based marketing
- Unexpected outcomes: Price – when they first listed $2.99, didn’t work, then when they did video and explained what you get for $2.99, it did work
LPO Tips From Optimizely:
- Segmenting prospects vs. remarketing – going to show general content for prospects, more specific content for remarketing
- MTV: tested thru entire live broadcast – adjusting content on the fly with Optimizely
- Trend that Optimizely is seeing: Adjusting experience based on how far along you are in the lead qualification process
- Start small, make a long plan; have a really good hypothesis; don’t be afraid of tests that fail
- Present test in a form of the game – force audience to say which one won and why – great way to present tests

Increase Revenue with 1st-Party Data

David Rodnitzky (CEO of 3Q Digital), Brad O’Brien (Director of Social at 3Q Digital), Joe Stephens (Director of Native Advertising Strategy at Yahoo), and Russell Sprunger (Advanced Data Strategy Lead at Google)

What is 1st party data? Any information your company exclusively owns or intrinsically owns; CRM and website behaviors
Facebook Custom Audiences: Upload list; Website custom audiences; Lookalikes of custom audiences
Social Media: Interest and intent are not always aligned – 1st party data so much better than relying on actions someone takes on Facebook
Just launched Yahoo!’s version of custom audiences in Gemini; Just launched this week, in beta for some time now; Can target your customers on Yahoo! Homepage in the news feed; Next up will be lookalikes based on custom audiences
Google Customer Match – RSLA, YouTube, Gmail – Can Target Your Customers; Customer match does not integrate with Google for work accounts; Also, AdWords now offers ability to integrate with DMPs
Privacy Customer Match: Google requires advertisers who use this feature the ability for customer to link to the opt out page
RFM – recency, frequency, monetary – send different messages to different quintiles
Top Tips: Segment first party data; Just do it; Have a very clear objective in mind
Flurry acquisition; Flurry SDK; Yahoo! is starting to use this more; Yahoo! also starting to use data from Tumblr too

Attribution and the Channel/Device Diversity Riddle

Ron Fusco (Director of Strategy and Analytics at 3Q Digital), Ramy Mora (VP of eCommerce Marketing at HP), David Perez (Acquisition Marketing Specialist at Convertro), and Ada Pally (Sr. Director of Client Services at 3Q Digital)

Convertro:
- Acquired by Verizon, part of Verizon technology stack
- Work computer vs. home computer – multiple desktops
- Three aspects of attribution: 1) measurement, 2) how much credit, 3) activating upon that
- Email address is often the common denominator
- Convertro offers private co-op
HP:
- HP: Store influence score
- There are a segment of consumers that will only buy from OEM
- There are a large percentage of consumers that come to you as a destination site, but then buy from partners (such as Best Buy)
- Someone coming to site to learn, this has value, need to place a value on it
- Warby Parker – Highest sales per square foot of any retailer today, very successful story; Started online, now went brick and mortar
- If you don’t have your own physical stores, you should have partnerships with physical stores
- Consumers want to shop the way they want to shop, you need to offer all the options
- HP has physical stores in Brazil and India; In the US, HP partners with BestBuy

Fireside Segment – Stay Ahead of the Mobile Curve

Craig Weinberg (VP of Mobile Strategy at 3Q Digital), Wilson Kriegel (CBDO at PicsArt)

PicsArt: 250 MM users, largest photo app in the world
Suite of creative tools
Merge software and community into a single app
Company is 3 years old
Half billion creative assets per month
Over 10 billion views of assets
Profitable
PicsArt 70% Android, 70% international, 20 age group, 60% female
25% in Asia not counting China, 25% Europe, 20% Europe, 15% Latin America
Mostly advertising/sponsorship (70% of revenues) and in-app purchasing
Auto push content into Tumblr and track thru full lifecycle in Tumblr
Every week, hackathons; Bi-monthly releases
2nd highest rated app in the world
Facebook has been very successful for acquisition
Organically seeing huge velocity in a region, double down with paid media

Client Panel

Neal Ungerleider (Fast Company), Erica Yoon (Sr. Director of Marketing at Sungevity), Slaton Carter (Director of Digital Marketing at The Real Real), Matt O’Day (Digital Marketing Lead at Square)

Android has been very successful for Square
Same lifetime value for Android vs. iOS
However, less competitive on Android

Client Spotlight – SurveyMonkey

David Rodnitzky (CEO of 3Q Digital) and Ada Chen Rekhi (VP of Marketing at SurveyMonkey)

There are 1.6B smartphone users
Growing 24% YoY
Growth is not coming from here in the US
52% of smartphone share is with Android
84% of smartphone adoption is Android
SurveyMonkey: 6 years ago, 14 employees; Now 600 employees
85% English (5 years ago)
55% English (today)
17 languages, 28 currencies
How did we do this:
- 1) Speak in their language; Leverage platform called Smart Link that translates text, sits between user and site (on the fly)
- 2) Transact in their currency; Germany – bank transfers (not credit cards); Japan – invoices
- 3) Be visible and compelling; Search Ads; Diversifying Media; Landing page optimization
Start Planning International Now:
- Structural pre-planning for international – content, currency, time zones
- Keep testing – this is a scalable way to test and learn
- Partner to go international – leverage partners to scale to international

Slides From 3Q Digital Growth Summit

Image of PPC Ian 3Q Digital Lanyward © PPC Ian and 3Q Digital

Yesterday, I had the great fortune to attend one of the best digital marketing conferences of my life, 3Q Digital Growth Summit at Levi’s Stadium.

Ian Lopuch David Rodnitzky Donald Landwirth

Ian Lopuch, David Rodnitzky, and Donald Landwirth

This conference was so good that I’m going to recap my experience in two posts. Today’s goes through the experience side of things: the people, the networking, the place, the wonderful day. My next post will go through the knowledge side of things: the lessons, the insights, the speakers, and the takeaways. The best conferences marry the experience and the knowledge, and this is exactly what 3Q Digital did at their landmark conference.

To the right, is a picture of yours truly, David Rodnitzky (CEO of 3Q Digital), and my good friend Donald Landwirth. Spending time with some of the top thought leaders and executives in the technology space is what 3Q Digital Growth Summit 2015 was all about!

It’s All About Your Friends

Ian Lopuch and Donald Landwirth

Conferences are great places to network and make new friends. They are also great opportunities to reconnect with old friends. If you’ve been reading PPC Ian for a long time, you have heard me reiterate this point time and time again. Business is not about vendors and business partners. It’s about friends. Turn business partners into friends. (And, don’t even think about using the word "vendors". It’s just so impersonal and drives me nuts.) Life is too short and we could all use more friends, leverage your profession to make new ones.

To the right is a picture of PPC Ian and Donald Landwirth. Don is a good friend of mine, a serial entrepreneur and C-level executive. I had the honor of working with Don at Inflection, one of the hottest Silicon Valley Startups.

Prior to the conference, Don emailed and asked if I was going. He kindly offered to carpool. PPC Ian couldn’t pass up the opportunity to connect with an old friend. (Don, next time I’m driving!)

The Best Venue Around: Levi’s Stadium

Mason Garrity (VP, Strategy) and PPC Ian

3Q Digital is growing quickly (and has been for many years). After all, they are the digital agency of choice in Silicon Valley. They are known for helping companies grow into unicorns. When it comes to digital marketing, 3Q Digital is an agency that I personally recommend to friends time and time again. Why? They know what they are doing, and have some of the most amazing leaders and employees I have had the honor of knowing. They manage digital marketing the way I personally manage digital marketing.

Being such an amazing company, I expected nothing but the best at their Growth Summit. 3Q Digital did not disappoint. They chose to host their conference at brand new Levi’s Stadium in Santa Clara, CA, home of the 49ers and upcoming Superbowl 50. Levi’s Stadium, especially the BNY Mellon Club West conference center where they hosted the event, is among the nicest venues I have visited for a digital marketing conference. 3Q and their amazing sponsors (Google, Yahoo!, and Optimizely) went all out. They truly care about their clients, partners, and friends, and wanted to show them a truly valuable and fun day!

My Day At 3Q Digital Growth Summit

So, I mentioned above that Don and I carpooled to the event. What happened after we arrived? Here’s how my day went:

PPC Ian On The Field

Parking was incredibly easy. We basically parked right next to the front door, walked right in, and were greeted by the friendly 3Q Digital team. Upon getting our badges, we walked into the BNY Mellon Club West.
3Q Digital had an amazing breakfast ready to go. All types of food, drinks, and coffee made my day. This was a day to definitely bring your appetite.
We got there a bit early, so I took this time to just walk around and take in the venue. I got a ton of pictures, some of which are featured throughout this post. Make sure to check out the pictures below.
The venue had some glass doors which open right on the field, so I took the opportunity to walk out there for some fresh air. The friendly Levi’s Stadium crew took some pictures of yours truly on the field (thanks, guys!).
Very quickly, the event became packed. Nobody wanted to miss this great event, and I ran into so many great friends. Also, I made a ton of new ones! I was really happy that Don and I were able to snap a quick photo with David Rodnitzky, CEO of 3Q Digital, right before the conference (featured at the top of this post).
Next, we grabbed front row seats for the event. David kicked the event off with some incredible insights about the attendees. All of the speakers were top-notch. Not going to go into the content in this post, since I’m going to write another full post with the takeaways (stay tuned for my next post)!
After a few speakers, lunch time showed up before I even knew it! The venue had a kitchen right there, with expert chefs preparing delicious cuisine right in front of our eyes. Lunch was just great! Also worth mentioning, 3Q Digital provided great snacks and drinks throughout the day. They made sure their guests felt at home and fully nourished. I really enjoyed lunch (and the breaks) because I met so many new people, the networking was simply incredible.
After lunch, we had a few more speakers, and then my favorite: Round table discussions. I personally went to the mobile roundtable and power networked with the top mobile marketers in the industry. The future is all about mobile and it was so incredible to make these connections.
After a few more speakers, it was time for our stadium tour. I truly enjoyed the stadium tour, and have a few pictures to share below.
Closing out the day, 3Q Digital provided an open bar and amazing hors d’oeuvres. While the last speaker was presenting, they started cooking sliders. The smell of the cooking made everyone so ready for the sliders, and we were not disappointed. During happy hour, it was again a time of power networking.

I wanted to take this opportunity to sincerely thank David Rodnitzky, Hillary Read, and 3Q Digital for the amazing summit. It was an event to remember, one of the best I have attended. As a side note, I also wanted to encourage you to visit the 3Q Digital Blog. I guest post on the 3Q Digital Blog from time-to-time and it’s such a super resource.

Make sure to check out my next post, covering all of my notes and insights from the esteemed speakers at the conference.