SmartBrief interviewed David Doty, IAB Senior Vice President, Thought Leadership & Marketing, to get his MIXX takeaways.

SB: The announcement of Adobe's intent to acquire Omniture portends a future where analytic functions are baked into the software tools used to create advertising. How do you see the merger of these two functions as fueling the creative revolution that was the theme of the 2009 MIXX Conference?

DOTY: Analytics have been the hallmark of interactive advertising since its birth, and so this announcement by Adobe is a natural progression and a very smart move. A number of our speakers including AOL, Google, Microsoft and Yahoo! also addressed the importance of analytics in interactive. Our call for a creative revolution encompasses analytics, encourages them, and moves beyond them -- since interactive advertising provides marketers and agencies with an unparalleled opportunity to engage people emotionally with their brands, to be a common ground for fabulous, affecting and effective advertising. The energized combination of art and science, the vital core of great advertising, will reshape interactive into the main medium for narrating significant brand stories. That's what we call the Creative Revolution in Interactive Advertising.

SB: What did the emphasis on live Twitter feedback add to the sessions and keynotes? Will you do it next year?

DOTY: This was the first post-Twitter revolution MIXX, as our President and CEO Randall Rothenberg declared from the stage. And we used social media of all kinds to give people in the audience as well as people from just about anywhere the same opportunity as our on-stage guests to be part of the conversation. The excitement that approach generated, its ability to broaden the reverberating dialogue, expanded participation and penetration well beyond the central gathering room. Whatever channels we use next year, we intend to create the same flow of ideas from all quarters.

SB: Wired editor in chief Chris Anderson spoke in favor of a "freemium" content model, with publishers giving away the lion's share of their content in order to sell some of it to dedicated users. Do you think publishers will answer the call?

DOTY: Our members are pursuing a number of different models -- and they are very smart about their businesses' needs. Coming up in February, at our Annual Leadership Meeting in Carlsbad, California, we'll be gathering the movers and shakers of our industry once again, this time to talk about the next wave of revenue: premium, freemium or whatever works.

SB: What do you think was different about this year's MIXX?

DOTY: We've never had so much press and social media attention, and buzz, with so many of our speakers breaking important industry news at MIXX. It's the place for it, since the leaders of interactive are all there. I've been hearing that people perceived this year as an inflection point -- a return on what we set out to do: create a common ground for industry thought leadership, a place for the whole ecosystem -- agencies, marketers and publishers -- to come together and explore how to integrate brand messages seamlessly online and to advance consumers' interactive experiences so they're more relevant and compelling. We were just pleased to have had the chance to give our members, along with their partners throughout media, access to the sharpest minds in the industry in an informative, collaborative environment.

• Download Media Kit

• Breaking News
• Industry Home
• Competitor News
• Readers' Choice
• Press Releases
• Search
• Archive
• Grab our News Widget
• Get this RSS Feed
• Publish your Press Release

• Tuesday, September 29, 2009
• Monday, September 28, 2009
• Friday, September 25, 2009
• Thursday, September 24, 2009
• Wednesday, September 23, 2009