The first week of the new year is always saturated with media predictions for the year ahead and this year is no different. The overall economic gloom has washed over the media in a pallid periwinkle haze of indifference. Most current rhetoric points toward desperate depression-era advertising filled with a myriad of uses for old boots and stale Wheat Thins. The WSJ published their advertising forecast for 2009 and essentially just restates what has been repeated ad-nauseam for the past 6 months: Madison Avenue is cutting back the glitz and glamour in a rush to the bottom.

“Goodbye, A-List spokespeople with unspeakable price tags. Hello, Z-List,”

I agree with most of the contributors in the article: we will see more studio shot advertising, more Billy Mays, higher quality web video, and more emphasis on effective web-metrics. Measurable advertising is here to stay and I only see it increasing in importance; clients love seeing that cutting edge campaigns are reaching the desired demographic and are achieving set objectives.

One positive to come out of the economic downturn is the expected disappearance of one-way Internet communications. Banner ads will decrease in importance unless they offer consumers a compelling reason to interact with them. This interaction between Internet users and brands will be something to watch very closely this year.

I’m excited at the prospect for the prevalence of “Smart Advertising” that can adapt to each customer. We’ve become so tuned out to traditional mass-media that the only way to win back skeptical consumers is with messages targeted to their specific wants/needs. The growth of mobile applications, specifically the location based variety, will forever change the way consumers interact with brands and will hopefully spell the death of the mass-email, dummy billboard, and the Snuggie.

One aspect of the article I vehemently disagree with is the prediction that red will take over for orange as the most featured color in advertising this year. Orange will always be a classic choice for organizations that want to make a bold statement without appearing satanic. Plus, it looks great on business cards and on couches.

We’re excited here at Carrot Creative. 2009 has some big things coming up for us. (Stay tuned for them, of course we’ll let you know!)

To help get us in gear, I’ve asked the entire team to disclose their resolutions for the upcoming year.

Without further adieu…

Robert Gaafar, CEO

• Participate more in the NYC tech community, online and offline
• Get rid of the 10 foot pile of papers on my desk
• Establish a buzzword-free office. If anyone mentions a buzzword, they have to drop down and do 10 pushups. I’m not kidding.

Michael Germano, President & Creative Director

• Kick ass in everything I do. Social Media life. Personal life. Everything.

Chris Petescia, VP & Director of User Experience

• Update my personal website with complete relevance to my current portfolio and social media presences, likely with a blog as well.
• Design a new internet—even cooler than this. I can do it. Watch me.

Kristin Maverick, Director of Communications

• Communicate in 140 characters or less for half of my conversations during the day. Not just written, but verbal as well.
• Host a killer event introducing everyone to the awesome culture and company of Carrot Creative.

Kyle MacDonald, Senior Web Producer

• Build a new web app.
• Stop neglecting my RSS Reader.
• Double my Twitter Followers. Who am I kidding, TRIPLE.
• Get to more NY Tech Meetups.
• Wear Orange.
• Write the Great American Novel.

Maury Postal, Brand Manager

• Post more relevant links.
• Craft hard-hitting 140 character commentary on relevant events.
• Get 500 Twitter followers.
• Name drop like whoah.
• Learn to cook.

Sean Engelhardt, Art Director

• Actively seek out people to follow on twitter, but  be picky about which ones I choose based on how much value I’ll get out of it.
• Start a personal blog that I’ve had an idea  for over a year but keep putting off.

Steve Badowski, Jr. Creative

• Get in the habit of leaving comments on blog posts I read.
• Make the coolest Twitter background image the world has ever seen.

Christian Shaboo, Director of R&D

• Interact with the Twitter community more, as well as more actively engage others, whom are not yet a part of the Twittersphere, to join twitter.  Hear that? That means you.

Alvaro Bueno, Jr. Developer

• Get more involved in creative processes. I want to have more inspiration for the programming part.
• Go to more conferences, events and get involved in the NY industry.
• Learn flash.

Check out the whole article for some year-end eye candy.

UPDATE We’ve been also featured as BuildInternet.com’s top site for jQuery navigation in 2008! Thanks for the heads-up Zach.

Check it out and stay tuned for an upcoming prediction and resolution list about the future of web marketing in 2009 from the entire Carrot Crew.

Andy Sernovitz, contributing writer for the Smart Blog on Social Media has a great take on this and who he think should be running the social media world: PR executives. As Andy says, “PR executives make the best social media executives. There is a similar mindset. Traditional media relations requires finding the right influencers, building trust, and sharing credible, relevant stories. Translating those actions to social media — replacing reporters with the bigger community — is exactly how to run a great social media program.”

In one way, I obviously agree with Andy. Yes, I am a PR person now working on social media campaigns so it’s definitely refreshing to see the industry encouraging PR to manage these new objectives. In my opinion, PR people have the upper hand when it comes to getting social media. We’re ahead of the game (disclosure: this is for some PR folks, obviously there are the strays that don’t do this well.) We follow (or try to follow) the rules that make social media successful. And we listen to what is going on around us.

We also fit into the overall scheme of social media methodology:

-Conversation- We have them all day every day. With reporters. Clients. You name it. It’s how we work. With social media, the key to a successful campaign is continuing the conversation. For us, it’s just an extension of what we do.

-Community- Like Andy says, we’re used to finding the right influencers and building a trust with them. We choose wisely who should hear the news and determine how best to announce an important newsworthy piece to the public. We create our own level of influencers within this community.

-Collaboration- We work together to form relationships. While many think that PR people just pitch out a story and hope for the best, many of the talented flacks actually take the time to feedback ideas with a reporter and collaborate on their needs to determine what story angle will work.

But, as social media has changed the way we think, the traditional PR agency will also need to adapt to the new ways of handling these social media requests. While PR may be the right man for the job right now, it’s also important for PR to include others to help get it done. From partnerships with other specialists to new technologies and advancements emerging everyday,  the acceptance of all things changing will only help create successful outcomes and ensure social media success.

So there is my take. Will this change? Like everything else lately, of course. It will evolve. There’s an opportunity for many people to get involved in social media. What do you think???

While catching up on a weekend’s worth of news, I came across an intriguing New York Times article (which Mashable also commented on) dealing with the “struggle” certain advertisers are having creating successful social media campaigns. The article dealt with a certain subset of marketers who do not see the value in engaging the consumer with topical social media elements. It read like a textbook case of plug and play advertising, taking a circle peg from the past and trying to jam it into the square opening of the present.

My favorite example of  this”marketeering” lollygagging perpetrated by the offending party is their dismissal of targeted advertising. In their example they try to target individuals in their office by including such relevant activities as “Cereal and Sex.” Miraculously only one person in their office matched their query. Really!? They were shocked by this?

Another sweeping change occurring within the marketing community is in the metrics used to gauge the success of a campaign. Previous gross estimations of viewership and engagement are no longer acceptable. The architecture of the social web allows for scrupulous reporting tools, strategically targeted content, and superior engagement with branded content. In short, the revolution that has been prophesied for decades is now upon us.

Using the tools of the social web, it’s much more advantageous for a marketer to reach out to a targeted group of 200,000 users than a mass market audience of millions. The conversion rate on a blanket advertisement is around 4% according to a recent study by Integrated Media Measurement. The same report also deduced that the introduction of a second engagement point for consumers can raise that figure three-fold to 12% and higher. Social Media tools that are just now coming into prominence, serve as the perfect complement for an integrated campaign seeking to engage users in a multi-platform approach.

One very important thing to realize about social media, it’s not one size-fits all: There are some brands that don’t belong on Facebook.. Facebook is not the only social media tool in a marketer’s arsenal. Not all brands belong on all social media platforms. There is a reason that so many sites have popped up, each serve a specific purpose. To me, the bigger issue is the complete lack of understanding from members of the old guard. The game has changed, and few people want to admit it. The key to success in the new information economy is to leverage the data at hand to make informed decisions about what/how/and when your customers are interacting with your brand. Let your customers talk to each other. The marketer is there to guide the conversation, not be the monarchical overlord.

I call on journalists, marketers, and the media at large to take note: social media is here to stay, it’s relevant, useful, and will change the face of capitalism forever. Writing it off as a failure is an admission of personal and corporate ignorance. Embrace it, find new ways to harness its power, and most importantly write articles in support of its importance.

As communications and public relations campaigns continue to mix and social media becomes a more common focus of the overall communications strategy, it’s important for growing agencies to take this into consideration and work together across all of these areas.

So, here I am. I will be the new Director of Communications here at Carrot spearheading the external communications for the company as well as providing insight to communications strategy on all of the amazing campaigns Carrot is currently working on with their clients and partners. If you’re interested, more information about my professional experience can be found on my LinkedIn page, but in the spirit of communicating, feel free to leave a comment and say hi. Or, follow me on Twitter.

Make sure to come back and visit the blog as we’ll be expanding it and continuing to share what the team has been up to.

We’re thrilled to announce that our President and Creative Director, Mike Germano, is prominently featured in Liz Lynch’s new how-to guide for the new-age marketer, Smart Networking.

It’s always good to see the mainstream taking note of the importance of social media and realizing that it is not just a passing fad, but an integral component in every new advertising and PR campaign.

On November 4th we built and launched one of the most successful fanpages on Facebook: Yes We Did. Now that we’re closing in on 81,000 users we thought we’d give an update on our vision for the page.

We are in the process of authoring a comprehensive article about our experience bulding the page and the reaction that you, the fans, have had to it. As part of our article we will be conducting a survey of our users to find out how social media played an important role in this year’s historic election.

What are you interested in finding out about fellow fans of “Yes We Did?” Help us analyze one of the most diverse, most influential groups on the Internet.