« Deliverability Roundup 9/28 – 10/3 | Deliverability Roundup 10/5 – 10/11 »

DMA Annual 2011

October 10, 2011 by Dennis Dayman

What a fun time in Boston last week. As some of you might know the DMA held it’s annual event at the Boston Convention center and I was like many was invited to participate in things like the Town Hall meetings and teach in the EEC Conference Intensives classes.

This event seems to have grown in terms of how the DMA is looking at digital technologies that power marketing revenues. I was happily surprised to see more of a move from things like paper based agendas to things like Vivastream which tells you Who to Know based on your interests, profile, and skills, and helps you connect and interact with other like- minded individuals before, during and after the event. You could see all the classes available, check-in to them, submit questions prior to the class, and also connect via other social media platforms like Twitter and Facebook. I even made some new friends because of it. You should check them out for your next event/conference. Many of the guys working here came from many of the companies you might use today in terms of email and social media.

There were other things as well onsite like VYou which allows people to broadcast video structured questions and answers as conversations. They are not real time, but allow anyone participating to create a quick vignette that again seems like a online chat function. I like the way this works and could easily see this being used for many other purposes. I’m even wondering if we could use it here on this blog.

I was also happy to hear that our good friend Matt Blumberg was voted in as the DMA Board Chairman for 2012! Matt is a 17-year practitioner and supplier in the direct marketing and email marketing industries, Matt and many others at Return Path have been key supporters and active members of the DMA. Matt has served the DMA in a variety of leadership capacities, from the Board of the Association for Interactive Marketers to the founder of the association’s Interactive Marketing Advisory Board to his current term on the DMA Board of Directors including participation on the Board’s Evolution Task Force. A few thousands of us are very excited to see Matt in this capacity and know many bigger and greater things will come from him and the DMA with him in this leadership position.

I’ve even excited myself for being nominated to the DMA CEO Advisory Roundtable that will take place in early November. I’ve already begun the conversation with Larry Kimmel while at the annual event in Boston and have plenty more to say and do for them in the coming months.

All in all, I see the DMA is taking a few big steps forward into the digital world. Not that they weren’t before, but putting some of these companies at the events and people like Matt into such important positions will increase the DMA’s growth and leadership in these important economic arenas for many of us.

The next DMA Annual event in 2012 is in Las Vegas next year. http://www.dma12.org/ Should be a fun one! Oh, also don’t forget the Email Experience Council (EEC) Email Evolution Conference in Hollywood Florida in 2012.

-Dennis
Eloqua

Don’t Just Send, Deliver!