Despite an 11 per cent fall of digital revenue in 2009, to €67m, Montgomery believes that the company's target is achievable. He pointed out that turnover of Mecom's online news newspaper websites had increased by 5 per cent in 2009 and that web traffic had increased by 31 per cent over the same period. The revenue decrease was down to various standalone sites, he explained, including recruitment and classified advertising, that had been hard hit by the recession.

Mecom owns 30 newspapers and operates 200 websites across Norway, Denmark, Poland and the Netherlands.

Montgomery said that they plan the digital growth to come from advertising and various paid-content products, rather than paywalls.

"We are not contemplating direct paywalls. We see standalone [paid-for] products [working] only for highly specialised or unique content. Online newspaper revenue has continued to grow and we have started 2010 strongly," he said.

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Individuals, especially young people, spend less time nowadays looking at the websites of large companies and more time checking out what their friends and peers are doing on sites like YouTube, Facebook or Twitter. As a result of this, off-site content distribution is growing at speed and big brands are pushing content to as many off-site sources and platforms as possible.

Brands need to reconsider how they reach their customers online and make sure that they take advantage of the many tools now available, such as affliliate marketing programmes, RSS feeds and the range of other applications and widgets now coming out on the market. Many brands are already doing this and those not already doing so will need to bring these tactics on board to keep up with their competitors and make sure they are reaching their target market.

There is a new social networking site called linkedFA, which aims to help companies with this. Founded by Jason Bishara, a former financial executive, it specifically targets investors and financial advisers and focuses on off-site content distribution rather than traditional advertising.

Bishara says: "I felt that there was a void in regards to complete and correct information in the financial world. I developed linkedFA to allow advisors and their clients to leverage technology, to maximize business opportunities in a secure environment."

A total of 155 marketing professionals were questioned about their digital marketing budgets in the survey and 69 per cent answered that their budgets will be increasing this year, which is positive news for the industry.

The research found that consumers are still in bargain hunting mode, however, with 66 of marketing executives believing that will this will remain the case for the present. Reflecting this, 17 per cent of respondents said that online vouchers and offers will form a part of their digital marketing campaign this year. Online video, interactive games and augmented reality were not deemed so important to the marketers, with only 3 per cent mentioning these areas as a focus for spend.

Some 59 per cent of the marketers said that are looking to place more emphasis on performance based marketing this year.

One of the analysts commented: “The research is a positive sign for the industry as we move out of the recession. Marketers are looking to spend more in 2010 and are continuing to develop their digital marketing strategies in line with consumer buying habits”.

He commented: "News sources that have highly differentiated content may be able to make pay-for-access work. This will likely be difficult for more generic news sources.”

Publishers are increasingly looking at charging for online news content as they lose out on circulation and print advertising revenue.

However, Varian believes that publishers will need to encourage readers to spend even more time reading online news. At the moment, people spend an average of 70 seconds per day viewing online news content, as compared with 25 minutes per day reading a newspaper, he stated.

Varian pointed out that there are huge cost savings to be made with online news, including savings on printing and distribution costs. He added: “Newspapers could save a lot of money if the primary access to news was via the internet.”

There is also a trend for people to get news on mobile devices like electronic readers and phones. Varian predicted that reader involvement and multimedia content will grow as a result of this.

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Jacob Morgan, from Chess Media Group – a social business consultancy, says that the kind of information that can be gleaned form consumers’ social networking habits can be used to help marketers build up pictures of their customers’ needs and wants.

He explained, "clearly understanding where your customers are the most active is crucial for a successful social media campaign." "Brands need to continue to provide interactive, valuable and unique content to their customers to keep the relationships and the community going strong."

Facebook fan pages are particularly useful, according to Morgan, who says that these pages can help marketers gain valuable information regarding the way in which customers engage with a certain brand or product. Marketing professionals would do well to spend time analysing these pages to increase the power of their own campaigns, says Morgan.

Facebook is becoming an even greater source for advertisers, as a result of a recent deal with PayPal. The agreement means that advertisers can pay their subscription fees through PayPal, which is set to benefit smaller firms in particular.

Jacob Morgan of the Chess Media Group says that businesses that want to take advantage of the social networking phenomenon need to first establish where their customers are most active. This will enable them to identify where their customer base spends most of its social networking time, thus enabling their marketing to target these areas.

The next stage is the creation of unique content, which is the key to establishing a strong brand community online. This is according to Morgan who explains, "brands need to continue to provide interactive, valuable and unique content to their customers to keep the relationships and the community going strong."

Morgan’s statements follow news that Facebook is the most popular avenue through which to share online content, such as news articles and blog postings. Some 31 per cent of all content sharing occurred through Facebook, with 30 per cent happening through Google and 25 per cent through Yahoo!

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Now, the full seminar programme for the Earls Court show has been confirmed and over 70 big brand, case study-led sessions are lined up.

Alongside the ten keynote sessions from industry experts like Google, Facebook and YouTube, visitors will hear from brands including Boden, Skype, Carlsberg, Sony, Monarch, Coca-Cola, O2, Boots, Sainsbury’s Bank and Best Western across five themed theatres.

Sessions taking place in the Digital Marketing Theatre include:

• Boden: Driving business online: email innovation in the era of web 3

• Monarch: The latest trends & best practice to improve online conversion & ROI

In the CRM & Campaign Management Software Theatre, visitors can attend:

• MyCustomer.com: The C word – C is for… CRM, Cloud, Competition & Catch up

• Sage: Social media – what does it mean for your customer management

• Radar: Customer retention in a digital world

The Data & Marketing Analytics Theatre is the setting for the following sessions:

• Best Western Hotels: The application of consumer insight across multiple channels

• BT: First steps in predictive analysis for marketers

• CACI: Using multi-channel marketing to balance the needs of customers with commercial objectives

Sessions in the Content Management & eCommerce Theatre include:

• Boots: Online brand integrity – how do you protect it when you can't control it?

• O2: Multi-touchpoint marketing for brand consistency across channels

And in the Online Advertising & Social Media Theatre will be:

• DSNR Media Group: Beyond post-click: technology for campaign value chain management & optimisation

• Sony: Beyond SEO: new developments in the search industry

• Skype: Paid search & Skype – increasing new registered users by 100%

TFM&A is happening next Tuesday and Wednesday (23-24 February).

Its representatives say affiliate marketing is currently responsible for around ten per cent of the chain's sales and they consider the channel to be a key platform for growth.

Targeted social media activity will be launched in university towns and communities as part of the plans, with localised Facebook campaigns rolled out and microblogging site Twitter used to promote in-store events, the Blackwell brand and its website.

"We're looking to build online communities where we can really engage with customers," confirmed Jessica Armishaw, head of online at Blackwell UK. "It's an extension of communities that exist in our stores."

She continued: "Affiliate marketing has always been attractive as our brand name is so widely known – we have a great deal of affiliation with universities and corporate institutions through our academic bookselling heritage."

Publisher Random House also recently unveiled plans to launch a social network so fans of its Vintage books can communicate online and write reviews, an initiative aimed at connecting with customers and driving product sales.

Users will know that various changes have been made to the site to mark its sixth birthday, and the latest entails Facebook allowing Bing – Microsoft's "decision engine" – to include richer, more comprehensive search listings.

The intention is to move beyond link-based results to provide richer answers and boost the speed of the search experience.

Furthermore, whereas Bing had previously only secured search on the American version of Facebook, a global switch opens up the engine's results to a significantly larger audience.

As part of the overhaul, Microsoft will no longer be responsible for display ads on Facebook since the latter claims its own ads are better suited to the site.

In a statement, the social network's representatives explained: "Ad formats that feature social actions perform better and provide a better user experience since they are more consistent with the look and feel of Facebook.

"This combination of targeting and social relevance is the primary driver behind the shift in strategy."

“This is one of the most common mistakes for newer internet markets”

So back to basics, what is the online buying lifecycle? Let’s take for example a weight loss product:

1. New Generic Search – I have a problem to solve, lets search online for a solution
2. Researched Search – I like the sound of that method, looking to learn more
3. Specific Search – That type of solution sounds like its right for me
4. Brand Search – That product looks like the best, what do others say

Some people may work through this cycle very quickly possibly even skipping steps, however the majority of people will want to take their time to ensure the solution they have found is right for them.

Top Tip: It is normal that people will never take one source of information as fact, we like to compare and understand all the alternatives and make feel that we are making an ‘informed’ purchase, it is very important that you allow people to enter your website at each stage of this buying process.

Building your website with the above in mind!

OK, so now we know how people want to buy, how do we make sure people either stay on your website throughout this process? We need to ensure we funnel the visitors down though the buying cycle as follows:

The biggest search volumes are for generic keywords there are thousands of combinations for each niche and with article pages and content pages you can easily pickup traffic from longer tail keywords, for example it is very easy to rank an article for a phrase like “lose that weekend indulgence weight”.

Now I doubt very many people search for that made up phrase but the more articles/content you have, the more chance you will pick up traffic. The more popular key phrases like “weight loss” are much more competitive, however you can start to rank for more competitive terms as you build more power and reputation.

Once you have landed traffic to your website from these longer tail keywords it is then your mission to direct them to your “power pages” these are the niche specific pages which introduce the surfer to some solutions to their problems, using the example from before:

“Lose that weekend indulgence weight”

You may have a few links throughout your article linking to a page which is all about weight loss pills, “If you are looking to lose that weekend indulgence weight, you should look no further than a fat blocker”.

Pushing the surfer to your “power page” which talks about “fat blockers”, this page is designed to convert, whereas your article page is designed to get traffic.

Once you have the surfer on your “fat blocker” page, you then need to convince them of the following:

In your “power page” the main aim is to give the surfer a clear recommendation of where you want them to go next.

Either on the same page or on a specific “product comparison page” you need to clearly demonstrates why your recommended product is the best for them, giving the surfer the ability to choose from multiple options.

The main aim of the product comparison is to pass them through to the product review page.  This page is the end point in the funnel and where you want to get as much of your traffic to as possible.

This is also the final step in the buying lifecycle, if you can get your visitors from your long tail keyword pages to the product review page though the lifecycle then you have done your job fully.

The product review page should complement the merchants site, pass across the key selling points and pre-sell the customer, you want the customer to leave your product review page desperate to purchase, this will ensure visitors go on and buy from your site.

A poor pre-sell will result in the surfer searching for the brand and possibly coming across other affiliate reviews and buying from them.

Top-Tip: Make sure you only link out to the merchant site from the product review once they are ready to purchase, however ensure on the product review pages there are plenty of outbound links.

“Throughout the rest of your site push the visitors down your funnel!

Give them a CLEAR path to take! ”