Online Marketing and Media Buying

Robert Bonomo - Online Marketing & Media Buying

2010-04-01T09:33:00.000-07:00

What is Direct Marketing?

Direct Marketing is addressing the fundamental desires of people, engaging those desires and offering, at least temporarily, the sensation of satisfying those desires while measuring each stage of the process, adjusting and improving accordingly.

An apt comparison is fresh water fishing. The media source you use is the lake or river where you fish. This is by far the most important decision. Good direct marketers are like savvy fisherman, they fish for one type of fish, at one time of year, in a specific lake or river. The bait is your creative and catching the fish is a combination of your landing page, sales team and CRM.

If you really have no idea what to do, watch where the other guys fish, what they use for bait, and how they cast their lines; it isn’t rocket science, but it can get a little expensive if you fish in the wrong lake with the wrong bait.

I once struck up a conversation with woman and when she told me she was a psychologist, I smiled and told her I was a direct marketer and that we did the same thing; we both changed people’s behaviors by manipulating the words they hear and speak to themselves. She got angry and said that she never wanted to manipulate people. I found that difficult to believe, who isn’t constantly trying to adjust the behavior of those around them? The only difference is that direct marketers openly admit to it as their profession and measure their success and failure.

What Can I Do for You?

With over 10 years of experience in the online marketing world, I can offer you Director level skills at mail room temp prices. Are you are on a beer budget but really want a "guru" to take your marketing to the next level? Look no further. I have worked as Online Marketing Manager for three companies in banking and financial education. I have been Director of Media Buying for a New York affiliate marketing agency as well as Product Manager for an ad-network.

I have also launched two DR sites of my own. I am one of the few marketers in the business that have worked for an ad-network, for an affiliate network AND on the other side as online marketing manager. You better get up real early if you want to fool me, I have bought and sold. I have hands on experience in all facets of online marketing.

CPM Buying
Media Planing
Affiliate Marketing
SEM and SEO
PPC campaigns
CPL and CPA buys

Do you need a media buyer or online marketing manager? I can give you Director level skills at a fraction of the cost you would pay to bring someone in full time. Let me use my know-how and contacts to improve your company's online conversions.

I am a "guru" in the financial education and publishing space, having launched Optionetics, Bettertrades, Russ Whitney and Spread Trade Systems into the world of online customer acquisition. Let me put my skills to work for you.

These are two sites I built myself, let me build these kind of lead generators for you.

http://www.freetradingquiz.com/
http://www.etraderiq.com/

Please contact me at : Robert Bonomo
rfbonomo@gmail.com
Tel. 646.652.6854

Experienced Team of Collaborators

This team of collaborators has already spent years working together. Need a Programmer? Designer? Someone to do your Paid Search? Need a Copy Writer? Need someone to write and publish a Press Release? Need someone to handle you CPM Display Buys and Email List Rentals? Do you need a person to do your CPL & CPA buys? Need a Landing Page designed and built? Do you need a Reporting System created? Do you need Creatives made?

We can do all of this and more, and with the cooperation and seamless communication of a team that has worked together for years.

Elena Welch – Graphic Design eWelchStudios

Jerry Kapron – Programming & Web Building

Vincent Colmar – Paid Search & Reporting Pelican Search

Robert Bonomo – Online Marketing and Media Buying Online Marketing and Media Buying

To bring on board full time a team of this caliber, you would spend over $50,000 a month in salaries and benefits, that is over $600,000 a year!

For a fraction of that, you can contract our services à la carte. No fees, no benefits, no retainers. You pay only for what you need, when you need it. Need a full service Marketing Department but you only want to pay for actual services provided? That’s us. We give you what you can’t buy, at a fraction of the cost of what you would spend if you tried to buy it. Because you can’t buy teamwork, chemistry, fluid communication and “guru” level thinking.

Four entrepreneurial professionals, experts in their fields, covering all the major areas of online marketing, from the first line of code to your banner ad on the www.nytimes.com, lets us take your marketing to the next level.

We can handle projects in English, Spanish, French and Polish.

RESUME

DIRECT MARKETING CONSULTANT – New York City 2008-Present

Consultant to many of the biggest players in financial education and publishing, including Russ Whitney, BetterTrades, and Spread Trade Systems.

VENTURE DIRECT – New York City 2007-2008
Venture Direct is a full service direct marketing agency established in 1993, specializing in online lead generation. Venture also has a print, list services and list management division.

Director of Media Buying
Managed distribution for over 200 campaigns in 4 separate verticals, managing a budget of over 1.5 million dollars a month and a team of 7 persons.
·Closed a million dollar media buy with Liberty Tax for their online tax preparation campaign.
·Helped to close business and managed Russ Whitney’s Teach Me Trade and Rich Dad media buys.
·Played key role in closing over $300,000 in business for Ebony Magazine.

OPTIONETICS INC. - Redwood City, California 2005-2007
Optionetics Inc. is the holding company for a variety of financial education, software and seminar companies including Optionetics, Profit Strategies, FXTE, Safety in the Market and the trading software’s Platinum and Profit Source. The company operates in 11 countries.

Customer Acquisition Marketing Manager
Responsible for client acquisition for seminars and other financial education products. Developed the model and metrics and initiated the media buy which includes portals, emails, vertical financial sites, ad-networks, print ads in national media and direct mail lists. One direct report.
·Consistently reached over $1,000,000 dollars of new revenue on a monthly basis with a media spend below $300,000.
·Achieved an ROI of over 150% on direct marketing campaigns.
·Brokered the in house direct mail list.
·Spearheaded both national and geo-targeted campaigns to drive attendance to seminars on sites including Investors.com, Zacks, The Street, Smart Money, Yahoo, The Fool and Kiplinger’s.
·Reached over 7% conversions on leads through creative and media optimization.
·Negotiated international CPA deals.
·Managed three outside creative groups developing all formats of Internet advertising as well as the creation of multiple landing pages.
·Researched and selected a firm for both natural and paid search.

BANCO SYGMA, Madrid, Spain 2003-2004
Banco Sygma is the Spanish affiliate of Cofinoga, the financial arm of the French department stores Galeries Lafayette. The bank markets personal and consumer loans.

Internet and Partnership Manager
In charge of launching the Internet as a channel for client acquisition for Banco Sygma. Created the model to project potential acquisition costs and measured the internal impacts of the project before launching the channel.
·Launched the bank on the Internet even before they had a web site. This channel increased production by 25% with an acquisition cost below that of other channels.

I-NETWORK S.A. (Antevenio) Madrid, Spain 1998-2003
I-Network is the leading online ad network in the Spanish speaking world. I-Network has an ad network, a permission email marketing division (CorreoDirect), and a lead generation network, (Centrocom).

Product Manager
Responsible for CorreoDirect, the permission e-mail marketing product of I-NETWORK. In charge of launching the product, signing co-registration contracts with web sites and the commercialization of the product. Four direct reports.
·Established CorreoDirect as the leading broker of on-line data bases in Spain, representing many leading data bases such as The Financial Times, The Economist, MP3.es, i-españa (Vivendi), and Gay.com.
·Planned successful campaigns, CPM/CPA, for advertisers such as Land Rover, Mercedes, BBVA American Express and CEAC (largest Spanish direct marketer). Achieved goal of optimizing ROI and reaching conversion rates on leads of up to 10%.

Country Manager
General Manager of the on-line advertising network I-NETWORK in Argentina, the leading ad-network in the Spanish-speaking world

Sales Manager
Responsible for a five person sales team whose mission was to present the full range of I-NETWORK on-line advertising products to media buyers and advertisers in Spain.

Education

1993 BOSTON UNIVERSITY, Boston, Massachusetts
MSM, Master of Science in Management

1990 UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA, Gainesville, Florida
Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts (History)

Skills

LANGUAGES

-English: Native
-Spanish: Bilingual
-Italian: Basic

Unabridged/Uncut (Almost) Curriculum Vitae

2010-04-01T07:03:00.000-07:00

Robert Bonomo

Tel. (650) 488-3945 E-Mail: rfbonomo@gmail.com

Skype: robertbonomo67 GTalk: rfbonomo@gmail.com

Publications, Translations, Blogs & Websites

Publications

Novel, Cactus Land, 2009,

Novel, Twilight Breakout, 2009

Blogs & Websites

Main Blog: www.thecactusland.com

Marketing Blog: http://youronlinemarketer.blogspot.com/

Lead Generation Sites: www.freetradingquiz.com & www.etraderiq.com

Translations

Memoriam Anual 1999” of the port of Cartagena. Translated the Annual Report for the Port of Cartagena into English, 127 pages.

The classical music magazine Melómano Año IV /Numero 34, July and August 1999
Interview with Vladimir Ashkenazy.

Journal of Psychopathology and Behavorial Assessment, Vol 21, No. 1, 1999
“The Social Phobia and Anxiety Inventory: Reliability and Validity in an Adolescent Spanish Population”

Various advertising texts for furniture, agriculture, real-estate and tourism.

Copy edited several articles for pubication in peer reviewed journals for the Pacific Fisheries Insitutute of Kamchatka, Russia.

Professional Experience Marketing, Advertising , Sales & Other

FREELANCE MEDIA CONSULTANT 2008-Present

Media buying and consulting for many firms, focusing primarily on the financial services area. Major media buys and lead generation programs for Bettertrades, Rich Dad, Spread Trade Systems and Freely. Also created two lead generation sites targeting active traders, www.freetradingquiz.com and www.etraderiq.com

VENTURE DIRECT – New York City 2007

Venture Direct is a full service direct marketing agency established in 1993, specializing in online lead generation. Venture also has a print, list services and list management division.

Director of Media Buying

Manage distribution for over 200 campaigns in 4 separate verticals, managing a budget of over 1.5 million dollars a month and a team of 7 persons.

·Closed a million dollar media buy with Liberty Tax for their online tax preparation campaign.

·Helped to close business and currently manage Russ Whitney’s Teach Me to Trade media buys.

·Played key role in closing over $300,000 in business for Ebony Magazine.

OPTIONETICS INC. - Redwood City, California 2005-2007

Optionetics Inc. is the holding company for a variety of financial education, software and seminar companies including Optionetics, Profit Strategies, FXTE, Safety in the Market and the trading software’s Platinum and Profit Source. The company operates in 11 countries.

Customer Acquisition Marketing Manager

Responsible for client acquisition for seminars and other financial education products. Developed the model and metrics and initiated the media buy which includes portals, emails, vertical financial sites, ad-networks, print ads in national media and direct mail lists. One direct report.

·Consistently reached over $1,000,000 dollars of new revenue on a monthly basis with a media spend

below $300,000.

·Have achieved an ROI of over 150% to date on direct marketing campaigns.

·Brokered our own direct mail list.

·Spearheaded both national and geo-targeted campaigns to drive attendance to seminars on sites

including Investors.com, Zacks, The Street, Smart Money, Yahoo, The Fool and Kiplinger’s.

·Reached over 7% conversions on leads through creative and media optimization.

·Negotiated international CPA deals for several countries.

·Manage three outside creative groups developing all formats of Internet advertising as well as the

creation of multiple landing pages.

Panda Software, Madrid Spain 2004

Panda Software is the largest software company in Spain and a leading player in the anti-virus space.

Business Development Manager

Did a one month stint in the Scientology based firm.

BANCO SYGMA, Madrid, Spain 2003

Banco Sygma is the Spanish affiliate of Cofinoga, the financial arm of the French department stores Galeries Lafayette. The bank markets personal and consumer loans.

Internet and Partnership Manager

In charge of launching the Internet as a channel for client acquisition for Banco Sygma. Created the model to project potential acquisition costs and measured the internal impacts of the project before launching the channel.

·Launched the bank on the Internet even before they had a web site. This channel increased production by 25% with an acquisition cost below that of other channels.

ANTEVENIO (I-NETWORK) Madrid, Spain 1999-2003

I-Network is the leading online ad network in the Spanish speaking world. I-Network has an ad network, a permission email marketing division (CorreoDirect), and a lead generation network, (Centrocom).

Product Manager

Responsible for CorreoDirect, the permission e-mail marketing product of I-NETWORK. In charge of launching the product, signing co-registration contracts with web sites and the commercialization of the product. Four direct reports.

Country Manager

General Manager of the on-line advertising network I-NETWORK in Argentina, the leading ad-network in the Spanish-speaking world

Sales Manager

Responsible for a five person sales team whose mission was to present the full range of I-NETWORK on-line advertising products to media buyers and advertisers in Spain.

BALTIMORE SPICE (FUCHS USA), Miami, Florida 1995-1996

Sales Manager

Opened and maintained accounts with food manufacturers, food service companies and brokers in Florida, the Caribbean and Mexico.

UNITED PARCEL SERVICE (UPS), Miami, Florida 1993-1994

International Sales Representative

Opened and maintained new international accounts. Produced market studies on the potential of the international courier business in South Florida in collaboration with the International Marketing Department of UPS.

Coral Springs GMC & Oldsmobile, Coral Springs, Florida 1993

New and Used Car Salesman

Sold new and used cars for the mega car lot in Coral Springs.

Wantman and Associates , West Palm Beach, Florida 1988

Land Surveyor

Worked in land surveying crew as Rodman and did some basic work turning angles.

Collection Agency, Pompano Beach, Florida 1986

Telesales

Sold collection services to accounts receivables departments.

Professional Experience Teaching

_____________________________________________________

IELTS SCHOOL- Kamchatka, Russia 2009-2010

English Teacher

Prepared Russian students for the IELTS exam, a necessary test for foreign students wishing to study in Canada, the UK, and Australia.

MONTEAGUDO MASTERS – Madrid, Spain 2002-2003

Moneteagudo is a school with masters programs in business and for the pharmaceutical industry.

English and Advertising Professor

Taught Business English to students studying Masters programs in business and for the pharmaceutical industry. Also gave seminars on online marketing.

WALL STREET INSTITUTE – Cartagena, Spain 1996-1999

Wall Street Institute is a chain of English schools operating throughout Spain.

Director of Studies

Managed all didactic activities of the school which had over 600 students, placed in 48 different levels. Managed scheduling of classes, training and management of teachers, purchasing of texts and placement and progress of students. Managed team of 7 teachers.

ESIC UNIVERSITY - Valencia,Spain 1992-1993

ESIC is a private university in Valencia specializing in advertising and marketing.

TOEFL & GMAT Teacher

Prepared students to take the TOEFL and GMAT exams for acceptance into post graduate programs in the USA.

CEU UNIVERSITY – Valencia, Spain 1991-1992

CEU is a private University in Valencia specializing in applied sciences.

English Teacher

Gave Pharmacy students their assigned English course.

CENTER FOR NORTH AMERICAN STUDIES – Valencia, Spain 1991

The Center of North American Studies is one of the oldest English Academies in Valencia, once funded by the US Government.

English Teacher

Internships

__________________________________________________________

PORSCHE ESPAÑA S.A., Madrid 1992
Consultant
Studied the dealer network, sales methods and communication between manufacturer, importer, dealer and client.

BIONAT S.A., Madrid 1992
Consultant
Study of the real and potential market for Antioxidant E-306 for a bio-technology company.

ALACHUA COUNTY CRISIS CENTER, Gainesville, FL 1989
Volunteer Phone Counselor
Successfully completed very intensive two month training and selection process, where over 30% of candidates were able to complete training. Did weekly shifts for over a year receiving calls from people in crisis situations, handling many different kinds of highly intense and dramatic situations.

Education

_______________________________

2005 INSTITUTE OF TRANSPERSONAL PSYCHOLOGY, Palo Alto, California

One semester in the Masters of Transpersonal Pyschology Program

1993 BOSTON UNIVERSITY, Boston, Massachusetts

MSM, Master of Science in Management

1990 UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA, Gainesville, Florida

Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts (History)

1990 FLORIDA INTERNATIONAL UNIVERSITY, Miami, Florida

Course in Teaching English as a Second Language (TESL)

1988 NEW YORK UNIVERSITY (Tisch School of the Arts)

Attended one full year of film school.

1987 UNIVERSITY COLLEGE DUBLIN, Dublin, Ireland

Certificate in Irish Studies

1986 UNIVERISTIY OF MIAMI, Miami, Florida

One Summer Semester at Uof M.

1986 UNIVERSITY OF GRANADA, Granada, Spain

Signed up for classes in Spanish Language and Culture

1985 UNIVERSITY OF NAVARRA, Pamplona, Spain

Certificate in Spanish Language and Culture

1985 PINE CREST PREPARATORY SCHOOL, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida

Graduated with a High School Diploma

Skills

LANGUAGES COMPUTER PROFICIENCY

-English: Native

-Spanish: Bilingual

-Italian: Basic

-French: Basic

-Russian: Notions

MS Office, DART. Webtrends and HBX.

Robert Bonomo: Online Marketing & Media Buying

2009-10-19T17:55:00.000-07:00

What is Direct Marketing?

What Can I Do for You?

Education

1993 BOSTON UNIVERSITY, Boston, Massachusetts
MSM, Master of Science in Management

1990 UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA, Gainesville, Florida
Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts (History)

Skills

LANGUAGES

-English: Native
-Spanish: Bilingual
-Italian: Basic

The Email Labyrinth

2009-10-19T17:50:00.000-07:00

All direct marketers, if they are worth their salt, have gotten clobbered, and more than a few times, and if they haven’t gotten clobbered recently, they are probably sitting on there laurels. Renting email lists is a wonderful way to get clobbered.

The key to being a good direct marketer is to consistently test, and a good rule of thumb is to dedicate 20% of your budget to testing. Why? Two reasons. If you don’t test you won’t grow, and sources burn out, so if you just stick with what works your returns will diminish over time.

Good email lists are fabulous resources. Often they are easy to geo-target and if they are treated gently and kindly, (not bombarded with advertising) they will give you fabulous ROI’s. The key is to use common sense, imagine your target; would he spend time on this site and open the newsletters being sent him?

I have worked on both sides of this business, on creating and selling opt-in lists, as well as renting lists as a marketer and following through on life time value etc. First, as always, it is easier to explain what not to do.

One franchise campaign I worked on bought leads from us, lots and lots of leads, from well over 50 sources (and 40% margins), and a very high percentage (almost 90%) of the leads that closed (person actually bought the franchise) came from one source: Entrepreneur Magazine. Go figure. And it was the only source that we lost money on. The advertiser could have saved sacks of money, as my aunt likes say, by just buying that one list. Lesson to be learned, buy quality email lists that your target is going to read, and don’t let affiliate networks become your marketing department.

Be very wary of generalist opt-in lists created through co-registration. Many large list owners, Permission Data, for example, have very large lists that were created years ago. I am old enough to remember these opt-in (sometimes out) lists when they had 50% open rates and 20% click through rates! I am getting old. That was when people didn’t get email, it was big deal. Times have changed. If the list owner does not have a relationship with the reader, be very careful. What does have a relationship mean? You have to call once a week at least. Weekly communication is crucial, and the quality of the communication is very important. Is it an email with a list of 10 free offers or a well written, quality newsletter that the reader is anxious to open?

You must ask the right questions, but before you do that, sign up for the list you want to use. Have an email that you use just for testing email lists, and see how much advertising the list is getting. The difference in lists can be tremendous. I worked with one list that as soon as the person opted in, they would receive 4 or 5 emails from a third party that had first dibs on the list. They got the virgin emails. If the user opened, they got more, and if they opened and clicked they were bombarded. That was a garbage list that should only be used for CPA (Cost per Action) deals, I would even be nervous about CPL (Cost per Lead) because of the low quality of user.

Good, high end lists may cost $100 (CPM) and upward, but they are taken care of. One drop a week for advertising, always the same day and always identified. The Motley Fool took very good care of their lists, and were quick to ax an advertiser if complaints were generated. The Fool used to always have open rates about 10% and very high click through rates on open.

One other important factor in email marketing is how many emails were actually sent. This has always been a point of contention, because unlike display campaigns, it is not transparent. Open rates (on HTML) and click through rates can be measured objectively, but not how many were actually sent. So when a good advertiser does a drop and the numbers don’t look great, a common practice is so over send. No harm no foul, right? Not really. We are about numbers, and when the numbers are fake, we than extrapolate, compare, and eventually get burned.

Some of the big data providers, I won’t name them to stay out of trouble, but you know who they are, will tell you that they can model you data, and come up with lists that mirror you demographic. For example, you have a list of Forex users, heavy traders, they go into their list, find the dupes, and than come up with demographic models that find more users like the dupe. Makes for a great meeting, and fun ideas, but why give these guys your list so they can mark the dupes than hammer the life out of them. Some of these companies have access to hundreds of millions of emails, and they can most likely find half your list in their database, and sell the list, with a wink, to your competitor. “Hey Howie, I got a deal for you, you know your competitors email list, want to drop to it?” Contract will say “email select, active trader” I wouldn’t let them near my list unless it was total garbage to begin with.

Finally creatives. First, test you creative on your own list. Create an internal list of non-buyers, bench mark it with outside lists, and use it as a test. Put all your creatives through spam filters, watch the language. Remember this rule, subject line=open rate, email creative=click through rate, URL=deliverability. Your first questions to a list owner should be, what is the communication with list, advertising and content, what is the deliverability (you only pay for delivered email, make sure that is in the IO) and what are typical open rates and click through rates for content and for advertising. Run the numbers and see if it makes sense to test. Push them for cheap tests, if the list is that good, they should sell you a cheap test to wet your appetite. Just be very careful about ramping up. I savvy list owner will drop to his openers and clickers for the test, and when you sign the 50K IO he will throw in a lot of garbage.

This is a tricky business, let me help you navigate your way to a positive ROI.
Robert Bonomo- Email: rbonomo@yahoo.com

Robert Bonomo: Online Marketing & Media Buying

2009-10-11T07:08:00.000-07:00

Professional Experience

DIRECT MARKETING CONSULTANT – New York City 2008-Present

Consultant to many of the biggest players in Financial Education and Publishing, including Russ Whitney, BetterTrades, and Spread Trade Systems.

VENTURE DIRECT – New York City 2007-2008

Venture Direct is a full service direct marketing agency established in 1993, specializing in online lead generation. Venture also has a print, list services and list management division.

Director of Media Buying

Manage distribution for over 200 campaigns in 4 separate verticals, managing a budget of over 1.5 million dollars a month and a team of 7 persons.
·Closed a million dollar media buy with Liberty Tax for their online tax preparation campaign.
·Helped to close business and currently manage Russ Whitney’s Teach Me to Trade media buys.
·Played key role in closing over $300,000 in business for Ebony Magazine.

OPTIONETICS INC. - Redwood City, California 2005-2007

Optionetics Inc. is the holding company for a variety of financial education, software and seminar companies including Optionetics, Profit Strategies, FXTE, Safety in the Market and the trading software’s Platinum and Profit Source. The company operates in 11 countries.

Customer Acquisition Marketing Manager

Responsible for client acquisition for seminars and other financial education products. Developed the model and metrics and initiated the media buy which includes portals, emails, vertical financial sites, ad-networks, print ads in national media and direct mail lists. One direct report.
·Consistently reached over $1,000,000 dollars of new revenue on a monthly basis with a media spend below $300,000.
·Have achieved an ROI of over 150% to date on direct marketing campaigns.
·Brokered our own direct mail list.
·Spearheaded both national and geo-targeted campaigns to drive attendance to seminars on sites including Investors.com, Zacks, The Street, Smart Money, Yahoo, The Fool and Kiplinger’s.
·Reached over 7% conversions on leads through creative and media optimization.
·Negotiated international CPA deals for several countries.
·Manage three outside creative groups developing all formats of Internet advertising as well as the creation of multiple landing pages.
·Researched and selected a firm for both natural and paid search.

BANCO SYGMA, Madrid, Spain 2003-2004

Banco Sygma is the Spanish affiliate of Cofinoga, the financial arm of the French department stores Galeries Lafayette. The bank markets personal and consumer loans.

Internet and Partnership Manager

In charge of launching the Internet as a channel for client acquisition for Banco Sygma. Created the model to project potential acquisition costs and measured the internal impacts of the project before launching the channel.
·Launched the bank on the Internet even before they had a web site. This channel increased production by 25% with an acquisition cost below that of other channels.

I-NETWORK S.A. (Antevenio) Madrid, Spain 1998-2003

I-Network is the leading online ad network in the Spanish speaking world. I-Network has an ad network, a permission email marketing division (CorreoDirect), and a lead generation network, (Centrocom).

Product Manager

Responsible for CorreoDirect, the permission e-mail marketing product of I-NETWORK. In charge of launching the product, signing co-registration contracts with web sites and the commercialization of the product. Four direct reports.
·Established CorreoDirect as the leading broker of on-line data bases in Spain, representing many leading data bases such as The Financial Times, The Economist, MP3.es, i-españa (Vivendi), and Gay.com.
·Planned successful campaigns, CPM/CPA, for advertisers such as Land Rover, Mercedes, BBVA American Express and CEAC (largest Spanish direct marketer). Achieved goal of optimizing ROI and reaching conversion rates on leads of up to 10%.

Country Manager

General Manager of the on-line advertising network I-NETWORK in Argentina, the leading ad-network in the Spanish-speaking world

Sales Manager

Responsible for a five person sales team whose mission was to present the full range of I-NETWORK on-line advertising products to media buyers and advertisers in Spain.

Education

1993 BOSTON UNIVERSITY, Boston, Massachusetts
MSM, Master of Science in Management

1990 UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA, Gainesville, Florida
Bachelor of Arts in Liberal Arts (History)

Skills

LANGUAGES

-English: Native
-Spanish: Bilingual
-Italian: Basic

Testing Media with Cost-per-Click Campaigns

2009-10-11T06:14:00.000-07:00

CPM campaigns, display campaigns where the advertiser pays for ad impressions, can be very difficult to make work for the direct marketer. Why? Two reasons, CTR’s (Click- Through- Rates) can be very difficult to predict, and with most ad units, generate very high costs per click. The second reason CPM campaigns are difficult for direct marketers is because you don’t know how the clicks will convert to leads, and how well those leads will convert to sales.

In today’s market, almost all sites have some form of CPC working on them, Ad Sense, Industry Brains, Ad Sonar etc. These are all excellent ways to test a media source and see how well the clicks convert to leads, and whether those leads convert to sales. The good thing about testing sites this way is that your risk is limited. You will find out very quickly if your landing page is converting traffic from the site within a range that is reasonable for you.

For example, most sites will want at least a $5,000 minimum spend to test a CPM campaign. But in the case the test has a negative result; at what point do you know that it is a loser? If you are running a lead generation campaign with a target conversion on click of say 3%, you know if your are in the ball park after about 300 clicks. If after 300 clicks, your conversion to lead is below 1%, it is almost impossible that it will rise to 3%. You can buy 300 clicks for far less than $1,000 on most quality sites.

If you keep in mind that most direct response campaigns are losers, about 70% of tests will tank, limiting your losses on those losers is very important to keeping your overall ROI positive. Using the example above, if you test with a CPM campaign, you will know whether it works or not usually after $1,000 in spend, and the most likely scenario is that it will be negative. You are effectively throwing 4 grand to the wind.

Test with CPC campaigns, if they work, then roll out with text link heavy CPM campaigns, and email campaigns from the media sources lists. Starting out with site targeted CPC is the best way to find which sites work for you, and where you can really open up your budget and look for business development opportunities.

Breakeven Analysis: The Math before you go Live

2009-10-11T05:26:00.000-07:00

If you are going to buy leads or generate them yourself by sending traffic to a landing page that converts the traffic to a lead, you need to set up some basic metrics to measure your campaign. The math is very basic, simple, and it only takes a few columns on an excel sheet to give you a very clear idea of what is happening.

But before you ever sign an insertion order, you should set up the metrics on an excel sheet. If you were doing a CPM campaign (buying ad impressions) you would start out with the CPM, than estimate a click through rate, than you have a cost per click, than a conversion on click to lead, a price per lead, a conversion on lead to sale, cost per sale, margin on sale, ROI on Sale. After that, you must consider the lifetime value of the customer, to make it easy on yourself, estimate a life time value after the initial sale, in terms of net margin. Sometimes you do this analysis, estimating of course click through rates, and conversion rates, and you see off the bat that there is no way this campaign will ever work. Below is an example of pre-campaign breakeven analysis for a free giveaway of a financial DVD (Learn how to trade Forex in 20 Minutes while drinking Bud Light). The highlighted numbers are estimates.

I made this one purposely inconclusive. The three estimates here, CTR, Conversion click to lead, and Conversion Lead to Sale are more precise than you might think. If you have ever worked with the media before, for example, on a CPC campaign, you will already have these numbers in your data base. That is why, before you ever buy a CPM campaign from a media source, it is highly advisable to first do a CPC test, to see how the clicks convert to leads, and the leads to sales. If you plan your year well, you could run tests every month, and when those tests mature in six months (you know how well the leads converted to sales) then you can decide to roll out with a bigger campaign or not.

Let’s imagine that the conversion estimates are based on past CPC campaigns, which means they are quite accurate, is this campaign a go? Of course it is. Experienced direct marketers will all tell you that most campaigns bomb, and bomb badly. A campaign that can come close, as this one does, is a definite go.

For a good business person, this campaign, as is, is already a winner. Why? First year return is 38%, which is nothing to scoff at. There will be more sales down the road, the experienced eye here sees at three years an ROI of probably over 50%. There are many hidden columns in this spreadsheet, the farther the report goes up, the more columns you should hide. It is amazing how limited the mathematical skills are of many CMO’s, COO’s not to mention our beloved CEO’s, generally, the political skills that move one up the food chain don’t come with great theoretical abilities. Oh to have a metrics driven leader!

The real danger with this campaign, if you have already tested the media source on a CPC campaign is the CTR. Click through Rates can vary, but if you base your estimate on the same creatives used in similar media, and make the estimate conservative, you are probably okay. Always do this analysis with very conservative numbers, makes you look smarter and Murphy’s Law is always something to have in the back of your mind.

But let’s say your not to enlightened leader nixes the 5 grand test. Don’t despair; ask them what has to be improved to get the green light. Many will say they don’t want a campaign with a negative ROI on the first conversion event. Sharpen your pencil and call you account executive who is hopefully dying to take you out to dinner, just needs a IO from you. Time to squeeze their ever so delicate genitals; I had an elaborate mime for this that my reports loved.

Remember all the columns you hid, those columns had the ROI by each creative. You will find that some creatives will give you much better ROI’s than others, by skewing the campaign toward those creatives (text links, text links, text links) you bring down the over all CPM considerably. After bit of squeezing, here is the new spread sheet.

Now we are at breakeven on the front end, over 50% at 12 months, and probably somewhere over 70% after two years. If they were only all this easy. They are not, but that is why when you get one like this, a good fish on the line, you must work it till it becomes a winner. If a direct marketer bats .300, he is in the big leagues. That means 70% of his tests are losers. Keep that in mind.

Do you need an Affiliate Network?

2009-10-09T17:47:00.000-07:00

If you are generating leads, probably not, if you are running a Cost-Per-Action campaign, where you only pay out if there is a transaction, than you probably do want to use a network. For CPA campaigns, the two major networks are Link share and Commission Junction. If you have the capacity to pay out a nice premium per sale, it is probably a good idea to work with one of these networks. Your risk is limited and their margins and fees are reasonable.

On the other hand, if you want to generate leads, either co-reg leads or full leads, using an affiliate network is a much trickier business. First of all, what is an affiliate network? I had worked in online marketing for over 8 years, and I really didn’t know exactly what an affiliate network did. That was, until I went to work for one. An affiliate network is basically a fancy term for a lead broker. The network either has direct offers, or it is picking up offers from other networks. They hire young folks with little or no experience to call around and see if they can find someone to fulfill on the leads. Sometimes they will call other networks, or sometimes they will call site owners, or list owners, who are the “affiliates”.

I have done many things in my life, surveyed, sold cars, taught English, and of course spent ten years in this racket. But the slimiest people I have ever met were definitely in the affiliate marketing business. They beat out cars salesman, and barely overtake a crowd I worked with in college who bought bad debt from small businesses, paying out only when they collected. But that is another story.

The margins in affiliate marketing are usually over 40%, and there is little or no transparency. I remember working on a very large campaign for a well know hair replacement company. They said they wanted all leads sourced, but we only had one source, one guy produced all the leads, but we didn’t say that, so we put different sources on his leads. One day they called and said they wanted to kill one source, oh, too bad, so we just changed the source code, they came from the same place anyway.

Did we actually know how to generate a lead for the hair guys? No. No idea. Why try and generate a lead when you can just buy them? So much easier. That is the reality of the affiliate marketing networks. For making a few phone calls, they will tack on a nice 40% margin. But imagine they did actually generate the leads, why would you want to outsource the marketing of your product, better do it yourself. Better to know where your customers are and how to reach them.

If you do feel compelled to enter the world of affiliate marketing, demand transparency. I would demand a list of sites where my campaign is running, and only allow them to I-frame my page. That means that the affiliates send traffic to your page, which is shown on their website. This way you can measure traffic and conversions and see if anything strange is going on. Do not allow anyone to ever post leads do you. You are guaranteed to get at least 50% garbage. What is garbage?

In the affiliate world garbage means incentivized leads, promotional leads, opt-out leads, you name it. Scary stuff, sign up for this offer to enter into a raffle to go on a date with Beyonce. And your leads are for trading software.

Affiliate people love to talk about the soup, that is some garbage and some good leads to keep those marketing managers happy. Affiliate networks do not earn their margins. Better to find sites that fit your target and discuss with them ways they can generate leads for you. I remember one client, big franchiser, spent well over 1 million dollars, and used maybe 40 sources. At the end of the year, we find out that almost all the sales came from one source, the most obvious one, the one that best fit the target.

Robert Bonomo: Online Marketing and Consulting

2009-08-21T06:08:00.000-07:00

How to Write a Novel

2009-08-21T06:04:00.000-07:00

So you have had this idea floating around in your head for years, and you want to write it. It’s a story, fiction, and you think it may be a novel. It has gotten to the point where it is almost bothering you. You need to write it. So you turn on the computer, make a cup of coffee, open a new Word doc, and the wind blows right out of your sails. You can barely get a sentence out.

I have written three novels, and am ready to break ground on the fourth. I know that feeling of looking at the screen and not knowing what to do. I will explain to you step-by-step how to get your novel written and begin the publishing process. But before I begin, one piece of advice. Do not discuss your idea or novel with anyone until you have finished the first draft. Why? Have you ever had something funny or very interesting happen to you? The first time you tell the story, people are rolling over laughing because you have some much energy as you tell them what happened. The 5th time you tell it, the laughs or reactions are not as good, because you have lost energy in the story; the story is no longer completely yours. Every time you tell a story you lose some of it. The great thing about writing a novel is that if the topic is something that weighs on you, when you finish, the weight will leave, that cloud will pass. You need all the energy of your story to get that first draft done, once it is done, you can talk about the story all you want.

First, the basics. What is a novel? Without going into too much detail here, let’s just say that any piece of fiction over 50,000 words. I recommend using this as the minimum because you will find some contests and literary agents who consider that the minimum. So, considering that the minimum you want is 50,000 words, I would shoot for 60,000 so you have plenty of room to trim in the editing stage. Remember, a page is about 400 words (depends on fonts and page size etc)

Your plan. First, create the story in your head, than outline the chapters. I would do a paragraph or two for each chapter. Make a list of each character that appears in each chapter, we will use this later. Make sure the chapters are driving both the story line and the character development. Remember, any story is made up of three things. 1. Exposition: this where you introduce the characters and setup the story. Conflict: Something goes wrong, there is tension. Climax: The high point of the story, maximum tension. Resolution: This is where you tie up the loose ends and make everything nice, or not so nice, but you leave everything resolved.

This is the classic structure. You are an iconoclast? Great, just keep in mind that this is the structure people expect. Remember the famous line from Hitchcock, you can’t show the public the bomb under the table than explode the bomb, they will feel betrayed.

Many people have difficulty understanding this structure, and it is absolutely crucial you have this clear for you book. I will use the film Rocky as an example. Very simple structure and most people have seen it.

Exposition: We see Rocky fighting in cheap clubs, working as a hoodlum, basically living the life a loser. Adrian is introduced, manager, neighborhood etc. No tension, just showing you around.

First Plot Point: Apollo Creed’s opponent cancels big fight for July 4th 1976, so Apollo decides to fight and unknown in Philadelphia, in honor of the bicentennial, and randomly picks Rocky. The tension begins. Rocky is now up against the world champ. He is completely outmatched. He begins to train, but can’t. He fights with his manager, who rejected him, he feels like a bum. How will Rocky confront the great Apollo?

Second Plot Point: Rocky climbs the stairs in Philadelphia, and raises his hands, the music plays, the tension is over, he has won the battle, he has conquered the “bum” inside himself which is the true battle he is fighting. From this point on the film winds down through the fight, which he loses honorably, and all are happy.

Keep in mind your novel needs tension. So as you write the chapter outline, pay attention to where you are in the overall structure of the story.

Write a few paragraphs about each character in the novel. More about the main characters. What do they look like? Where do they live, work, and drink? Where were they born, what did their parents do? What where they in high school (geek, jock, druggy etc.) Review of love life, college, work, dark secrets, and vices (we all have vices and secrets fantasies, know them for each character). Have an idea how long you want the novel to be; this may change or be adjusted, but start out with an estimate, i.e., number of chapters, average pages per chapter.

So before you sit down to begin chapter 1, page 1, you should have an overall outline of the story describing what happens during exposition, conflict, where the climax is, and finally how you resolve everything. You have a description of all the characters that will appear in the novel and you have a description of what happens in each chapter. One note here. Characters come alive, you create them in clay, but as you write, they take on a life of their own, let them, this is good. If they rebel against your structure and begin to go down another path, follow them, change your structure. Don’t be rigid with the characters, the more alive they appear to you, the better your novel will be.

Now the hard part. Writing is not easy, and I have never met anyone who said that it was. So I follow these rules when I am writing a novel, and I have completed three, so this method does work. You must write every day, you must write a minimum of 1,000 words a day, and you must write at the same time, same place every day. Now obviously things happen etc., but I would try and be as strict with this as possible, because it is the best way to make sure that you have a first draft completed in a few months, depending on how long you want the novel to be. Coffee helps. Try and get into the characters, feel them, become them as they speak. First few paragraphs can be painful, but just keep banging out copy, get it out there on the page. You will find that writing is like working out, you hate it, but you will feel so good afterwards.

Now a quick word on types of writers. Let’s just say there are two types of writers, those that write quickly, and spend a lot of time editing and revising, and those that write slowly, the perfectionists. I really think it is a personality thing, so you will have to figure that out for yourself, but really try and knock out the 1,000 words. If you are very much a perfectionist, maybe do 800 a day. But I wouldn’t do less than that.

I always read what I wrote the day before first, do some revising on it, almost as a warm up, to get me into the story. I like to write with music, but, for example, I can’t read with music. Everyone has their quirks. One thing that works for me was a piece of advice Hemingway gave. He said to always leave off at a good point, when you feel you have some rhythm, because this makes it easier to get back into the next day.

Keep writing, once you have twenty or thirty thousand words under your belt, you will feel very good, like you can get the book written. And one fine day you will come the end, type those last few words and you will feel very strange. I can’t say so more about it.

Now, immediately, next day, start with the revision. Try and knock out a chapter a day, no more. You must be very attentive with the first revision, as soon as you get tired you will miss things. Some things will need major re-writes, some things will seem just plain boring and bad, and other parts will seem surprisingly good. If it feels wrong, it is wrong. If you have slightest hesitation about something, re-write it, fix it. Don’t leave it to you feel good about it.

This will take a couple of weeks. Do it one more time than don’t look at the novel for at least three months. After three months, I usually wait a six, but that is up to you, do two more revisions. Now you need someone else’s eyeballs because you know this story way to well. This is where a good copy edit is well worth the money. Someone you don’t know who is a professional writer. They will charge around a $.01 a word, but it is well worth it. If you can’t afford it, join a reading group; just be very careful who you let read your work. The first time you let someone read what you have written can be very traumatic, make sure you have similar tastes, same genre and know how to make a constructive critique. When you critique their work, be constructive, if something doesn’t work, gently let them know and offer a solution, if it works, tell them it works.

After you are confident that the novel is clean, no mistakes, no fuzzy areas in the plot, consistent etc. you can think about publishing. You can do it yourself on CreateSpace from Amazon, and for the cost of one book, about 10$, you will have your novel on Amazon. If you want to try and publish it through traditional channels, there is a book, Jeff Herman’s Guide to Publishers, Editors and Literary Agents. It is an excellent place to start. You will write a query letter, make a lot of Self Adressed Stamped Envelopes (SASE) and send a lot of emails. But the most important thing is that you have written your novel. And nobody can take that feeling away from you.

If you have any questions or comments please shoot me an email at rfbonomo@yahoo.com
I can help you with ghostwriting and copy edits, very reasonable prices and quick turn arounds.

Turn you Cost-Per-Click campaign into a Cost-Per-Lead campaign.

2009-08-21T03:22:00.001-07:00

A CPC (Cost-per-Click) campaign is a campaign were you pay a price every time someone clicks on your link, be it a banner, email, text link etc. A Cost-per-Lead (CPL) campaign is where you pay every time someone successfully fills out your lead form.

Usually there is a cookie on the “Thank You” page that fires every time some arrives there. This is to give the advertiser an idea of what kind of traffic and creative is working. At the end of the month, depending on your contract, you remove the duplicates, and tell the advertiser or agency how many leads you received. There is usually a scrub rate that is decided on before you start. These are the amount of leads you are allowed to discard due to internal duplicates, or other reasons.

If one of the conversion events of your campaign is that a lead is filled out, than why not turn you CPC campaign into a CPL campaign. Media folks will not be happy about me spilling the beans, but if they are not selling large portions of traffic, and you have money to spend, maybe you can convince them to turn your CPC campaign into a CPL campaign.

Now, in defense of the publisher or Ad-Network, they may say, if the traffic doesn’t convert, it is your landing page that is the problem, and they may be right. Make sure the form is on the initial landing page, above the fold. Never ask for city and state if you are already asking for zip code. Do you really need physical address? Make sure you ask yourself these important questions, put analytics on the page, Google gives it away, and try to improve the conversion rate.

Nonetheless, in these difficult times, when ad sales are very much down, money is money. Maybe you can come to an agreement with the publisher or network. They may guarantee you a conversion rate. If your best month you converted 5% of unique visitors to leads, back in your cost per click, say it was $.80 a click. This would have a been $16 a lead. Maybe chisel down to $15, nicer number. These are just some of the ways I can help you with your online media buying and marketing needs. Please contact me for more information.

Robert Bonomo rfbonomo@yahoo.com

Do Co-Registration Leads Convert?

2009-08-21T03:09:00.000-07:00

Yes, they do. No maybes. Co-Registration leads can be your highest ROI leads. There are several keys to making a co-registration campaign work, but first we will review exactly what is a co-registration lead and then discuss the best way to get them.

Co-Registration means what is says, as you are signing up for on thing, for example, for an online newspaper, you are asked to sign up for another thing. The advantage to co-reg is that you only have to give your data once. I began doing co-reg around 2000, when I worked for a Spanish company that was copying the Yesmail email model. Folks signed up for the NY Times online, and once they finished, Yesmail asked them if they would like to receive partner offers. Opt-in email is another form of co-reg. Chances are you wouldn’t sign up for partner offers from Yesmail, but since you have already given your email to the NY Times, and the NYT seems pretty legit, why not receive some extra offers.

Remember, co-registration has one big advantage, it is much cheaper than acquiring a full lead, filled out expressly for you offer. Why can co-reg be so valuable? Because if you know where your customers are, it is the best form of lead acquisition. I will give you a real example. I worked for customer A, he wanted options traders. I find website B that was all about options trading. They had co-reg leads. Now website B was an ugly site, lots of content and adds, all regarding options trading. No Verizon adds, no Match.com banners. This is very important. Look for your competitors, and targeted ads. I saw all of the competition on site B. I bought the leads for around $5 a lead, and each lead generated over $100 of revenue a year. With margins over 50%, that was a campaign with an ROI of 500%.

Why did it work? I bought directly from the source and I only got leads from website B. No network or affiliate agency mixing in garbage. I knew exactly what I was getting. I was buying high end, quality co-reg.

This is a good example of a trading site, with a co-reg offer at the end The offers are tailored to each result, FREE TRADING QUIZ

On the other end of the spectrum are the very low end, broad, inexpensive co-reg deals that are practically the same as buying raw data. You get name and email, for a little more phone number, but always well under $.50. The problem here is you never know where they come from or if they are incentived or not. These leads work well when they are posted live to a call center, so the person gets a phone call within seconds of having submitted the lead.

Everything has its usefulness and value, but at a price. I made money on .50$ Value Click leads, as well as on $10 IBD leads. There is value in co-reg, but you must know what you are buying, and preferably, know the source through other campaigns.

The World Venue, the next generation Social Networking Site

2009-03-25T22:52:00.000-07:00

www.TheWorldVenue.com

The cultural networking site that will change the world.

Introduction
There is a missing link social networks; a place where people connect and exchange ideas from a cultural and political point of reference.
There are over 1 billion registrants on social networking sites. Social networking has become the life blood of Internet 2.0 and has connected people in a way that has changed the way we socialize. Facebook, connects people by family, circles of friends, and schoolmates and LinkedIn does it through professional contacts. There are many sites for singles, such as Badoo.com, Match.com, Friendfinder, Woome.com, Tagged.com as well as smaller sites that fill specific niches. The social networking space focused on family, friends, schoolmates, work, dating and flirting is very developed, and while there may be new entries, the competition is fierce.

Social Networking            Professional Networking    Cultural Networking

Facebook, Myspace,                     LinkedIn                                                ?
Badoo, Match.com,
Odnoklassniki
Tagged, Orkut

The Opportunity

There is a major gap in Internet 2.0, and it is the lack of a cultural networking site. www.theworldvenue.com will fill this gap, which in terms of social change is by far the most important. The World Venue will literally change the world by connecting and organizing people primarily by their cultural, political, social and artistic preferences. Theworldvenue will not only connect people, it will give them a place to exchange ideas and organize themselves globally around those ideas, and potentially transform a virtual global organization into a brick and mortar local one. “All politics is local” but concepts and ideas can be global.

Theworldvenue.com will connect people by finding other people with similar tastes, ideas and philosophies. The site will allow the user to search by affinity, city, state (province/region), country or the entire world. There will be a global site in English, and localized sites by country and language i.e. www.badoo.com. People will be able to freely communicate with other users using an internal instant messaging system, i.e. www.badoo.com , create and join groups i.e. www.facebook.com and www.linkedin.com as well as create and attend live forums ie ZeroHedge. Each user will be able to create a public profile, as well as a personal cultural space, (library/study) where they can express themselves in the classic “you know a person by their books”, and in this case, their books, their music, their paintings, their press, media, magazines, personal portfolio as well as design and furniture.

The site will be free and generate revenue through advertising.

The site will eventually pass on 25% of ownership to ten thousand ‘early adopters’ or ‘trend setters’ once the 50,000,000 registrant threshold is reached and at least half that amount are active on a weekly basis. This will be a new online concept, a public space really owned by the public. The buzz and excitement not just of the ownership, but of the chance to change the world will catapult the site into the most important online phenomena since Google. Theworldvenue will change the way politics, power, and even money is distributed in the world.

From an advertising perspective, this is a much higher end user than a Facebook user, much closer to a LinkedIn user. One of the keys to the success of www.theworldvenue.com is finding an effective advertising eCPM somewhere between Facebook and LinkedIn.

                  Registrants (Millions)       E-CPM’s        Valuation (Millions)        Valuation Per-Registrant

Facebook                500                         $1.00                  $50,000                              $100
LinkedIn                      50                             $7.00                         $1,000           $20
WorldVenue(Target)     50                     $2.00                   $1,000                             $20

There is room in the Cultural Networking Space for more than one player, and these sites might develop by political ideology, (ie. some more conservative, liberal etc.) But there is a big advantage in being first.

Features

The main features of site are:

Profile

There was a time when a person was known by the books, journals, and press they read, the music they listened to, the art on their walls. It was something for the privileged few, with grand libraries and big fortunes. People still listen to music, read and have art preferences, but the personal library is a rare component even of today’s elites. The virtual world of Kindles and I-pods needs a new library. www.theworldvenue.com will create it. Anyone in the world with a computer and internet connection can create their own library and invite their friends over for a chat in the intimacy of their books, music and art.

To register for the site a user creates a profile. Only users who create a full profile and fill out all mandatory fields will be considered ‘Registrants’. The profile will ask for city, address, region, education, profession, country, email, age, and gender. Future ownership will be a big incentive for users to give real data; any false data will void future ownership. Part II will ask the user to select preferences from the sites database in the following areas:

Area To Select          Min                 Max            Mandatory

Books                               10                  50                    Yes
CD’s                                         10                  50              Yes
Films                                          5                  50                        Yes
Political Orientation                1                   1                     Yes
Spiritual Traditions                    1                   3                     No
Artistic Movements           1           2                       No
Architectural Movements    1     2                          No
Historical Periods                      1    3                           No
Economic/Environmental   1                  1                            No
Philosophical Movements    1                3                            No

The Mandatory fields must be completed for a person to have a completed profile with a private library and access to profile matching, as well as group matching, and ownership, . Obviously, the more fields that are completed, the better the matches for people, groups, and forums (venues). Again, all mandatory fields must be completed, and email verified, for a person to begin to qualify for future ownership.

The profile will be put into the database to find matches of people, groups and forums (venues) that have affinities. Just as Amazon digs into its dbase to finds books that other buyers with similar patterns bought, www.theworldvenue.com will offer you the person, not the book.

This will create a public profile that will show as much or as little as the user prefers, ie www.facebook.com and will have a place for one picture.

Once this is completed, shouldn’t take more than 15 minutes, the user will be asked to customize their personal library. This room will have bookshelves and an LP or CD holder that will display the CD’s they choose from their profile, three frames on the wall for paintings, a coffee table with place for 3 media sources, a bar (several versions – old fashioned hidden in a globe, art deco, modern etc.) with three bottles of the users preferred beverage, two picture frames (can be user, famous person, whatever they want as long as it is not indecent or copyrighted) an optional ashtray ( with pack of cigarettes, cigar or pipe of the users preferred brand). Each brand, book, CD, etc. will have a link out if chosen brand has bought the “library sponsorship”. All books and CD’s will link to an Amazon, (or equivalent) affiliate program.

The library will also have a Private Shelf, for the user’s portfolio, blogs, paintings, videos etc. There will be an option to make this area visible on the public profile also. www.theworldvenue.com should have a strong appeal to artists, writers, musicians and creative folks in general, and the portfolio will be an important part of the profile.

There will be several designs available for the library, and there is the possibility of selling sponsorships to companies like IKEA etc...

This will be the user’s private area, only other users who are invited to a private conversation in the library will be able to see it.

Matching- (Profile/Group/Venue)

Once the person’s preferences are put into the database, matches will be made for other people, groups and forums (venues) where the affinity between profiles is high. For example, it could begin with low, medium, significant, very high. This will allow the user to meet people, join groups and participate in forums with other users that have similar affinities, or for contrarians or evangelists, it could function as a tool to look for people with opposite ideas. Organizations, political parties and companies can join directly by creating a group, and a profile for a group. If a private user creates a group, the user can use his or her profile as the ‘group’ profile. For Forums, the same thing would be true, the user or group can create a profile for the forum, or use the user’s or group’s already existing profile.

Profile Search

Users, including group managers, can search for users by city, state/region/province, country or world. They will be able to sort by affinity, age, online, etc… i.e. www.badoo.com

Messaging

There will be a Messenger button in a person’s public profile, which will show if they are online, and allow the user to send them an instant message, very similar to www.badoo.com Up to15 people can chat in the messenger, as Skype group messaging creating an opportunity for intimate conversations in ones library. Users will be able to block, or ignore users, all within a privacy control panel.

Forums (Venues)

The Forums will be a very important part of www.theworldvenue.com They will be the place where ideas are discussed, policies and political parties created and molded, books and films promoted etc. To create a forum, a user must fill out a registration form and give an agenda for the forum, covering each 10 minute period, between 30 – 90 minutes. Each forum will have a setting that makes it open to the public or by invitation only. Forums will also have an imbedded video feature where the monitor of the forum can upload a video introduction for the forum. Finally, each forum will have an area with uploaded documents, images and videos pertinent to the topic and valuable for users to view before or during the forum. All discussions, comments, and uploaded materials will enter www.theworldvenue.com with their corresponding SEO value. This will be very important for the commentaries and discussions, as much of the content will be original. Something similiar to ZeroHedge, but with the potential more accompanying information.

Forums will have an instant messaging system that will allow users to instantaneously comment (comments will be limited in length, and a there will be a pause between posts for attendees to read posts before new ones are loaded as well as turns for posting. Forums could have a several formats, for new books, it could be short video upload of author reading or discussing their book, than Q & A. This would work with films, journalists, politicians, and artists. Another format would be the open format. The monitor of the forum will choose the appropriate format. An aficionado could have a forum on Blood Meridian, with their own intro created with on their webcam, and their own notes, or Sony Pictures could have a forum on a film to open, with a professional clip, and interview with major Hollywood star. Political and economic topics could be treated in the same way, ie Zero Hedge. There is no fee for the service. There will be a sponsorship of forums by topic and region, and Pay Per IM system that would be fully automated ie, Industry Brians, Ad Sense etc to select and send IM’s to folks by interests to promote forums. To attend forums, users must click on a link that adds their data to a database of that forum. It will be possible to rent email lists of attendees that have opted in.

Political parties and politicians will also be able to run Forums, and generate attendees by sending Pay Per IM’s to users within their preferred demographic.

Each user will have in their profile a Forum Ranking, which will rank them as far as attendees to Forums they have created.

Groups

There will be three types of groups. Commercial, Political, and Private. There will be no fees to create groups, but Groups created to promote the purchase of a product of service must be designated as Commercial. If it isn’t, it will be immediately designated as SPAM and eliminated. All political parties that form groups must identify themselves as such. The forming of groups will be crucial, and complex. There can be different levels of an organization, for example, Global Greenpeace Group, Spanish Green Peace Group, Catalan Greenpeace Group, and Barcelona Greenpeace group. As global concepts created by a few members in a chat become a forum, which becomes a Global group, eventually that chat in someone’s library can become a physical meeting in a coffee shop. This is the beauty and power of the www.theworldvenue.com.

Groups must be started by at least two unique members, with unique ip’s. A president and secretary. Starting a group will require some documentation regarding objectives, etc. All groups will be subject to approval.

Revenue Generation

                    Registrants                  Annual Ad Rev            Ad Rev Per Month/Per Registrant

Facebook                          500,000,000                $1,000,000,000                          $0.15
LinkedIn                              50,000,000                             $75,000,000                                    $0.125
Worldvenue (Year 4)      50,000,000                $120,000,000                          $0.20

Opt-in Email Lists: All members will be asked to opt-in to accept promotional emails. To register one will have to confirm email. Users will only receive two promotional emails a week if they opt in, on Tuesday and Thursday. All demographic information, preferences, group memberships, and forum attendances will be available for selects.

Pay Per IM: These instant text messages on the internal IM system will be offered through an interface similar to Adsense. All demographic information, preferences, group memberships, and forum attendances will be available for selects. This can be used for internal groups and forums as well as outside campaigns; users can only receive two PP IM’s per 24 hours.

Sponsorships: When a forum is created, one of the initial ten areas of interest (Books, Films, Music, Art, Architecture, Economic/Environment, Philosophy, History, Politics and Spirituality/Religion) must be selected. Beginning from that level, sponsorships can be sold. For example, a new film is opening in 10 countries on a specific weekend. A sponsorship can be sold for those ten countries for all forums regarding films, the same for new CD’s, books, galleries, etc..

Contextual Text Links: Contextual text links will be sold through one of the major networks on the Forums, Profiles, and around the Messenger.

Affiliate Program. Every library will have books and music, with links to Amazon.com’s affiliate program.

Promotion

There are several campaigns that will launch. ‘Change the world’ , ‘Take the Power’ away from the elites, etc… and ‘Use it, own it’. Revolution, Capitalism, and a bizarre form of multi level marketing all in one.

www.thewordvenue.com will try and take as neutral a stand politically as possible. The initial promotion will be for the global site in English, and localized sites for all English speaking countries including India. Once the English version is ready, the site can move into beta, while localized versions for the rest of the world role out in order of importance.

Viral. The most important form of promotion will be viral. People will be asked to send a message to their email contacts as well as their contacts in the major social networking sites. The difference between www.theworldvenue.com and other sites is the www.theworldvenue.com will be owned (25%) by its 10,000 most active users (the early adopters) once the 50,000,000 registration threshold is reached as long as activity levels are 50% per week. To become a share holder, one must be active at least once a week for the previous 26 weeks AND you must have at least 1000 members who registered with your code (emails will be sent with source codes of users, and new registrants who register with the links will be put in the data base as such, each user can see how many users they have registered and how many are active, but not specifically who) who are active. An active member is a member who has registered and has been active at least once every week in the previous four weeks. Of course, there will be a major counter on the home page with registrants, online now, and active registrants. Just the buzz about this will generate many registrants.

Organic. A major PR campaign must be organized, cadres of paid commenter’s on blogs and forums. The campaign must be institutional and guerrilla at the same time. Major Astroturf buzz, becoming real grassroots groups and members. All clichés, fear mongering labels, anything for attention. Revolution, multilevel marketing, and the world elites rolled into one. A no holds barred barrage.

PPC. A major PPC campaign will be put into place to bring the site to critical mass. Sites such as Salon.com, Huffington Post, Newsmax, DrugdeReport, ZeroHedge will all be tested and cost per new active user identified. Facebook, MySpace, Linkedin will also be prime testing areas. A very wide umbrella that will eventually focus on the prime sites. One key metric will be used, and that is number of active users generated (including residual virals) after 3 months. Target acquisition = $5 Cost Per Registrant. This will become a marketing mantra.

Ownership

As mentioned above, once the 50,000,000 registrant threshold is reached, 25% of the shares will pass to 10,000 qualified members, 25% will go to vested employees, in equal shares, 25% to investors and 25% to partner sites. The partner sites will be paid in ‘equity’ to generate active registrants. For example, in the Russian speaking world, a partnership with Mail.ru where 1 million registrants, half of whom are active, would be exchanged for equity.

Please see this link for Financing Requirements and Revenue Projections

Please contact Robert Bonomo at rfbonomo@gmail.com for more information