Wired has a great article on how the open nature of Google Maps is changing how we interact with our surroundings. What really struck me as interesting is the potential of KML, which allows users to mash-up maps with any data they want and openly share it. Notably, Google is indexing all of the KML files they can find, whether or not it is specific to their own product. So what does this mean for marketers? Google Maps (and for that matter Live Local from Microsoft) will be integrated more and more into mobile, as evidenced by the iPhone’s deep integration of the service, and “third screen” marketing will become a much more effective and necessary part of the media arsenal. Will I drive an extra mile off the highway to go to a well reviewed local diner, versus a fast food chain at a rest stop? Definitely. Would I plan a vacation itinerary around other user reviews that I find via an online map, versus brochures I pick up, or a paid travel site listing? Absolutely. The talk about online local advertising is mostly focused on the online extensions of local media, not the local extensions of global portals, but I think that this will shift in the near-to-mid term. And again, what will drive the expansion, plus make local search (and by proxy, mobile search) much more effective is user tagging. Instead of a product page, it’s a businesses sticky on a map, and letting your users know how you want to be described (not that they’ll always listen) is a large part of taking advantage of this new platform. Whether I’m a car dealership that is betting that my location and advertising will carry the day, a casual dining restaurant chain that wants a new, better way to connect with my customers, or even a global CPG that wants to communicate with a customer base that is on a cell versus a laptop, the geoweb is worth exploring.

Digg’s popularity is not news, in fact, many mainstream news sites, like the Washington Post have embraced social news services for some time, based on the fact that a story on the front page of digg can drive tens of thousands of extra visitors in a 24 hour period. What I find fascinating, however, is that marketers have failed, AFAIK, to incorporate social news services on their own sites. The investment to incorporate such functionality on a product page is minimal, and the return can be significant. It also has SEO benefits, and can create a long term presence within social networks for accurate product information. Unlike news organizations, which have to maintain objectivity, companies are also free to suggest tags to shoppers who want to share their finds with others, and while screening out negative tags is impossible, the vast majority of shoppers who have come to a page will follow a recommendation versus creating their own. As we see more and more search engines begin to incorporate user tagging into their rankings, it is likely that experience integrating services such as digg now will potentially give a significant edge to marketers in the not-so-distant future.

Earlier this week, TNS released the latest media spending numbers broken out by platform. While most of the attention has focused on the continued decline in TV, radio, and print spending, and the 16.7% increase in online (not even including paid search, which is larger), something that struck me are the other gainers. Magazines (4.4%) and outdoor (2.4%) were the only platforms (besides Spanish media, which is moy cayente right now) to show an overall increase in spending. Two things that connect the two- they are non-interruptible (unless you tear the ads out of your People , but that is probably extreme), and their ability to be effectively tracked is very limited, especially compared to online. I’ll give magazines a pass for right now, as I get that there are advantages to editorial adjacency, it is easy to follow an ad online, and there are still times when consumers, even me, would rather read a magazine than my laptop. But outdoor? Even less trackable, and no ability to connect for further information, as most of the time, it is encountered in a car. That said, how many times have you seen a pedestrian stop, take out a notepad or their phone, and write down a URL or phone # on a billboard? I can kind of see how it would benefit local retailers, but I am mystified as to what the real gains a national marketer sees by placing an ad by a tunnel entrance. I see many of the same problems with radio, but investment fell 2.9%, continuing a long downward trend. There must be a concentration of amazing salespeople in this space, because it has managed to avoid the cold, hard stare of ROI that has eroded other media.