Larry Weber's new Digital Marketing Organization

When Larry Weber, creator of the world's largest public relations organization WeberShandwick, stepped down as Interpublic Group division leader in May, many people wondered what he might be up to next.

Now an article in the Boston Herald gives a little insight into his new project (via Up2Speed):

Internet marketing headed to next level

Digerati take notice: Larry Weber is hunting - again. And he might want to buy your company, if it's in the right niche. (...)

From his corner office at Weber Shandwick Worldwide overlooking Cambridge's Kendall Square, Weber said he is working with venture capitalists and other investors to put together a marketing organization for the digital age. Among the primary components will be database builders, providers of data analysis and digital marketers. (...)

Motivating Weber's hunt this time is the desire to create a mechanism to deliver precise pitches to a finely filtered target audience. You could say he wants to transform spam into useful messages. But it doesn't stop there. (...)

A published author as well as an entrepreneur, Weber called his forthcoming book "The Morphing of Marketing." From an overstuffed green leather chair, he talked about "viral communication" or using virtual communities to spread a message. "That's what blogging is," Weber added, referring to the Web's proliferation of open but focused bulletin boards called Weblogs, or simply blogs, that anyone can use to post a message. "You really can't underestimate that," he said.

"I think there's going to be a consolidation of marketing," Weber said, as enterprises seek better ways to use technology to reach target audiences. "I want to lead that!" he concluded.

After the demise of the new economy, many in the advertising industry, especially here in Germany, felt vindicated in their view that online media was only some kind of temporary anomaly. After spring 2000 it was time for business as usual for them and it still is (...to see what this means, just look at the website of Springer & Jacoby).

They couldn't be more wrong ! As the Internet gets more and more integrated into people's lives, it just starts to become a great platform for market communication.

But today's Digital Marketing goes far beyond banners and websites. There are many more things that need to be covered: viral agents, weblogs, chats, instant messaging, mobiles, search engines and so on...

An agency that is able to integrate all these channels into its offering and combines it with the knowledge of how to target the right customer at the right time and place, will have a clear competitive edge over traditional advertising outfits.

If that's what this new marketing organization is about, it could be a really interesting project !!!

BTW, where is Larry's own weblog ? I really have trouble finding it... Can anybody help me out here ? ;-)