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This is the fifth in our www.www series in which guest contributor Michelle Corsano talks with Ken Schafer, Executive Vice President at Tucows.
What impact is the recession having on marketing operations?
My sense is that the recession’s impact has been very uneven. Some industries are really feeling the effect and obviously this takes a real toll on marketers in those categories because they can’t argue for online initiatives from a position of strength. Others,
in particularly those who’ve already seen quantifiable success from their online marketing, should be able to take advantage of the downturn.
Which online tools and sources of information do you rely on?
Personally, I try to do as much as possible using online tools. For example, Twitter, Google Reader, Facebook, TypePad, MSN, Email, Forums, Yammer, Internet Relay Chat (IRC) and Short Message Service (SMS) are the core communications tools I use. People know not to call if they want to reach me fast!
As a pure Internet company, Tucows is a heavy user of Internet tools at a corporate level. We have multiple corporate wikis running on MediaWiki and PBWorks. We use Yammer (like a corporate version of Twitter), IRC and instant messaging for internal communications. Our public communications run through four audience-specific Wordpress blogs and we run a forum using phpBBS.
Where do you go online when you login in the morning?
Between bouts of “real work” I do a circuit of online touch-points that goes something like this: Email, Twitter, Yammer and Google Reader followed by Techmeme. On a less regular basis I’ll also check our Wiki and Dropbox (an amazing file sharing and sync service) along with the social channels we host (blogs and forums) plus industry-specific news sources, forums and blogs.
Who do you follow online?
http://twitter.com/kenschafer/following ☺
When and how do you measure digital marketing success?
I’ve mentioned more of the social media side of what I do which is kind of tough to put hard metrics against. We also do a lot of email marketing and search advertising as well as manage the web sites we run like www.opensrs.com and www.hover.com (they’re both our marketing sites and our products after all!). We use Salesforce.com for our customer databases and Exact Target for email marketing. Google Analytics tracks what’s happening with our online campaigns and web properties.
Why are some companies reluctant to embrace social media?
My guess is many (most?) companies still think of social media as optional. Of course it’s not, and they’re doing themselves a great disservice.
Founder of Profectio of business sites which includes 
