CardMarketing 2.0

I wonder how many issuers have a blog monitoring tool that allows them to actively track any mentions of them in the blogosphere? It's an area, I'm pretty sure, few issuers have looked into yet (I say this because I was in a meeting the other day with a highly successful UK dotcom and even they are only starting to do it in the new year). But it's an area issuers can no longer afford to ignore.

Starbucks in the US has started allowing people to design their own customized cards — and is doing a fantastic job of it, too. In fact, the way it's promoting the new service on its website is pretty damn awesome — the usability is sublime.

Capital One today launched an interactive online 'Do-It-Yourself' credit card program for customers, which leads them through an array of options resulting in the card that suits them best. As choices are made, certain options are greyed out so you can see, in real time, the various trade-offs of having this or that card. So, if you decide to opt for an annual fee, you can earn rewards faster. The greying out is evident in the screengrab, below.

In recent weeks, LG, the consumer electronics company, has been running a fun 'moblogger' competition where people all around Europe get to send in portrait photos taken on their phones, along with a brief description of why that person (or those people) reflect the lifestyle or character of their country. The ten best piccies, when the competition ends on Nov 30th, will win the new LG Viewty camera phone and get their phone bills paid for two months up to a maximum of 50 euros (IMO, pretty stingy, but still).

I have written before on chance, randomness and serendipity — and how much fun it would be if issuers could integrate these concepts into their marketing. Well, one issuer has made a stab at this recently, and it's a good start. I'm talking, of course about Chase (which is usually the case whenever I'm covering innovation and clever goings-on in the cards space).

Shopping for blinds is something no man should suffer, is a truly desperate fate, but my excuses — and there were many of them, believe me — had run out. So, there I was, on the last Sunday of September, being led around Peter Jones like a corpse on a skateboard, having to cope with alien terms like 'fine perforation' and 'twizzle'.

The amount of money spent on online advertising in the UK during the first half of 2007 was up 41.3% year-on-year, taking the sector to a half-year high of £1,334.3 million. This compares to £917.2 million last year, and means online now accounts for just under 15% of total UK ad spend. At this rate, it's predicted to reach a potential new high of £2.75 billion by the end of 2007. The figures were released today in the biannual internet advertising spend study commissioned by the Internet Advertising Bureau (IAB) and PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC).

If you've got a lunch or coffee break spare, check out this podcast on web 2.0 and the financial services industry. OK, you'll have to put up with an aussie drawl — the stars of the podcast are Charis Palmer, editor of Brisbane-based Online Banking Review, and Simon van Wyk, founder of Hothouse, an Oz-based web company — but the content is good to firm. Beats talking to Brenda at the coffee machine. (I love the aussies really, but it's rugby world cup time and nobody wants the men in gold to win that — again).