One of the beauties of the online marketplace is relative youth and wild west mentality. On the other hand, for those of us who have worked in big business or even for those who have been burned by fraud (and promptly protected by our banks), we know there is something to be said for standard practices. Online lead generation is one of those areas that remains scrutinized because of the frequent use of tactics that mislead consumers and because of the mis-use of information provided by those consumers.
On August 15, 2007 the Interactive Advertising Bureau’s (IAB) Lead Generation Committee released their first pass at a best practices guide for lead generation. The 15-page document, titled “Lead Generation Data Transfer Best Practices” is meant to help “standardize the transfer and receipt of data between advertisers and lead generation service providers.” An overview of the document, on the IAB website, highlights the importance of consumer transparency (ethical practices to ensure that consumers are not duped into providing sensitive information) and data integrity (standard to ensure that data transferred from publishers to advertisers is accurate and secure).
With an emphasis is on security and data integrity the 50+ member Lead Generation Committee outlined some high level standards that were sorely needed in this space. In addition, the committee gives a formal definition of lead generation in their Lead Generation Companion Document. They also offer details on “specific category verticals effectively utilizing lead generation,” including Automotive, Mortgage and Dating.
According to IAB and PricewaterhouseCoopers, marketers spent $1.3 billion on lead generation in 2006 (up more than 100% over 2005′s $753 million spent) – 8% of total online ad spending in 2006. I’m with the IAB – let’s keep the wild west mentality where it fits best – in the creative department.
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