P O I N T S O F E M P H A S I S third-party providers | online advertising lock-in | context | etc.
Here are some notes we created to help you in the decisionmaking process.
Using In-House Teams v. Out-of-House Providers -- It's our view that no single staff person can do it all, and even a team of staff may not always justify the hours spent for the results produced. Put another way: Being a member of an in-house team reduces that individual's primary workload, and thus team members assembled from within may view the overall assignment as secondary. Coordinating with your Marketing or Communications manager, 3DIT can help identify specific projects for development and begin creating the final work product without disrupting your current workflow
Preventing Lock-in -- The term lock-in refers to reduced productivity caused by a company's prior technology choices, including hardware, software, and resource management. Before undertaking to improve any system for communications, whether for online marketing, in-house collaboration, or external publications, it's important to identify what has and has not worked before committing to any system that locks in users to a narrow set of options. It's within this context that 3DIT assesses your current state of lock-in, takes an imaginative leap forward to picture where you could be in the future, and then backtracks to identify the simplest and least expensive ways to unlock your existing resources.
Connecting to Your Subject Matter -- So-called online market intelligence providers often farm out assignments to whatever freelancer is available. Accordingly each article (or annotation or blog post or what have you) could be written by a different specialist without any context explaining your current position within the market segment. In that case there exists a built-in disconnection between the final work product and your company's identifiable goals. 3DIT creates all content in-house.
Online Advertising and Kickbacks -- Beware online media specialists who promise "exposure and access to a variety of outlets," "an ability to push boundaries to their limits," or "the opportunity to shape the future of online marketing." In this world, online marketers often maintain side agreements with advertisers but fail to disclose this fact to clients. In that case the provider may be receiving a percentage of the online advertising fees that you pay to a third party without your knowledge.