For Summit attendee Stephen D. Kempisty, director of media buying and planning for eDiets, targeting to relevant content has been the most effective method of customer acquisition.

Stephen D. Kempisty is a director, media buying and planning at eDiets.com. He sits on the BPAWW/IPRO Interactive Advisory Committee and is a member of the South Florida Interactive Marketing Association. Kempisty teaches classes in management and marketing for the University of Phoenix online. He is also an Alumnus of Rutgers, The State University of NJ, and the founder of the Nova Southeastern University MBA Alumni Chapter. Currently at eDiets.com he oversees the media planning and buying execution for major online portal deals, second- and third-tier sites, organic and paid search engine marketing, affiliate marketing and TV advertising. He oversees approximately $25 million in advertising buys and planning on an annualized basis.

iMedia: What's your current greatest challenge when it comes to marketing in general, and interactive marketing specifically? How are you tackling it/them?

Stephen Kempisty: The biggest challenge we face is finding new places to reach our demographic both online and offline. We continue to test new ad delivery technologies, new networks, various websites and content targeting in an attempt to find our consumers wherever they are.

iMedia: With which online marketing tools (email, behavioral targeting, display advertising, et cetera) has your company experienced marketing success in recent months?

Kempisty: PPC search, display advertising, integrated content placements and email have all been quite effective for us in recent months.

iMedia: With regard to this success, what are some lessons learned that you can share with our audience? What worked? What were some challenges and how did you overcome them?

Kempisty: For our advertising, targeting our message to relevant content has been the most effective method of customer acquisition.

iMedia: Think about your company's favorite online marketing tool or mix of tools. What advice would you give to marketers interested in trying these out for the first time?

Kempisty: Try to diversify as much as possible with your available budget so that you are able to find a variety of channels that work for you. If you are unable to do this because of a limited budget, focus on a few high-yield opportunities (search, email, et cetera) and fine-tune your campaigns. Once you have proven some success, layer on new distribution channels one at a time and perfect each as you go along.

iMedia: What's the most out-of-the-box thing you've done in your marketing efforts to reach a hard-to-reach demographic or meet a specific goal?

Kempisty: We combed through pages and pages of search results for hundreds of keywords to find new websites that rank highly in natural search for our industry.

iMedia: Online video is coming of age. Has it impacted your marketing yet? Do you plan to do more of it soon?

Kempisty: We have tested online video with a couple of publishers and find that it is most effective for customer acquisition when it is targeted around very specific content (relevant to our product). In other unrelated topics it serves mainly as a branding tool. 

iMedia: Consumer-generated content is scary for many brands because of their inability to control it. How do you view the topic? Have you had much experience dealing with it yet? Any advice for other marketers?

Kempisty: Typically we run a small advertising campaign on diet and fitness related websites or even engage in an affiliate marketing relationship with a relevant blog. Before we actually engage in the partnership, we monitor the website for a period of time to make sure it is a suitable site to promote our brand. Even with the proper precaution, it still is necessary to constantly monitor the content that is being published to insure that your brand is not exposed to objectionable content. My advice, start slowly and work with smaller sites you are familiar with to minimize risk. Obtain references from other advertisers as appropriate.

iMedia: Is there another brand you admire for how its agencies are using interactive media to either increase branding or sell it? If so, why and what have you learned from that brand? 

Kempisty: Geico-- I just can't seem to ever escape their advertising, online or offline. That Gecko still gets them a lot of mileage.

iMedia: What are you most proud of from the past year? Why, and what should other marketers learn from that?

Kempisty: Working with AOL on a large integrated promotion called America Takes it Off! It was amazing to see a promotion/event that spanned the online and offline spaces while including PR to support it. Other marketers should learn that it is possible to work with more than one partner to reach their consumers offline while reinforcing their marketing message online in a big way.

Dawn Anfuso is senior editor for iMedia Connection.