Monster's Neil Perry, a Summit attendee, advocates large interstitials and page takeovers, having seen recent success with these units.

Neil Perry is the vice president of marketing at Monster.com. Perry oversees the field marketing activities for Monster, both online and offline, as well as all marketing initiatives targeting the small- to medium-sized businesses (SMB Division). Also coming under Perry's responsibilities are event/sponsorships for Monster, and all promotional activities. Perry was a 23-year veteran of McDonald's Corporation, where he last served as senior director of national marketing, in charge of interactive marketing. Under his leadership, McDonald's adopted a five-year strategic plan for employing the internet in its marketing mix, and benefited from Perry's involvement in a ground-breaking Cross Media Optimization Study. While at McDonald's, Perry also led the merchandising and field marketing departments.

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

Neil Perry: Finding the right marketing mix is a challenge for us at Monster, just like it was a challenge when I was at McDonald's. We are scouring the marketplace for newer and better ways of evaluating the effectiveness of various media to insure that we are reaching our targets with a laser-like focus.

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

Perry: Monster is a huge direct marketing organization, and one of the larger spenders on the internet. Perhaps you've seen a few of our banners! We market to those seeking employment, and to companies who post jobs on Monster or access our huge database of resumes. We employ all of the traditional forms of consumer contact strategies, from email, to behavioral targeting, to large and small banners and skyscrapers. Recently, we've had some great success using larger size interstitials on our website home page.

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?

Perry: One of the keys to Monster's success is a sophisticated yet nimble approach to changing out creative executions on the fly based on performance of the individual units on individual sites. By reacting quickly and smartly, we can insure that we reach the kind of consumer behavior metrics we desire.

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?

Perry: We have a large, talented pool of online experts in house, and I bet each has their own favorite mix of tools. Personally, I've always been a proponent of "bigger is better" in ad unit sizes, and I think email marketing is making a strong comeback. Consumers do react, and can react predictably to recognized brands marketing quality products, like Monster's employment services.

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?

Perry: Introducing an interstitial page takeover ad on Monster's home page, an unheard of idea in the corporate offices a few short years ago, was a dramatic change in direction for Monster, and I applaud our online team for pushing the initiative forward and for generating the results we did.

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

Perry: Online video is on our radar screen for 2006, for sure. We are going to utilize it, evaluate it and, if successful, add it to our marketing mix.

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?

Perry: You can't control it. But you also can't ignore it. If you don't have your finger on the pulse of the consumer, then your brand is vulnerable. I propose that being proactive towards consumer-generated content, and implementing plans to manage it rather than ignore it, is the right strategy.

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? 

Perry: I think Visa is raising the bar each year on integrated marketing efforts, with a strong reliance on interactive media. 

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

Perry: I'm proud of the remarkable performance of my company, Monster. Our year-to-year growth is nothing short of amazing, and I fully expect it will continue.

iMedia: Anything else you'd like to add?

Perry: iMedia should be proud of its contribution to the interactive world. When the bottom was falling out of our industry, iMedia was at the forefront of sharing, learning and growing our business through the rough times. And now look where we are.

iMedia: We are proud. Thanks.

Dawn Anfuso is senior editor for iMedia Connection.