Digital marketing [Special report]

LOGING ON Auto info online MediaLinx Interactive LP and DigitalViews & Associates of Toronto are set to launch an automotive Internet service, Chariots.com, geared specifically at Canadians. The service, which will debut in the next few months, will allow the more than 285,000 users of Sympatico to obtain information about both new and used cars, plus leasing, selling and insurance information. There will also be daily news about cars, and an events calender. "There are many aspects of the automotive industry that do not transcend borders," says Scott Remborg, senior vice-president of MediaLinx. A U.S.-based car service doesn't address the needs of Canadians." Chariots.com will accept banner advertising, and Remborg says both Web and print advertising is likely to support the service's launch. YTV ups interactivity YTV, the children's cable channel, is getting a boost from the big guys. Beginning Sept. 30, when Microsoft Canada's updated Internet Explorer 4.0 Web browser is released, YTV's logo will appear on the screen as a "default channel" or preferred site to visit, says YTV's director of information technology, Steve Rolufs. The new version will allow YTV to "deliver a better, richer and more interactive experience to kids and viewers," he says, including new effects and subscriber and push technologies. YTV and Microsoft's relationship dates back awhile. The children's channel partnered with Microsoft last summer on Bill Gates' stop in Toronto, where he talked about technology to kids. Retail lands Spaceman The ACNielsen Corp. of Stamford, Conn. has launched a new software application to make shelf and floor-planning for retailers a piece of cake. The Spaceman Viewer allows all store buyers, category managers and salespeople to view depictions of the store's floor space and an electronic plan which has been prepared by merchandising analysts. Comments can be made and returned to the analysts, or the plan can be printed out. A demo of the Spaceman Viewer can be downloaded off the ACNielsen Web site at http://acnielsen.com. It is also available from ACNielsen in Markham, Ont. in CD-ROM and diskette formats. CEO strategies It is a low-tech approach to a high-tech concept, and its creator, Canscape Inc. of Markham, Ont., thinks it's just what the CEO ordered. "Dominate Your Market by Using the Internet-Powerful Strategies for CEOs" is a 40-minute cassette tape narrated by Canscape's executive vice-president Kevin Sterling. Canscape also recently partnered with IBM Canada to launch a direct-mail campaign to push the tape, says Canscape spokesperson Rose Scapin. Thus far, the free cassette has been mailed to over 5,000 CEOs in Canada, and Scapin says an audiotape is perfect for professionals with little time. "You can listen to it in the car, or anywhere, really." Show time As advertisers continue to explore creative ways to market online, the jury is still out on how effectively online programming is reaching target markets and closing sales. As with any new medium, online programming is going through growing pains. Much of its success depends on the adroitness with which America Online Inc. of Dulles, Va. and its main rival, Microsoft Network, a division of Redmond, Wash.-based Microsoft Corp., shape this emerging medium. What we're doing is wrapping content, context and community together," says Stephen Bartkiw, managing director of Toronto-based AOL Canada. With the help of some 30 corporate partners, AOL Canada operates 13 Canadian sites or channels organized around topics that range from sports and entertainment to business and shopping. The service, which has 100,000 Canadian subscribers, began with four channels in January, 1996. Programming highlights include news from Southam Inc., pop-culture from CHUM Ltd.'s MuchMusic and chat sessions with celebrities such as Don Cherry. With 8.6 million subscribers worldwide, AOL also produces content for the U.S., British, French and German markets. AOL Canada's roster of advertisers includes Sprint Canada, Corel Corp., General Motors of Canada Ltd. and Via Rail. As to whether advertisers are getting the bang they expect for their bucks, Dave McCall, manager of product PR for GM in Oshawa, Ont. says it's still too early to tell. Besides the obvious exposure offered by an online banner and the opportunity for suffers to click through to an advertiser's own Web site, McCall says the information being gathered on the habits of online users is proving to be just as valuable. What GM has learned so far is that the creative it presents online has to appeal to a non-traditional audience. "They aren't people who are normal TV watchers who are lumped into the demographics of certain viewing times. We also look at it from a cost-efficiency standpoint. Right now, the costs are relatively reasonable," McCall says. Software developer Corel Corp. is satisfied with the responses it's received while advertising on AOL Canada, according to Corel spokeswoman Sue-Ann Wright. The reasoning behind going with AOL was that when tracking hits (to our own Web site), we realized 40% were from AOL (subscribers), so we were anticipating increased traffic," Wright says. "As well, AOL Canada just received its nine millionth customer, so they have a large customer base." Over at MSN Canada, a second season kicks off in October and will likely feature eight online shows-twice as many as last year. The company is currently negotiating deals with major Canadian advertisers, but CIBC, which was the exclusive sponsor for the four MSN Canada programmes launched for the Canadian market in April, is rethinking its commitment. Our discussions are at a sensitive stage," says David Cyr, vice-president of PC banking, noting that CIBC is also talking to AOL Canada. The four online programs MSN Canada launched in April are: dew-LINE Comics, a series of multimedia comic books; Fou-Net, a satirical look at headline news in Quebec; Splice, the history of communications in Canada; and Freaky Stories, a program for kids. The shows, which MSN Canada likes to describe as smart magazines, appear on one of six channels along with MSN programs from other countries, including Australia, France and Japan. A new episode is posted every other week. Jordan Chrysafidis, sales and marketing manager for Toronto-based MSN Canada, says online programming tends to blur the distinction between content and advertising. To wit, an interactive ad that ran on MSN last year required people to assemble a Swatch on their computer screen. Each time they picked up a component with their mouse they were told of its merits by the manufacturer. Chrysafidis says that although marketers are interested in online programming, "we're not making huge money on this." Chrysafidis says his company's mission is to make the service profitable within five years. Microsoft expects to spend US$1 billion getting MSN off the ground. Delayed Delivery At the push of a button, the movie company in L.A. instantly transmits the print campaign running in Canada. After a brief pause at the Toronto pre-press shop, where size and content are adjusted to meet local specifications, the digital ads arrive simultaneously at dozens of newspapers across the country ready for insertion. Thanks to electronic ad delivery, the entire process takes minutes rather than days. Digital transmission of print advertising material has arrived, and it works. "We're gearing up to do the bulk of our advertising this way," says Doris Payne, vice-president and general manager of 20th Century Fox Film Corp. in Toronto, just one of the entertainment companies now moving print ads around electronically over telephone lines. Warner Brothers Entertainment Inc., Alliance Communications Corp., Universal Studios Ltd. are some others getting away from hard-copy ad material to get word of new releases out to movie goers faster. "By sending our ads via digital transmission, we can save as many as two or three days. And in this business, time is money," says Payne. Beyond these time-sensitive advertisers and some other pioneers, however, digital ad delivery is far from being embraced in Canada. As marketers, publishers and printers debate technical issues like the standardization of file transmission formats, and digital proofing, the biggest stumbling block isn't technology, but the print industry's lack of confidence in making the leap to a digital way of doing things. Who wants to assume the risks?" asks Cathy Szathmary, general manager of Optic Nerve Design, a Toronto design, production and new media studio owned by SMW Advertising Ltd. The studio utilizes electronic channels like the Internet or dedicated phone lines to send ad concepts to clients for approvals, but not final proofs. Szathmary says she finds many publishers reluctant to accept digital files and the risks that go along with that--corrupt files, no hard-copy references. "You're leaving things to chance. You re relying on the publisher to translate digital material into finished product with no verification mechanisms. Printing something out without anyone seeing it first, that's scary." No one in the print world is denying the inevitability of digital ad delivery, or even the assumption it will be a better way of doing business. It's generally accepted this will help speed up the print process, cut down on costs like couriers and increase flexibility for making last-minute changes. And because less time will be spent getting hard-copy material from one place to another, marketers are looking forward to having more time for the creative process. Tom McAllister, for one, believes quality of print ads will improve as digital material is distributed electronically. The graphics and promotions manager at the Quaker Oats Company of Canada Ltd. in Peterborough, Ont., says major advertisers will have more control over the consistency of their print material when they can create digital ads centrally and distribute them locally, meaning there's less reliance on local printers or ad agencies to get it right. "The only way to guarantee the Quaker head or the Coca-Cola label is going to look the same everywhere, whether in Canada or Indonesia, is to do it all electronically. Major advertisers as a community believe this is the way to be going," says McAllister, who represents members of the Association of Canadian Advertisers on the technical standards committee at Magazines Canada, an association of around 33 Canadian publications. Moreover, digital ad delivery will help the magazine industry keep pace with increasing competition from other, more immediate forms of media, says McAllister. "By reducing end costs, upgrading the quality of advertising and allowing magazine advertising to be more timely, readership will benefit and so will advertisers and publishers." But at the moment, the electronic transmission of digital ads is resulting in more confusion than anything else. It's technologically feasible today to send both black-and-white and color ads in digital format over the telephone lines via modem. Powerful desktop computers with lots of memory, ISDN fibre lines connections, and software such as Adobe Acrobat--which compresses huge graphic files down 10 to 20-times their original size and converts them to PDF (portable digital format) files so that design elements aren't altered--have pretty much licked technical hurdles such as slow transmission times, or unreadable fries. Although some digital ad material is being routed via the Internet and bulletin board services, much of what is moving electronically is on dedicated phone lines or point-to-point networks. Speed and security are the two main attractions of point-to-point networks and a new industry of digital ad couriers is springing up to provide this. Mijo Print Technologies, a division of Mijo Corp. in Toronto, is one such company. Its direct-delivery system transmits print advertisements from advertisers to newspapers across Canada and the US. But when it comes to moving color ads around electronically, the lack of a reliable proofing system is one huge hurdle that's far from being cleared. The device an agency uses to output color proofs from digital files is obviously not the same one the printer will be using and end results are not always faithful to the proofs. "There's no absolute guarantee that what you last approved will be exactly what you get," says McAllister. The only way around this at the moment is for every advertiser to show up at the printer at press time." Digital ad delivery will reach take-off-once there's a critical mass of acceptance. Currently, everyone in the industry is looking to everyone else to get the ball rolling. "If all the hurdles have been resolved, then why aren't a lot of publications asking for digital ads?" asks Ron Scott, vice-president and production manager at Roche Macaulay & Partners Advertising Inc. in Toronto. Linda Melrose, production manager at Reader's Digest Canada, one of the first Canadian publications to shift to an all-digital production system--it will be digital-to-plate within a year-points the finger back at agencies. "We accept digital ad material if it conforms to our specifications, but not that much is being done. It's very difficult to convince the major agencies because it's going to cost them to change." Peter Hedgecock, director of print operations at St. Joseph Printing Ltd. in Toronto sits on the executive steering committee of the DDAP (Digital Distribution of Advertising for Publications), an international consortium of printers, advertisers, publishers and technology companies. He says Canada is not any further ahead or behind the U.S. on digital ad delivery. "When you get down to it, sending ads digitally is really quite simple. The hardest part is convincing people to change the way they do things. That's what takes time." The great Internet Licensing Board hoax proves the power of online PR It's not every day that you get a call from Internet Crimes Division of the Halifax Police Department. Was that a real policeman on the line, or was someone playing a joke on us? Maybe we should start at the beginning. Last fall, we hunched Hip Hype Inc., Canada's first online and offline public relations and marketing firm. Hip Hype was created to offer effective strategies to raise awareness and drive traffic to a client's Web site and/or provide consultation to maximize a site's public relations and marketing potential. We don't design Web sites, we promote them. To us, online communication is an integral part of the overall brand or corporate message and should be developed with an understanding of the unique culture of the World Wide Web. One of the curses of being first in anything is that a lot of people can't quite figure out what exactly it is that you do. So we decided to show people rather than tell. We created an online stunt event to coincide with April Fools' Day that would: demonstrate the power of online promotion in a measurable way; be Internet-specific, Canadian and topical; be supported by a combination of online and offline activities; and encourage thought and stimulate discussion about a subject that is near and dear to our hearts-online freedom of speech. At the time, Elections Canada was making noises about censoring political Web pages, and there were grumblings from Ottawa about regulating the Internet. As the climate was perfect for a wall-aimed parody, we invented a fictitious client, Harold Oser, and created a satirical Web site for his "Canadian Internet Licensing Board" a 'CRTC of the Web' at www.cilb.com. On March 26, we posted an online "press release" from Harold Oser ([email protected]) to 16 targeted Canadian newsgroups and Canadian journalists who cover the Internet. The release announced the first call for Web site licence applications and invited Canadian Webmasters to fill out an application form at the CILB Web site. At first glance this site appears suitably bureaucratic in look and tone, but it becomes increasingly ludicrous in its "Cancon" requirements (Anne of Green Gables, beer, hockey, igloos, etc.) until it is clearly revealed as a joke. We registered the site in search engines and directories and participated in newsgroups to monitor reaction and drive traffic to the Web site. In less than 24 hours, the site received more than 11,000 hits and more than 75 "licence applications" (most of them tongue-in-cheek) without us having even implemented the offline campaign to support the stunt. By anyone's yardstick that would be considered a success, but in fact it was only the beginning. Within hours of the site launching, a call came from Sergeant Bill Cowper (a.k.a. "Sergeant Internet") of the Halifax Internet Crimes Division threatening to charge us with mischief until we agreed to put "Ifs a joke, eh" on every page. As Cowper had already spoken to the local media, we quickly incorporated this newsworthy information into our offline campaign. "Police not laughing over Internet hoax," screamed the Halifax Chronicle Herald; and "Internet stunt draws warning from police," shouted the Halifax Daily News. The media in the rest of the country had a field day with this (with help from us, naturally). We supported CILB with a follow-up press release (both online and offline), calls to the media and an online press kit featuring tons of helpful resources, links and background information about our stunt and the reaction to it. This led to extensive national media coverage including Citytv's MediaTelevision, Andy Barrie's morning show on CBC Radio in Toronto, and newspapers from coast to coast. The CILB Web site also won numerous awards, including Cool Canadian Site of The Day, Yahoo!Canada Pick of the Week, Molson's I Am Online Site Of The Week, and Canuck Site of the Day. Four months later, hundreds of people visit the CILB site every week, and we have received e-mail messages of support from as far away as Japan. Over 100 Canadian Web sites now proudly display their "licence" certificate, which continues to drive traffic to the CILB site and demonstrates the benefit of reciprocal links. People are still using the site as a practical joke on their friends and colleagues, and every so often we get requests for copies of "the Information Highway Act." Maybe it's time to make one up. Did we achieve our objectives? You bet, eh! How the Net complicates PR for the local operations of multinationals When Serbian opposition leaders used the Internet earlier this year to galvanize international opinion against their government, there was little government supporters could do to stop them. In the Information Age, news can no longer be contained by large organizations. The Internet has effectively eliminated national borders, distant geographies and time zones; moreover, it's an increasingly common, instant source of information for journalists who require just-in-time facts for shorter, more imposing deadlines. According to a 1996 Canada NewsWire and Ernst & Young survey, 69% of Canadian newsrooms are using the Internet, more than twice the 31% rate in 1995. But while the Internet provides the immediacy of international news, it does little to shape the significance and impact of the news within a domestic context. And for large multinational business organizations' news announcements, particularly product-driven news, the careful balance between the news' significance and domestic relevance is being undermined by the Internet. The implications are twofold: For the Canadian marketplace, where a significant portion of the economy is subsidiary-based, most media-relations strategies for new product announcements by multinational organizations are guided by global competitive pressures, rather than unique domestic considerations. The result is more homogeneous, corporate-centred news with little relevance to domestic markets and publics. Access by the media to this information through the Internet weakens a company's ability to speak directly to domestic audiences, as well as enhance ties with local media. In addition, latitude given to some corporate divisions in devising communication strategies to local audiences is laudable; however, when isolated regional announcements are hoisted on the Internet without intercontinental coordination or sufficient consideration of the news announcement's global implications, the result is precarious, even misleading inf ormation. It's an odd sort of information paradox, one that attempts to reconcile the need to provide journalists with information instantly, before the competition, while at the same time affording it indigenous news relevance. A new product, for instance, announced only in Europe by an organization with a worldwide presence, but disseminated over the Internet is readily available to 'wired' Canadian journalists. Its relevance to domestic audiences, however, may be suspect without a local news angle. Whether it's the product's availability or business significance, a domestic context better ensures that news is tangible to local audiences. More important, though, isolated regional product announcements over the Internet can hinder the ability of communication professionals to cultivate media interest for a product's introduction into other local marketplaces. Its premature presence over the Internet deflates the news value, since the product's primary newsworthy features have already been reported by wired journalists reviewing the company's Web site, or public databases and Internet-based wire services through various search engines. What's more, news without a domestic context may lend itself less to convenience than to misinformation. Indeed, as events unfolded in the Bre-X saga, some unsubstantiated rumors disseminated over the Internet played a role in the mining company's fluctuating stock price, affecting investors and the public's perception of junior mining companies. It's critical, therefore, that information conveyed over the Internet be as accurate as possible, whether it's price information or strategic alliances. Put simply, multinational organizations committed to providing domestic relevance to news announcements are in a better position to counter misinformation on the Net. As well, the imposition of homogenous corporate information on both key publics and journalists may further accentuate cross-cultural antagonisms. Culture can be a national pathology; and Canada is a case in point. Multinational organizations that refuse to pay heed to this country's linguistic duality run the risk of a public relations nightmare. And modifying information to the cultural realities of a country through the Net is one such way to avoid misconceptions and bad press. Moreover, a failure to recognize the important cultural nuances of different world regions belies the real advantages of the Internet: its interactivity. What the Net provides is a two-way medium of communication, an ability for organizations to enter into a more intimate dialogue with journalists and other publics, to convey information that is relevant and tailored to individual needs. To do just that requires media-relations strategies that are global in scale, yet local in relevance. Rather than an obstacle to localizing news for media and key publics, the Internet is an exceptionally cost-effective tool for developing and coordinating media-relations strategies across continents and time zones. Participatory and immediate, the Net provides a cyberforum for discussion among a company's communication professionals, enabling them to better coordinate worldwide media relations strategies in conjunction with the development of local key messages. Web-based press centres, for instance, are one increasingly popular way of wedding domestic and global relevance to news announcements. Here, news is not only categorized based on topic, but geographic region as well, enabling journalists to glean its local and global significance. Such a company news site could also post recent news clippings, industry analyst comments, newsgroup remarks and recent media reports. Neither journalists nor the Internet are the source of this information paradox. Instead, it's the inability of some organizations to grasp the fundamentals of this new communication medium that's global in scale, yet offers an intimate way of reaching media and the public. In its truest sense, the Internet acts as a critical bridge that enables large multinational business organizations to deliver news that is both global and local in relevance. Wiring the trade show Trade shows and the Internet, at first blush, may not seem to have a lot in common. But when you think about it, their main strengths for marketers are essentially the same--they provide the opportunity to give qualified potential customers almost unlimited access to personalized information about products and services. So it's not surprising that a growing number of marketers are experimenting with bringing their trade show and Internet marketing programs together. Companies are now using broadcast e-mail to target past and present show attendees, and then following up with brochures and more info on their products and services. Web sites are useful, as well, for companies who can't attend events, but still want up-to-date info, and more organizations are using the Internet (and kiosks) on site. Still, few marketers have completely embraced digital marketing to promote their participation in large trade shows and their own cross-country presentations. Even many information technology companies, which tend to be new media leaders by virtue of the computer-oriented products and services they sell, continue to fine-tune their trade show Internet strategies. Toronto-based Xerox Canada Ltd., for instance, tends to use the Internet before its events mainly to register attendees and publicize the show, says Jeff Watts, manager of marketing and customer excellence. A Web site (www.docuworld.com) connected to the company's 1997 DocuWorld show was available to Internet users beforehand and let people know about the activities planned during the two-day show. At DocuWorld, Xerox Canada handled registration on-site through the Internet, and had "a cyber cafe where people were able to surf the Net to experience virtual demos of our product offerings," says Watts. After an event, the Internet is used for acquisition of leads, but not direct lead follow-up, he says. Most of Xerox Canada's advertising literature carries the "Ask Xerox" tagline, which is also an e-mail address connected to a New Brunswick call centre. E-mail messages are then forwarded to company sales representatives who deal with customers face-to-face. Still, "there's nothing that really works as well as the Net," declares Watts, adding that it complements traditional marketing initiatives, such as direct mail and advertising, and allows trade shows attendees "to find information on a timely basis." One technique Xerox Canada has dabbled with is holding a virtual trade show, an event held within a Web site setting that has the look and feel of a trade show, and is designed especially for people who can't attend the actual event or who want to revisit it once the show is over. Kodak Canada Inc. in Toronto uses the Internet to raise awareness of its trade show events and potentially to increase traffic to the booth, says Bob Cromie, communications project director, new media. Dates, locations, and booth numbers are listed on the Web site (www. kodak.ca) for shows at which the company has only a low profile. But Cromie says that, in addition to these, the Kodak Canada site for a trade show at which the company figures more prominently features "a separate page devoted to the show...(and) links into our product catalogue for products that are on display in the booth." On-site Internet kiosks are useful if a sales representative "doesn't have the answers off the top of his head" to technical product questions. Conventional marketing for trade shows remains, but Cromie expects the Internet to dominate one day. Apart from Kodak Canada eventually holding a virtual trade show, he envisions creating a database for e-mail follow-up with customers and potential customers. Mississauga, Ont.-based Microsoft Canada Inc., which uses "the full marketing mix," believes the Internet definitely has an increasing role in relation to industry trade shows and Microsoft's own events. "But it'll be a while before it supplants the phone," concedes Simon Geoghegan, marketing manager and Web editor. Companies interested in buying software, for instance, are still contacted by phone after the show, Geoghegan says. Internet technology will be applied more in the future, though. The software provider's Web site, meanwhile, has been used for pre-show registration, but it's primarily a promotional vehicle. At the recent COMDEX/Canada '97 trade show, Microsoft Canada video-recorded a keynote speech and product demonstrations by one of its vice-presidents and put it on its Web site for people to view live or later on demand, he adds. Audio and video streaming, as well as adding PowerPoint presentation slides to a site, are areas that Microsoft Canada would like to explore further. Hewlett-Packard (Canada) Ltd. is also in an experimental mode when it comes to trade show marketing. Its pre-show PR strategy consists of mailing promotional materials and giving away show passes. But the Mississauga-based info tech company is interested in sponsoring the next COMDEX trade show in Canada and in turn being allowed to advertise on the COMDEX home page, says Doug Garnett, marketing communications manager at Hewlett-Packard. Echoing other marketers, Garnett says an online literature library at the trade show conveniently allows a booth visitor to print specific product spec sheets rather than force the company to bring stacks of brochures. This practice also accustoms people to accessing information from Hewlett-Packard's site (http://hpclweb.external.hp.com). In the long run, Hewlett-Packard plans to move away from trade shows because of their high costs, and concentrate on electronic communications to announce new products and services. Not-so intelligent agents: Canadian ad agencies don't seem to be paying attention to their Web sites Point your browser in the direction of the major Canadian advertising agencies and prepare to be disappointed. While ad agencies pretend to be on the vanguard of technology and innovation, they seem reluctant to get on the Internet bandwagon. Strangely, it is the big multinational agencies that are remiss; many small Canadian shops already have sites up and running. Here are some sites to see (and not see): Missing in Action. Look for Leo Burnett (www.leoburnett.com) or DDB Needham (www.ddbn.com) and all you'll find is "coming soon" and "under construction." (Don't hold your breath either: these messages have been displayed for months). Meanwhile, the likes of Young & Rubicam, FCB, Saatchi & Saatchi, Vickers & Benson and Palmer Jarvis are not to be found. Oops. Bozell and J. Walter Thompson share the award for inaccuracy. As of Aug. 28, 1997, Bozell Worldwide's site (www.bozell.com) lists Bozell Canada's address as 1867 Yonge St. when it is in fact 121 Bloor St. East. (The phone number is listed as 932-9595; it is actually 961-9595). J. Walter Thompson's global site (www.jwtworld.com) similarly provides outdated information. John Clinton is listed as JWT Canada president instead of Ted Nation. Better than Nothing. Cossette and TBWA Chiat/Day and JWT Canada do have sites. Cossette's site (www.cossette.com) gives us a brief overview of the "Cossette Universe" (which includes direct marketing, PR and interactive) but tells you almost nothing about their advertising work (an advertising-only site is promised in the future). The Cossette Interactive area is much more developed. They claim to be the "anthropologists of the Information age" and use cave paintings, totem poles and amphoras as icons. Hyperlinks connect you to sites they created. Click on the running man on the TBWA Chiat/Day Web site (www.tbwacd.com) and you go on a "virtual" tour where you'll learn that "the smartest thinking leads to breakthrough work." You can also learn about their so-called "virtual" office, recently profiled on the CBC's business program Venture. Alas, the office is not really virtual. There is no virtual work--just "practical" work. JWT Canada's site (www.jwtcanada.com) features the lovely (illustrated) Miss Melanie as tour guide. Surrounded by bubbles, she beckons, "Enter my innermost thoughts." Sadly, her thoughts are all about advertising and not the tantalizing fantasies one images such a beauty would ponder in her bath. Of interest, though, is "Heaven & Hell," where visitors can leave comments on current Canadian advertising. Our first client: ourselves. Interactive agencies, quite naturally, have a presence on the Web. Obviously, there is great incentive for them to do a good job. But if Cossette Interactive can create a site for the entire Cossette Universe, why can't BBDO Vancouver (www.bbdovan.com) or DDB Interactive (www.ddbniac.com) create one for their Toronto-based siblings? As a bonus, visit Planet Genesis's site (www.plnetgenesis.com) which links you to the Cadbury "Time out" site where you can download a cartoon screen saver. Life is a highway. Hop on the electronic highway and visit agencies from coast to coast. Follow the seagull for a look at advertising in Atlantic Canada and M5 Advertising (www.m5.ca). The bilingual site of Montreal's Groupaction/JWT (www.gampub.com) features samples of their work in the "Advertising Art Gallery." A stylish and colorful Toronto-based site is home to Scott Thornley + Company (www.stc.com). Read all about "The Browners" in Regina's Brown Communications site (www.browncommunications. com). A slick, multimedia presentation awaits you at the Vancouver-based Glennie Stamnes Strategy site (www.gs-strategy.com). Don't miss the "Van Cam" for a view of the harbor. Want more? BBDO New York runs a site called Tech Setter (whatever that means) at www.techsetter.com featuring surveys, quizzes and other advertising "news." Finally, leave it to advertising master David Ogilvy to do it right. Ogilvy & Mather Worldwide's comprehensive site (www.ogilvy.com) is called BrandNet. It offers a little bit of everything, including the agency's storied history, its "vision & values," "brand stewardship" concept and some wonderful Ogilvyisms like "bark yourself," "you get monkeys," and "ticket on the meat," (you'll just have to visit to find out what they mean). But best of all, the site has advertising (for IBM and Ford). And what an novel idea! Advertising on an advertising agency Web site!