ACCM 2008: On The Ground

Within ninety seconds of entering the Gaylord Palms here in Orlando, I met a half-dozen folks that probably attended this conference in 1993.

This fact is going to be part of a theme I hope to explore over the next two days. How does an industry with deep roots and strong loyalty face adversity?

My goal is to share with you how real people deal with real multichannel problems. You won't hear an overview of keynote speeches, you won't read about glitzy products that promise to increase ROI by 243%. I will try my hardest to illustrate how human beings are dealing with an industry being assaulted by online pureplays, postage increases, co-op colonization, channel shift, declining response, economic woes, increased foreign labor costs, increased delivery costs, and the inclusion of third-party opt-out services to the business model.