Marketers typically cut interactive spending in a recession. But a Forrester survey of 333 interactive marketers revealed strong support for maintaining or increasing budgets, reported Forrester’s Josh Bernoff.

The categories of choice include search optimization, social networking, email and blogging. In fact, among 12 major categories only online displays ads looked soft.

According to Forrester, professional services, financial services and media marketers are most likely to plan increases in interactive marketing.

In a recession like this, Bernoff suggested marketers should focus on the measurability of their online and social applications and think in terms of building long-standing assets, not one-off campaigns to pump up quarterly sales.

Mobile search is gaining in both popularity and frequency of use in the U.S. and Western Europe, reports comScore.

In June 2008, 20.8 million U.S. mobile subscribers and 4.5 million European mobile phone subscribers accessed search during the month, an increase of 68% and 38% from June 2007, respectively.

The U.K. had the highest penetration of mobile subscribers using search at 9.5%, followed closely by the U.S. at 9.2%.

Google is proving to be the preferred brand for browser-based searches with a 60% share of mobile searchers.

The cell phone is quickly becoming the mobile PC. Businesses will have to pay attention to this vertical, and get onboard sooner than later as local search starts to dominate the mobile search space. Without a doubt, these portable devices are creating full-scale opportunities.

We just released How to approach customer service 2.0, an article that has two social media experts discussing the “social revolution” and its impact on businesses and their brands.

To demonstrate the power of the social sites, I noted a blog post about terrible service that was delivered by Rogers Communications. Thousands have read the post and, despite many comments from other customers sharing their displeasures with Rogers, the phone company has yet to respond. That silence damages their brand.

Ironically, just yesterday, an Accounts Receivable rep from Rogers’ frontline stepped forward to personally apologize. Here’s what he wrote:

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As Web 2.0 matures, the line between marketing and customer service is beginning to blur.

Service mishaps and product breakdowns can no longer be swept under the rug. That’s because more than 70% of US and Canadian consumers use the Internet (InternetWorldStats) and can share their experiences with the world.

“The social revolution is forcing companies to evolve and redesign any and all strategies that include existing or potential customers and stakeholders,” said Brian Solis, Founder of FutureWorks and blogger at PR 2.0. “And,” he added, “many don’t even know it yet.”

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Just one comment captures just how fast the Web’s killing TV.

A friend and his crew taping a 2010 Olympics-related event in Vancouver were approached by a group of kids, ages six to 10 years old, who asked excitedly: “Cool, are we going to be on YouTube?”

YouTube. Forget about TV from the decades past. And when the group was told no, but that they’d be featured on TV, that news was met with a big, disappointing “Awwww.”

The new generation is onto something.

Sooner than later, those TVs in the family rooms will be giant screen monitors powered by the Web. The tipping point is here.

Consumers rule the Web. Consider bloggers; they freely praise or pan products and services, and companies can’t stop it.

While errors and incidents were easily swept under the rug during past decades, the Internet has made it easy for consumers to share horror stories with the masses.

When complaints about ongoing no-shows and screw ups fell upon deaf ears, I felt compelled to share my story about Rogers Customer Service. Now, when someone types Rogers customer service into Google and friends, there’s a good chance they’ll read about the poor service.

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There’s been a lot of concern surrounding the Facebook code that found its way to the Web in August due to a web server error.

While it reportedly hasn’t caused any members’ personal information to be exposed, it is a reminder of potential vulnerability on social networks. They can be enticing targets for hackers and identity theft.

For that reason, it’s probably a good idea to think twice before posting sensitive information on sites like Facebook and MySpace.

Thousands of applications and millions of downloads are driving Facebook’s economy. Who’s behind it? Hackers.

Unlike MySpace, Facebook has opened up its network to developers, making it easy for them to make money from applications. A full list of third-party applications, designed to allow Facebook users interact with friends and networks, can be found in the official site’s application directory. They range from tools to compare people to applications that allow you to adopt virtual pets.

To witness this economy’s escalation, one only needs to stop by Adonomics (formerly Appaholics). The website, conceived by San Francisco-based programmer Jesse Farmer, provides stock-market-style analyses of Facebook features. Programmers can analyze the value of their applications in advertising dollars, and how it correlates to their applications’ growth.

Once a social networking site exclusively for college students, Facebook opened registration to the general public last year and attracted vast groups of visitors from outside the 18-24 year old age segment.  In fact, comScore reported last month the website grew to 26.6 million unique visitors in the U.S. in May 2007, marking an 89 per cent increase versus the same month last year.

Editor’s note: see Facebook security post

Internet users are consuming more web content but communicating less, reveals a four-year study by the Online Publishers Association (OPA).

The report, released Aug. 13, states Internet users are spending 47% of their time online reading and watching content, compared with 34% in 2003, representing a 37% increase over four years.

The increase in the time spent on content has been steady; growing 10% from 2003 to 2004, remaining even between 2004 and 2005, growing 13% from 2005 to 2006, and growing 13% from 2006 to 2007.

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As Web 2.0 pulls the rug out from under news distribution monopolies, its interactive element will likely tune in millions more online users.

Not only are more people using the Internet each year (currently 1.17 billion globally, up 225 per cent from 2000), people are naturally drawn by its increasingly interactive nature. The opportunity to participate, even if not acted on, is engaging in itself.

Indeed, Web 2.0 allows users to discuss and influence precisely what’s near and dear to their hearts.

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