I'm a week or so late in posting on one of my favorite conferences, the eMarketing Associations annual West Coast conference.

I missed the second day of the conference this year because I was speaking at ad:tech just down the road but the first day was great.

Murray Gaylord, who had been with Yahoo! for years, has joined the NY Times as their head of marketing. Murray is funny, sharp and has an uncanny feeling for the new media. Even though he is no longer 20 years old, he absolutely "gets it".

One of my favorites of the day was Jeff Hilimire (CEO of Spunlogic) and his presentation on marketing in virtual worlds. He took the audience through the various virtual worlds like Second Life and showed us some great examples of how real businesses are using these worlds to tell their story and recruit customers.

The most unique presentation was by Jeff Zabin, the Chief Evangelist for credit reporting company, Fair Isaac. Jeff is one of the more quantitative and thoughtful marketers I've seen. I personally loved his presentation even if it wasn't as mainstream as some of the other presenters. If you want a sense of Jeff's thinking, his blog, Pareto Rules, is worth checking out: http://precisionmarketing.typepad.com/blog/ .

If you are considering the eMarketing conference, they have two every year - one in the spring and one in the fall. This year's fall conference is being moved from its usual Boston location down to my home town of Atlanta. Check out the details at: http://www.emarketingassociation.com/2007/atlanta/index.htm.

I definitely recommend this conference for anyone wanting an immersive two-day view of the online marketing world.

Note that although I am a regular speaker at this event, I have no other association with the conference.