Last week, Echo — the web community company that put Nashville on the map — went dark. Echo's owner, Ticketmaster, decided to jettison all but eight Nashville employees and move what was left of the operation to their Los Angeles office. At the end of the house-cleaning, only about 50 of Echo's 300 clients/artists/authors remained on their roster. Full 190 of them were evicted by Ticketmaster.

Since things have been unraveling at Echo, we've had the opportunity to meet with several now-former Echo clients. In fact, Echo's senior staff have been trying to connect some of them with Generator. Quite frankly, it has not been the bonanza for us that we had anticipated. And it speaks loudly to the problems inherent in the web marketing world.
So, here are my initial conclusions on the post-mortem of Echo:

1. It takes money to make money

If there is one huge problem with the web it is the misperception that the web is free and works on its own without any direction — let alone marketing money. Direct-to-the-customer marketing is still just plain old marketing.

Lesson learned: It takes cash to build and execute a marketing plan. If you can't fund your web marketing plan, then you don't HAVE a web marketing plan. Free web sites are ultimately worth what you paid for them. Someone has to create content, send email, respond to customer questions and comments, and respond to what did and didn't happen.

2. A web site is not a marketing plan

Clearly, if having a web site meant you were going to sell something, we wouldn't be having this conversation! If two thirds of Echo's clients were losing money — for Echo and/or for themselves — then just having a web site is not the answer. This reminds me of a commercial from (of all companies) IBM, where a designer offers to make their logo spin or enflame —  but the client pines for a business solution.

Lesson learned: Web design must be a means to an end. Many artists still absolutely refuse to see the web as something more than an imaging tool.

3. You have to want it

Web marketing takes work! It takes incredible perseverance. When you get a direct response from customers, and it's not positive, our mass marketing genes want to take over. Ignorance is not bliss in the direct-to-the-customer world, but it takes guts to push forward in the face of non-success.

Lesson learned: Not everyone has the work ethic it takes to succeed in direct-to-the-customer marketing.

4. The web cannot yet break artists or make a product exciting or relevant

Echo tried, but could not break an artist. Not once. Why? Even they don't know. But I suspect it is what we learned in running VandySpots.com (Vanderbilt's Rivals community): No one, and especially hard core fans, love a loser. You have to be a winner to have spontaneous community. Rallying around a loser is not fun.

Lesson learned: Make sure your product is good before you start telling the world to sample it. In the immortal words of legendary ad man David Ogilvy: A great ad campaign doesn't make a bad product successful; In fact, a great ad campaign makes a bad product fail faster.