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So many great speakers!  So many awesome sessions!  Yes, LeadsCon ’12 will offer more learning and networking opportunities than one person can possibly attend … so how do you know where to spend your time?

DoublePositive to the rescue.  Today, we’re offering our “Top Picks, Part II” for can’t-miss speakers and topics.  (Here’s “Top Picks, Part I”).

Like we said previously, this list is made up of the topics we are most interested in.  Please don’t feel bad if we didn’t highlight your event in this pre-show blog.  Feel free, in the comments below, to tell us why we should, and you just may see us in the audience at the show!

And now, friends, open your calendar, and get ready to plug in these choicest of events.  Here’s today’s batch of Top Picks for LeadsCon ‘12, and why we like them:

TUESDAY, 2:00-2:30PM
Break-out Sessions, Financial Services Track, “Inside the Great Big Ping Tree Circle Jerk”

Colorful title, and don’t worry, you won’t be bored.  QuoteWizard are good guys.  This is the second act for the founders, who sold their previous business to Education Dynamics and now focus on insurance.

TUESDAY, 2:30-3:00PM
Break-out Sessions, Financial Services Track, “What the Agents Have to Say”

Mike Ferree is a good friend of DoublePositive and runs a popular industry blog at LeadCritic.com.  Mike is Director for LeadsCouncil, and we’re interested in hearing insights from his ever-expanding point of view.

TUESDAY, 2:50-3:30PM
Break-out Sessions, Financial Services Track, “Is ‘Lead Gen’ a Dirty Word?”

This should be an interesting and engaging discussion on positioning vs. sentiment.  The moderator is Jeff Lawson, CEO & Co-Founder of Twilio.  Panelists include DoublePositive’s own Co-Founder & EVP of Sales Joey Liner (you may know him as “the mayor of LeadsCon”), along with other experts in lead generation.

TUESDAY, 4:00-4:45PM
Sponsored Workshops, “Lead Industry Awards (Presented by: Leads360)”

Sure to be a crowd pleaser.  Leads360, a strategic partner of DoublePositive, will look back on 2011 to award the top performing lead generators across verticals, as well as look forward to the opportunities for continued growth and evolution in 2012.

TUESDAY, 4:30-5:00PM
Break-out Sessions, Education Track, “New Technology Showcase”

New tech showcases are always fun.  Among the presenters are good friends of DoublePositive, including Joe Charlson of CallerReady, and Dave Wengel, who is a former TARGUSinfo and LeadsCon/LeadsCouncil executive and current Founder & CEO of iDatafy.

We warned you that LeadsCon ’12 has almost too many great sessions to offer!  And yes, there are still more to come.  Check back soon for DoublePositive’s Top Picks, Part III.

It’s hard to believe, but LeadsCon ’12 is almost here!  As you know, LeadsCon is the world’s greatest gathering of leaders and innovators in the online lead generation industry.  We will be treated to a slate of dozens of excellent speakers on many great topics again this year.  So how can you attend them all?

Well, you can’t – unless you plan to dash madly back-and-forth every few minutes like some character in a bad TV sitcom.

That’s why, over the next several days, DoublePositive has decided to present to you our Top Picks for this year’s conference.  We assembled our list based on the sessions that we, personally, are most interested in.  It’s not meant to be a judgment of how good they are.  They’re all good!

So open your calendar and get ready to paste in these can’t-miss sessions.  Here’s today’s batch of Top Picks for LeadsCon ‘12, and why we like them:

MONDAY, 3PM
Lead Buyer Summit, “JT Benton on Mobile Marketing & Lead Gen”

Yes, we’re cheering for the home team here, but if you haven’t had a chance to be in the same room with JT, he’s a captivating speaker with a brilliant perspective on what it takes to win in today’s mobile environment.  Cost-per-Lead buyers will learn how Cost-per-Call strategies on the mobile web affect their media plans and drive high quality leads. This first of its kind event is for those whose primary business is the purchase and closing of leads. Registration is required, and the event is invitation only.  Learn more at http://leadscon.com/leadscon-las-vegas-2012/buyers-summit/.

TUESDAY, 9:00-9:45AM
General Sessions, “Michael Norton – The IKEA Effect”

The presenter, Michael Norton, is a behavioral scientist and Associate Professor of Marketing at Harvard Business School.  His work has been covered in the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Post, and his topic, “The IKEA Effect: When Labor Leads to Love,” was featured in Harvard Business Review’s Breakthrough Ideas for 2009.

TUESDAY, 9:45-10:25AM
General Sessions, “LeadsCon Las Vegas ’12: State of Industry”

MUST SEE!  Sharing their view of the State of the Industry are CEOs from the two top publicly-traded companies in the space, Tom Evans of Bankrate and Doug Valenti of Quinstreet.

TUESDAY, 10:30-11:15AM
General Sessions, “Creating the Next Big Thing”

Here’s another high-octane panel.  The Moderator, Tolman Geffs, is Co-President of The Jordan, Edmiston Group, Inc.  Panelists include Patrick Quigley and Josh Armstrong of Vantage Media, Howard Yeh from BrokersWeb and Damien Dovi from BIA Digital Partners.  Get the inside scoop on Vantage’s unexpected and ambitious move to acquire BrokersWeb last year.

TUESDAY, 11:15-11:35AM
General Sessions, “You’re Buying Crap – More Than You Would Ever Know”

This is a short, powerful presentation by customer acquisition strategist John Demayo of zozi.  John is a former Ad.com exec with many friends at DoublePositive.  He’ll distill his 10+ years of weeding out the crap so we can all practice safer lead gen.

Remember, these aren’t the only events at the conference.  They aren’t even the only good ones – just the ones we are most interested in.  Whatever you choose to attend, you’ll be sure to have fun, learn a lot and leave Las Vegas better informed about the leads ecosystem than before you came.

Check back soon for DoublePositive’s Top Picks, Part II.

Hello again! Last week, we rolled out MobilePositive and gave a hint or two at what we’re up to. If you read that first post, you’d know that our new platform connects Advertisers with Consumers on the mobile web in a very meaningful and aligned way–driving heaps of quality inbound calls to our clients, daily. You would also know that I promised a follow up to that post explaining the timing of this rollout.

Thus, the title (or, question) of today’s contribution: Why mobile; why now?

Because it’s time. And, because before now, it wasn’t. Seriously.

If you’ve attended LeadsCon, Ad:Tech, Affiliate Summit or any other performance marketing event in the past four years, you’ve surely heard the hype on mobile. For years now, soapboxes at major industry shows have been occupied by folks signaling the ‘year of mobile.’ They blogged. They tweeted. They spammed us all on LinkedIn. Some of these zealots even went so far as to don QR-coded T-Shirts that were color coordinated to match their converse sneakers. Indeed, active were the hypesters.

And yet, despite all the hoopla, they were wrong. That’s right – flat wrong. At least in the context of the Cost-per-Lead media ecosystem. Mobile has been unworkable and unnecessaryuntil fairly recently. It’s taken Publishers, Advertisers, Networks and Consumers time to find the right way to play. We just weren’t ready, yet. Mostly, this was on the consumers and the publishers. It’s taken adoption rates skyrocketing, Apple’s stock booming, the Android market maturing, bandwidth levels rising and a whole host of other factors to get consumers ready for this at scale. For mobile publishers, the question has never been if – it’s been how and when. As in, ‘how and when can I make as much money selling leads as I do selling impressions and clicks.’ These groups needed to converge and align. It took help, muscle and risk. And, again, time. But now, it’s clear to me that it’s happening: mobile lead generation is alive and growing.

Ok. Before we get too far, I’m coming clean: I get the irony. In writing the above, one could argue that I’m now guilty of the same soapboxing I’ve just poked fun at. The argument is pretty linear, actually: I just said the people who announced the era of mobile lead-gen were wrong. And yet this post’s thesis is that the era of mobile lead-gen is, in fact, now here. Thin ice, right? Totally. Except I’ve got the in-house data to support this, and I see the interest on the advertiser side mounting: we introduce a new major advertiser to the mobile web weekly.

Last month, MobilePositive facilitated over 25,000 inbound phone calls to our early advertiser clients. These were direct, net-new customers, each happily dialing in. And, a considerably high number of them bought the services our clients were selling. These advertisers include leading brands in the Education, Mortgage, Insurance, Home Services and Identity Protection vertical markets. So far, the proof is the campaign performance. We see cost-per-sale figures that consistently perform on target and our budgets are growing. The publishers are happy, too. Both sides (buyers and sellers) see long-standing, steady campaign growth and an exciting new mix of partnerships as a big part of the upside to mobile.

So, why mobile? And, why now? Because – like I said, it’s time.

That’s all for today, gang. Thanks for reading. Next week, we’ll get more tactical with a piece on why publishers should love the pay-per-call format.