Although the web is still an infant, it provides more possibilities and more potential than other any medium. With what other channel can you control when, what and how you are presented information? Interactivity, personalization & on-demand content are the web’s strengths.

Interactivity is a powerful attribute. Joseph Jaffe calls it the fourth dimension. I like that. TV is highly entertaining, but one call yell at the TV till hoarse and it doesn’t do any good. On the other end of the spectrum are video games are the ultimate interactive experience where one controls almost every aspect of their environment. However, a game doesn’t have a goal of communication.

Good web sites are somewhere in the middle and capitalize on interactivity by collecting information, and presenting content to users based on events, or preferences. Interactivity leads to personalization. This is how a site “remembers” one’s name, what happened on the last visit, or what content to display. Broadcast media cannot do this; it shotguns content at the world in hopes of its message is understood. Every time one watches a movie, it is the same sequence of events, but each time one visits a web site, the experience can be totally different - powerful stuff.

Another huge property of the web is on-demand content. Broadcast media air content on a schedule - the show starts at 8:00 o’clock. One the web, the show starts at the click of a button. Tivo has given us some control over TV and its popularity proves we live in an on-demand world.

When I plan a site, especially as part of a cross-media campaign, I try to think how the site can use these traits to effectively communicate. This in turn leads to how the message is formatted and delivered. The message needs to be “Webified.” If not properly conceived, too often a site ends up being an on-line TV commercial, or just a digital brochure. It does not gain strength from interactivity and fails to provide the positive experience to make it successful.