Mobile Year in Review 2010
How Smartphones Are Becoming the New Candy Bar For Content Consumption
Our co-founder and CTO, Ryan Unger was interviewed last week by Rob Woodbridge. Ryan spoke about inspiring trust with clients and what the future of mobile marketing looks like. If you’d prefer the audio version, you can find it and other conversations with mobile marketing rock stars at Untether.tv
Garage Door Opener…There’s An App For That!
Google Goggles now competing with Scanbuy, JagTag, MSFT Tag, etc.
Source: http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2010/11/offline-meet-online-marketing.html
58″ iPhone
If you haven’t noticed yet within your apps, the login screen for Facebook Connect has updated to feel more “iPhone friendly,” and Facebook has dropped this idea of “connecting” as a result.
Additionally, there are many cues in the new UX which assume an experienced Facebook user, which seems like a shift in Facebook’s approach for their API.
Facebook Connect side-by-side comparison
Notable changes include:
- Removed all “Connect” language in favor of “Login”
- Simplifies language overall, which assumes experienced user
- Title “Connect to Facebook to “Facebook Login”
- Removed description of what Facebook Connect is for
- Remove visual cue that helps users understand the purpose of the screen
- Removed Facebook terms/conditions fine print
- Removed “Cancel” button
- Asks for either your email or your phone number
- Increases size of user input fields
Apple Updates Apple Store App…Lets Store Customers Check-In
This new update allows Apple Store customers the ability to check in for reservations and request help within stores.
Link to Apple Store app: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/apple-store/id375380948?mt=8
Mobile Ad Spending To Surpass $1B in 2011
Source: http://www.emarketer.com/Article.aspx?R=1007992
Three Indicators Your Brand is Ready to Go Mobile
Here are three indicators that suggest you should begin to develop a mobile strategy to launch your mobile presence. Consider if any of these scenarios apply to your brand:
1. You’ve been looking at the analytics for your website and notice your web traffic is increasingly coming from smart phones and mobile devices.
What this indicates: You could be missing opportunities to give your audience a rich mobile web experience. Mobile users visit a huge variety of websites from their mobile phone, so having a functional mobile site makes your brand highly accessible—something critical for marketers in this digital era. Of course, you’ll want to understand your audience base (i.e., High smartphone usage? Feature phone users?) and strive for a mobile web interface that will function seamlessly on a broad range of handsets.
2. Your service is community-based or requires a user to log in.
What this indicates: If your service is a self-contained experience, like a game or a social networking interface, you would want to develop an environment that your users could access on their phone, without sacrificing the display, formatting, and overall user experience. Ignoring the limitations of the mobile screen could lead to a loss of essential information and a poorer user experience for your dedicated users.
3. You offer products for sale or accept donations on your website, but you’re missing opportunities for your buying cycle to come full circle through the mobile channel.
What this means: Neglecting a mobile component in your marketing mix you could lead to missed opportunities to grow your revenue and donor base. Consider a brand that accepts donations on its desktop website. Not having a mobile site with donation-capabilities could literally exclude that brand from an enormous revenue stream. Verify that your shopping cart or donation features are fully functional through a broad range of mobile handsets.
Starbucks makes hire via iPhone app
Starbucks spokeswoman Stacey Krum writes: 
This was the first person that told us they found the job listing
through the myStarbucks iPhone app. Of course, there may be others but not that we’re aware. With an increasing number of people relying on their mobile phones for information, we thought it made sense to tap into a pool of potential employees directly. It’s a great way for us to reach out to job candidates who are already interested in Starbucks and we hope the popularity of the app will help us find the right people for our business.
Source: http://goo.gl/LD7k
