Posts by Randy Bradshaw
The Web isn’t about eye-catching graphics, animations or even motion video. And while all those elements, when properly orchestrated, can significantly enrich the online user experience, at the end of the day the Web is really about communication. Simply put, the Web is a vehicle to deliver a message. And to communicate your message to the appropriate audience, you need to go where that audience is. And guess what … They’re not just sitting in front of their computers waiting to be spoon-fed the latest trend or topic via their favorite blog. The term “online” no longer implies being tethered to a desk and monitor. People are on the move. Living their lives at a quicker pace than ever before, with more information, and messaging, at their fingertips than ever before.
The meteoric rise in popularity and participation on Facebook serves as a solid indicator of this trend in online behavior. As of this writing, Facebook has in excess of 400 million active members. And what may be even more telling is that in excess of 100 million active users are interacting with the platform through their mobile devices. More than 60 million of those users engage with the platform via Facebook Connect or native API (application programming interface) from other websites or third-party applications.
And Facebook isn’t alone in this. Twitter has seen similar indicators within its membership, with an estimated 80 percent opting to “tweet and be tweeted” via their mobile devices. And as of December 2009, there was estimated to be more than 50,000 registered applications using the Twitter API.
So, armed with this information, we must ask ourselves what does 2010 hold for us in terms of new opportunities and challenges? Well, speaking as a technologist, we must focus “beyond the browser.” And what we mean is that we must look beyond the traditional walled garden in which we have come to find such comfort since Netscape provided us with that first real glimpse of what was possible with the medium in 1995.
With the social media alpha dogs of Facebook and Twitter leading the pack, it should be no surprise that other services and solutions are springing up and taking advantage of these communities, thereby expanding their reach and conversations to realms beyond the browser.
Location-aware, or location-sharing, mobile applications such as foursquare and Gowalla have already started to make inroads into the space. Even Kevin Rose (of Digg.com) has become an angel investor in both of these ventures.
According to its website, foursquare helps you find new ways to explore your city. See where your friends are, learn about the places they frequent and even unlock rewards as you travel through the city. The foursquare application is currently available worldwide and supports a variety of platforms, including iPhone, Blackberry and Google’s Android devices.
Gowalla is also a mobile app that allows you to tag or “check in” with your current location, such as your local Starbucks or someplace in the mall. From there, you can do a variety of things, such as see who has been where you are or, for that matter, who on your list of friends might be there now. Gowalla even takes location-sharing a step further by adding some game-play in the form of trading virtual items left or “dropped” at a given location.
Both of these applications take full advantage of the open interfaces with Twitter and Facebook by allowing you to add your friends from those platforms. Foursquare offers businesses such as restaurants and retail stores the opportunity to participate through give-aways or promotional items offered for patrons who check in frequently. In this scenario, business owners or managers are referred to as “mayors” of a particular location. This creates buzz for the business within the mobile community. You can also become the mayor if you’ve been to a particular location more than anyone else.
As online marketing professionals, we must be there to embrace these opportunities from both a technical and strategic perspective. It’s a whole new paradigm in terms of messaging and creative packaging. And the possibilities are expanding on a daily basis. Think of a sculptor, constrained for years by a rigid, unforgiving medium such as iron or stone, suddenly exposed to very malleable material such as clay or wood. His creativity allows him to produce things that had previously been difficult, if not outright impossible.
The scenario is much the same in today’s world of online technologies. The exposure of new platforms and content to developers via open APIs and wrappers, such as Facebook Connect, promises to allow us to spend more time focusing on our message and much less time strategizing on how to shoehorn it into a rigid framework or existing website. We are free to participate in virtually any format we choose, whether that be a location-aware mobile application that allows us to stay in constant communication or simply syndicating relevant content into our own heavily branded website, blog or desktop application or widget.
But we must not become so intoxicated with this newfound freedom that we forget that we live in a digital world that is constantly evolving. As we exercise our creative muscle, be that visually or technically, we must be diligent in validating the direction that we’re heading against our strategic vision for the future. The truth is that no matter how reliable the rumor mill may be, we really don’t know exactly what the future holds beyond a certain limit. And it is with that mind-set that we must embrace and adopt practices that allow us to flex and adapt to new platforms, devices and, perhaps most importantly, user behavior. When Marshall McLuhan coined the phrase “The medium is the message” in 1964, I wonder if he realized how profound that statement would be for generations to come.
Now it’s also important to note that the decision to embrace any of these new platforms isn’t always automatic. That is to say, depending on your brand and your vision for that brand, this may not always make sense for you. In that vein, we have provided the following three simple steps that should significantly expedite the decision-making process.
1. Take inventory of your existing online presence. Before you head down a path, it’s important to get your bearings and have a solid grasp of where you are. Take the time to document your digital touch-points and don’t overlook items such as the Facebook pages, tweets or blogs of your employees.
2. Define and document a clear and concise digital strategy. This will enable you to evaluate your options and validate any choices you make as to how they align with where you want to take your brand. Technology for the sake of technology is rarely a good idea. Make sure you have a solid, strategic reason for the paths that you take.
3. Begin to identify the technical resources you have at your disposal. Whether this is an internal team of developers or a capable, reliable technology partner, this will help you set realistic expectations and reconcile those expectations with your overall objectives.
Once you’ve gone through these exercises and you know where you need to go, the next steps are pretty simple depending on your findings. Consider the following:
1. Facebook – Incorporate a Facebook Connect feature into your website via one of their cut-and-paste code snippets. Or implement the live chat feature for an upcoming event.
2. Twitter – Generate a Twitter feed of brand-related tweets and incorporate them into an existing website, blog or marketing dashboard.
3. Location-aware (Gowalla/foursquare) – If your business or brand is public-facing, consider seeding the Gowalla or foursquare communities via your employees. Identify someone from within your organization to become mayor for your location.
The digital space is constantly evolving. It’s quite true that the only constant here is change. This presents us with exciting opportunities, unique challenges and a seemingly endless series of decisions. If we approach these decisions in the context and with the attention they deserve, they will allow us to reach our goals and objectives well ahead of our original schedules.
View all 10 trends here: Ten Digital Trends for 2010… and Beyond.
No Comments | Trackback | Categories: Digital Trend Reports | Email This Post