May » 2009 » mobilegroove

SMARTPHONES ACCOUNTED FOR ALMOST THREE TIMES more usage than their relative market share, according to AdMob's April 2009 Mobile Metrics Report.The report compared usage of mobile websites to usage of HTML sites on mobile devices and found the relative usage of both to be highest on Apple and Android devices. The iPhone's OS had 8 percent of the smartphone market, yet generated 43 percent of mobile web requests and 65 percent of HTML usage. Ad requests from applications are said to have contributed to this heavy usage. Source The bottom line: As illustrated numerous times within this section, the data dominance and superior browsing experience allowed by smartphones is undeniable. Making mobile Web user experience smooth, easy, and compelling - as these handsets often do - is shown to consistently drive mobile data traffic. That many consumers probably can't tell and don't care about the difference between mobile websites and HTML sites is also testament to technical developments. *** GARTNER SAYS THE NUMBER OF MOBILE PAYMENT users will increase by 70 percent this year. Its report claims that 73.4 million users of mpayment in 2009 would represent a leap of 70.4 percent from 2008. By 2012, it says mobile payment will reach more than 190 million, more than 3 percent of total mobile users worldwide, attaining a level at which it will be considered "mainstream." Gartner defines a mobile payment as paying for a product or service using mobile technology such as a short message service (SMS), Wireless Application Protocol (WAP), Unstructured Supplementary Service Data (USSD), and Near Field Communication (NFC). It includes transactions that use cash, bank accounts or debit and credit cards, as well as non-carrier stored value accounts, such as travel cards, gift cards or PayPal. It does not include transactions that use mobile operators' billing systems, such as purchase of mobile content or telebanking by mobile to the service center via an interactive voice response (IVR) system. Source The bottom line: Although the definition of mobile payment is ambiguous here, these figures demonstrate that the mass market is slowly growing confident in using their mobile to pay for and transfer money. Much effort has been made to foster consumer confidence in the micropayment mobile payment space, and the adoption of mobile banking technologies still varies drastically from region to region. There are regulatory and security challenges to overcome, particularly with the emergence of NFC technologies, but these figures give strong reason for hope. *** SPEECH APPLICATIONS ARE TO TRIPLE by 2014 according to a new Datamonitor report. The report claims that as we get used to using mobile computing devices in 'hands-busy', 'eyes-busy' environments, speech recognition technologies are expected to gain considerable traction. The global market for advanced

Several weeks into MSG'S exciting line-up of mobile industry projects (mobile advertising and mobile search), and I am impressed by the pivotal importance the majority of interviewees place on context. Whether it's advertising or contextual search, the new business mantra is personalization. It's all about delivering the right advertising/content/app/results to the right person in the right context. But this time it's more than warm-and-fuzzy lip-service. This time it's hard-nosed business. Two developments - flat sales of more traditional mobile entertainment offers such as games and ringtones (albeit at a high level), and the phenomenal popularity of apps and app stores - exacerbate the content discovery dilemma, forcing companies and operators alike to admit that better personalization is a must if higher revenues are the goal. Last week I directed your attention to this excellent column from Mark Lowenstein, who drives home a point the significance of which I cannot overstate: "The most important way to differentiate in this growing but increasingly crowded market is to deliver a more personalized, contextual applications experience." He was referring to app stores, where we are forced to sift through thousands of apps. (Déjà vu! It was our frustration with scrolling up and down mobile operator portals and hierarchical menus that opened the door for a variety of mobile search and content discovery solutions and providers that promised to take the pain out of finding and buying content.) Put simply, personalization is not just central to app store schemes. It is critical to the delivery of content and advertising we will likely appreciate because it is in tune with our lifestyles (through profiling) as well as the important clues we leave behind though our browsing behavior, purchase patterns, and download history. (JumpTap, for example, has built a business connecting the dots between these data points to match relevant advertising to relevant consumer segments. As this MSG post recounts, the company first released tapLink, a platform that builds targeting intelligence from multiple sources including search queries, browsing history, demographic and location data, and then followed up with the recent launch of tapMatch, its pay-per-click (PPC) performance mobile ad marketplace.) As I have written many times on MSG, the new paradigm is personalized content-push based on a deep understanding of the individual. It's even more compelling if the technology can learn users' likes and dislikes over time to dynamically and consistently deliver the right content mix. One company making its mark is Xiam Technologies, a Qualcomm company that I have tracked from the start. I recently caught up with Colm Healy, Xiam CEO, in a video interview to discuss the role of recommendation and personalized discovery techniques. Xiam worked with Stuart Willett, who heads up MSG Media Solutions, and the film crew we assembled for the project to co-create the video I am proud to showcase in the MSG video player. (My personal thanks to Martin Clancy, Xiam Marketing Manager, for arranging the interview, and to Curtis Shmigelsky and the rest of the great people at bnetTV for including it in MSG video jukebox!) I encourage you to check out the video interview in the sidebar. A highlight: Colm's comments on the opportunities in personalization for mobile operators. As he puts it: "Mobile is a uniquely personal device and if you [operator/service provider] aren't taking advantage of that by building in recommendations and personalized discovery techniques, you're missing a beat."

MSG mobile search research (the profiles and analysis I share on MSG, and the new-release white paper assessing search, which I co-created with my esteemed colleague Peggy Albright) has attracted the attention of a growing community of readers and influencers across a variety of online destinations and industry organizations. I am pleased to report this work has also sparked interest at Eyefor Travel Research, a business intelligence firm known as the "leading voice of online travel." Andrew Merrie, research analyst and Headmaster of the School for Mobile (the firm's initiative for educating the travel and tourism industries on opportunities in mobile), reached out to me earlier today to collaborate on the firm's series of free reports (which are essential reads chock-full of case studies, key statistics, and best practice) focused on mobile technology and solutions. There is a special emphasis on mobile search (which we agree is the linchpin of a range of effective strategies to deliver mobile advertising, commerce, and CRM). By way of background, the Eyefor Travel report series consists of Vol.1 Mobile Technology in Travel: The Introduction, and Vol 2, Mobile Technology in Travel Report: The Detail. Vol 3 Mobile Technology in Travel Report: Consumer Insight is work in progress, but you can sign up here for an alert when it is released later in June. A trend that stands out is the new popularity of SMS search schemes as a sure-fire way to reach a mass market. As Andrew puts it: "SMS search is a tool that 99 percent of customers know how to use. In a consumer-focused industry such as ours, it [SMS search] represents a good first step in how companies need to move forward." Another advantage beyond intuitive usability: Proven monetization models around the delivery of related text links and advertising. This point came through loud and clear in this week's AdAge article, which outlines the advantages of SMS search, and takes a look at the companies (notably 4INFO, which MSG profiled here, and ChaCha) cashing in on its newfound popularity among users and advertisers. Rita Chang, who wrote the piece, contacted me for the article, and has since arranged a follow-up call to discuss the mobile search competitive landscape. The intention is to write a comprehensive feature on the models and companies I think set the bar. I gladly support her in this work, and welcome other journalists to reach out to me for comments or just a few company contacts. The increasing excitement around SMS search isn't limited to the U.S. (the focus of Rita's AdAge article). It's also going full-steam in Asia, where Mobile Content Networks (MCN) - a provider of mobile search and revenue solutions that deliver people connections to content, not links to content, on their mobile phones - has chalked up an impressive list of operator customers for its SMS search, which emphasizes content discovery instead of answers to specific search queries. Today marks the company's official launch of Smart Search (aptly named) in partnership with Smart Communications, the Philippines' leading mobile operator with 36.9 million subscribers.

Last week the news was all about GyPSii's new iPhone app. Developed by GeoSentric, GyPSii lets people, and now people who own iPhones ,create and share geotagged content in real-time with friends, family, and the growing global community of GyPSii members. But it doesn't stop there. The places and experiences users create become Internet-searchable destinations, available for friends and communities to share and comment on, not only in GyPSii, but also across other social media such as Facebook and Twitter. Read between the lines, and GyPSii goes one huge step beyond the slew of location-aware, mobile social networking services we've see up to this point. Sure, it allows people to instantly capture and share what they are actually doing, building a multi-media virtual diary on their world - the places they have been and the things that they have done. But it also allows people to search (and find) these places/people/experiences with their mobile phones. I am immediately reminded of the key theme of the Netsize Guide 2009, a milestone mobile almanac that represents an exciting (and on-going) collaboration with Stan Chesnais, Netsize CEO, who steered me in the direction of the next mega-trend in mobile: The blurring of the barriers between the virtual and physical worlds. But it's more than an adrenalin-driven vision of the future. As we described in the book (which I urge you to download via the MSG sidebar), it's happening now, and examples range from Ford's super-cool use of augmented reality in a mobile marketing campaign, to visual search/advertising schemes supported by SnapNow, to GyPSii's little known business model, which is all about indexing the world around us for the delivery of relevant advertising and services we can't yet imagine. (I hadn't had the pleasure of meeting with GyPSii at the time I wrote the book, but you can bet it has a top-notch spot in the 2010 Guide!) Shortly before GyPSii launched its iPhone app, Vanessa Vigar, Head of Corporate Communications, invited me to company HQ in Amsterdam to connect with Dan Harple, GyPSii CEO. The interview was a meeting of the minds, which I have produced as a two-part podcast here on MSG. (Thanks again for reaching out, Vanessa!) In Part 1, Dan gives me the high-level view of what GyPSii is (and isn't), presents his no-holds-barred view of the real market for location services, and walks me through the value propositions (for people and GyPSii partners) that are intertwined with the company mission to make sure all of us are out on our bikes searching the planet, instead of on our PCs searching the Internet.

Today marks the end of a long week of mobile advertising webinars (including this one organized by Mobixell - password adit123) and interviews, activities which for me drove home the pivotal importance of relevancy in all we do. Like a pop song you keep hearing in your head, my ears are ringing with how many times I have heard executives at brands, agencies, and operators echo the increasing importance of relevancy. In fact, Andy Bovingdon, Bango, VP Marketing, in yesterday's interview for the Mobile Advertising Research U.K. project, was by far the most adamant to date. In his view, mobile advertising is a form of mobile marketing that has many forms - all of which must be relevant to us. "The key across all platforms and forms of advertising - search, SMS, banners, and barcodes - is the relevance and the ability to target. Is mobile another screen, or the fourth screen, as some say? I would say it is the first screen. It's always-on and always with us, and that means we can learn a lot more about the visitors [but not individual visitor] to a site or an ad campaign. We can know more about the people who interact with advertising, and we must use this to give them advertising to interact with." Put simply, relevancy rules (!) The message isn't lost on MSG. Almost five years ago, I wrote the first report on mobile search and content discovery, where I preached the importance of delivering the right content to the right person - better yet in the right context. And that has been my message ever since. (Also reflected in the MSG strapline: At the intersection of content and context.) It's where the action is! And if you think it only applied to mobile content portals, then I have one word for you: App stores. This well-written and thoughtful column from Mark Lowenstein speaks volumes. He makes a plea for more personalization in application storefronts, and companies would do well to listen. "I think the most important way to differentiate in this growing but increasingly crowded market is to deliver a more personalized, contextual applications experience. In most cases, all users launching an app store are presented with the same menu. There have been some early stage attempts to enable users to do some content configuration on operator or third party portals, sort of a wireless version of My Yahoo. But if we're dealing with tens of thousands of apps and a small screen device with limited input capability, we have to get a lot smarter about what is presented to the user, with the magic being done in the background rather than relying on the user to self-configure." Where's the connection with Blyk? The answer is evident when we consider (in my view) a milestone quote/observation (below)from Antti Öhling, Blyk co-founder and CEO U.K.

A NEW REPORT SUGGESTS MOBILE ADVERTISING WILL INCREASE BY 30+ PERCENT, despite the overall marketing slowdown, because of critical development anticipated by the end of the year. According to a report by Magna, the U.S. mobile advertising market will grow by 36%. That's a rise from $169 million in 2008 to $229 million during 2009. Although this doesn't reflect a significant growth on previous years, Magna explains that we will witness a resurgence in the industry in 2010 thanks to the proliferation of mobile-based subscriptions and ad-supported mobile applications. Source The bottom line: Another reason to be optimistic about the development of the mobile advertising market in the U.S. Forecasts that growth will be stunted in 2009 are now tempered by bullish predictions for 2010. Advances in handset penetration, the spread of ad-funded content/services schemes, and a wealth of app store offerings should result in an even greater take-up of mobile advertising. *** THE MOBILE INTERNET, MOBILE EMAIL AND MOBILE SOCIAL NETWORKING ARE USED BY MORE THAN HALF of mobile phone users. A mobile Internet poll carried out by user experience consultancy Webcredible showed that of the respondents who used the mobile Internet (52 percent), over half (55 percent) used it primarily for emailing and social networking. Source The bottom line: We know that the growth of the mobile Internet usage is linked to the youth demographic and their particular usage pattern (transferring their fixed-line Internet/PC behavior to mobile). This study provides us with some numbers to back this up. *** SMARTPHONES REPRESENT A MINORITY of U.S. mobile device purchases, accounting for 23 percent of handset sales volume in Q1, says recent data from market research firm NPD Group. Yet as a percentage of overall handset sales to consumers in the U.S. from January through July 2008, smartphones represented 19 percent of all handset purchases compared to just 9 percent for the same period last year. This rise was put down to declining prices, streamlined form factors, and Internet connectivity bringing devices into the mainstream. Source The bottom line: It's easy (particularly if you are focused on the mobile content industry) to lose sight of the fact that smartphones, despite the hype and their urban cool factor, remain a minority in the marketplace. The percentage is rising, but there is no doubt a large and untapped market opportunity in catering to plain-old, low-end devices. ***