ANN ARBOR – The increasing functionality of mobile devices, driven by products like Blackberry and Treo telephones, is quickly chewing away at the tether that linked users with their personal computers. Today’s devices merge email, text messages and web traffic all in a small, handheld device, opening up yet another frontier for marketing and communications.
Marketing messages sent to cell phones are not altogether new. Ham-handed attempts to push commercial messages to consumers largely have fallen flat in the last few years. But more sophisticated concepts are on the horizon, merging the ability these devices have for pictures and video with their increasing information transfer abilities.
For example, a European auto manufacturer recently launched a campaign on billboards promoting incentives for test drives. Consumers would take a picture of the billboard and mail the picture to an email address where a bar code on the billboard was interpreted by server-based software identifying the location of the board and the featured model. From there, information was sent on to a local dealership who phoned the individual back to arrange the test drive.
More commonly, companies are offering incentives to its customer base to sign up for instant text messages on deals and exclusive offers. For inventory or market-price sensitive retailers, the ability to get people into the sales loop instantly is a giant step forward compared with coupons or ?fifty percent off? sale signs in the front window. Retailers can offer instant savings on overstocked items and quickly receive a response from interested customers. Costs to develop these information systems are offset through reductions in direct mail, catalogs and other printed and mailed promotions.
Pushing content to mobile devices belies a larger, arguably more important general trend: consumers are slowly uncoupling from their personal computers, email accounts and web browsers, opting to instead to use other devices to perform communications tasks. They are not just sending and receiving instant text messages, they are using these devices to execute the same functions they would normally perform on a PC.
The trend is expected to expand to other devices including in-vehicle systems and integrated home systems where users operate with their devices adjacent to their living space all the time. Car companies are working on systems that will allow users to ?hear? content rather than asking them to read it while driving. Advanced home information systems feature small kiosk touch screens throughout the house, giving users instant access to information beyond their PC.
Companies looking to capitalize on this growth need to begin with a quick audit of their web-based communications and marketing platforms, and assess how existing functionality fares on these new devices. Google, one of the most ubiquitous web search engines, has a search portal specifically configured for mobile devices. The screen renders quickly and legibly on a Blackberry screen, with the search ?button? set to work with Blackberry?s sometimes-eccentric user interface options.
Conversely, Network Solutions, one of the largest web domain registrars, does not distinguish between mobile users and high-bandwidth PC users, creating a cumbersome, aggravating user experience for anyone trying to use a Blackberry to register a domain. Users often need to query on domain availability outside of the office, and the company?s lack of mobile device infrastructure can only hinder their ability to execute business.
Business-to-business communicators might decide that mobile communications is only in the purview of B2C operations. But they would be wrong. Companies can use mobile communications for everything from delivery logistics and inventory, to internal and investor relations. The key: it isn?t enough just to push information out to people. Inevitably, if people feel the need to respond, they will want to execute through the same mobile device that received the information. Once again, the proper infrastructure is required to keep the experience from deteriorating into frustration.
Mobile devices are likely to see a few more evolutionary cycles in the next few years ? with upgrades in displays, browsers, speed and local memory options. As these devices become increasingly sophisticated, their user base is likely to begin phasing out the PC opting for smaller devices with the same capabilities. Recently, on a press trip to Iceland, a 30-year veteran journalist showed up only with his phone and a small, portable keyboard to facilitate typing.
While his colleagues fumbled with large PCs or scribbled with the last vestiges of the philistine world ? pen and paper ? he casually typed in his notes while the speaker gave his presentation. The journalist then used the phone to finish his story, file it on the magazine?s website and send a copy of the story via email to his editor who also was away from the office receiving emails on his phone. Shoving the phone and rollup keyboard into his coat he summarily announced ?times have changed.?
This column was written by Rob Cleveland, CEO of ICON Creative Technologies Group. You can reach Cleveland by emailing him at [email protected]
