iOS Comes Out on Top in Twitter Ads

Twitters ads just launched in Canada and we just finished our first campaign for a hockey product client.  The analytics are helpful.  Friday netted the most impressions in our 3-day weekend promotion.  The device analytics had iOS way out in front (not surprised) with desktop/laptop in 2nd (interesting) and Android in 3rd (slow adopters?).  

In our ad configuration, Blackberry was not selected (can't even remember if that was a choice). 

Can't wait to roll the dice again to see if we get similar results.   I'm guessing that #MobilePresence is big for Twitter. 

Brand extension beyond the ice rink

Business leaders are the ones always thinking of new ways to strengthen their brand and grow their sales.  Skating development professionals Steffany Hanlen and Vanessa Hettinger have been in rinks over the past 10 years teaching minor, junior and NHL players how to skate through their Quantum Speed company.  Last year, they got the idea of taking their techniques and putting it into the hands of hockey coaches and instructors around the world.  With the popularity of iPhones, this is the digital platform they selected.  Essentially, it was a 'mobile-first' initiative with any of the content appearing on their website as an after thought.

The first app is skating introduction ideal for young new skaters.  The second app launched in September 2013 is for intermediate skaters. Users can go through about 30 videos and access key teaching points for each one.  The videos are embedded right into the app making access easy where there is no data coverage.  A third app is expected next year for advanced skaters.


While other hockey development companies are still producing DVDs, social media posted videos and web-based videos, Quantum Speed has taken quantum leaps with mobile presence.

Habs app

Congrats to Twist Image for landing the Montreal Canadiens app project.  Just more evidence that hockey brands see the importance of mobile access over 'www' access.

Montreal Canadiens Hockey Franchise Choose Montreal’s Twist Image to Build New App - Techvibes.com

WWW dot graveyard

If they tried this as a mobile-first service, they likely would have done better.  Didn't anybody tell them that access to information via 'www' is dying.  Try access via touch instead.

Torstar shutters subscription-based business websites | Marketing Magazine

Blackberry - A thing of the past

(This is a post that originally appeared in 2010 in a different blog and now updated to August 12, 2013.  We are often asked about when our apps will be made for Blackberry.  The details below give some reason to our hesitation.)


November 19, 2010

What's the Exit Strategy?

RIM did a great job of taking the human task of processing email off the corporate desktop by making it mobile so that middle management could exist by the art of digital delegation and 'cya'.  Their jobs were justified based on their ability to process the inbox and the amount of mail sent to sub-ordinates.  Notice how middle management carries over vacation time.  They are worried that if they are away from the office, upper management will notice that the department can operate without them.  That's why they only vacation where there is network coverage.  They need to keep the digital delegation going.

So how does it end?

Let's use a hockey analogy.  When your team is scored on, most people blame the goalie for not stopping the puck.  However, great coaches will look at the sequence of events leading up to that goal against.  The winger not fore checking, the centre not back checking and the defence leaving too much of a gap and backing into their goalie.  The entire play gave the opponent a scoring chance.

Blackberry devices were rolled out to the carriers (single decision maker), who would then subsidize the hardware only to be recovered on the users' 3 year voice plan (back when voice calling was cool).  Corporate purchasing (single decision maker) would select the carrier, models and plans for the tens, hundreds even thousands of employees to use.  Yes, the days of the company issued device.  Not long after, the CFO (single decision maker) initiaties downsizing, right sizing, cost control measures.   10% of middle management and their Blackberry devices are off the air.   There's one goal against (late in the first period though).

Uses for email are becoming less and less (kind of like using Excel for everything).  Gone are sales reporting, network or system status updates, customer service reports, appointment scheduling and even chatting with the employee in the next middle management cubical.  These have been replaced with software in the desktops and now software as a service (cloud computing).

SalesForce.com will one day replace the Sales Director.  It will monitor sales performance and automatically generate sales training videos such as time management, selling skills, closing techniques to increase win rates, proposal writing and presentations and product FAB.  There's another goal against (on a breakaway even).

Global outages.  Another goal against (empty net perhaps).

The iPhone.  The iPhone and apps.  When Apple entered the consumer market (multiple decision makers), many tech experts were writing about how the iPhone would never enter the enterprise space and be a threat to Blackberry.  Today, many businesses are not only swapping out their Blackberry's for iOS devices but deploying enterprise applications (the apps you won't find on the App Store) on these devices for employees and visiting clients.  There are more and more new enterprise app developers hitting the market (many of them don't do consumer app projects).  Many companies will give employees the choice of using either device.  Since these companies use MS Exchange mail servers (in their data room or in the cloud), it's easy to deploy on the iPhone.  Plus, iPhone users have the ability to combine personal and business life into one device (mail, calendar and contacts).  Another goal against (the other team was even short handed).

Lagging behind in innovation, Blackberry enters the consumer market of data (apps, video, photo, music) with devices similar to Apple's.  They still make a big thing out of the keyboard (the pacifier of middle management).  As I've said before, Apple has turned the keyboard into an app (you don't need it all of the time).  Blackberry is now a 'me too' device.  There's the goal against (in overtime).


Not convinced?  I ran into Kevin Frankish (CityTV - BT) last April at the Toronto hockey show and asked him "What would happen first.  Leafs win the cup or Kevin trading in his Blackberry for an iDevice?" He's enjoying his iPad very much.


Articles from the recent Web 2.0 Summit has Balsillie talking about (what I interpret) the PlayBook as a new web browser (yes the world needs another way to multi-keystroke its way through a commodity resource).  Or could it possibly be something more than that?  He mentions something about using existing web content without apps.  He predicts apps will die out..quickly.  (Shortly after reading that article, the Blackberry App World commercial appears on my tv).  Is he relying on the market to decide this or is there some new innovation coming from RIM that puts the company into the next series of play?


If that doesn't work, what then?  Close shop and sell company assets, be acquired, merge? MicroBerry, HPberry, Faceberry?

Updated July 30, 2011:

Reading the Toronto Star article by David Olive this morning reminded me of my years at several telecom companies in Canada (local, ld, toll free).  Product innovation came through what the legal department said and running the company was only for share holder value.

New products were simply a change in pricing and a new plan name after legal approved it.  As an employee, I often asked where was the innovation especially after listening to Tom Peters audio books on my iPod.

2,000 layoffs at RIM just announced.  I can see how that went.  A CEO prep speech about market conditions and the companies financial performance...10% of all departments or non-customer facing employees will be let go.

Rumors about which day the layoffs will happen swirl around the organization.  I remember when a manager at AT&T Canada told his boss that he had a dental appointment the next day (which was rumored to be the day of layoffs) and he was given his package on the spot.  The following day, management decided not to do the layoffs as they thought the employees would be needed once the division was acquired by another company.

The day 2,000 RIM employees were let go probably went like this.  Several employees receive a  meeting request for room A and others receive a request for room B.  They gather at the scheduled time.  No one is late and they look around the room to see who is there and who is not there.  They wonder if they are in the room of people that will be let go or the room or people that will remain with the company (until the next round of layoffs).

I knew a guy who went through this at least five times and always ended up in the 'still employed' room.  After leave one of these meetings he said "I'm sick of being a survivor".

By contrast, I had the pleasure of working for a manufacturing company with its headquarters in Japan.  Japanese business management was a nice change from the Canadiana way of doing things.  They would never think of laying off employees to reduce costs.  Instead, they would look for ways to redeploy those resources for improved productivity or efficiencies in other parts of the organization.

If RIM let go talented product developers or engineers, those folks may take their talents to their own start-up enterprises and compete against RIM or later be acquired by RIM competitors.  If RIM took a page from Tom Peter's, they could have spun off these employees with a start-up development task with funding providing.   A few years later, use the innovation in their core business.

So what is the core business of RIM now?  Sitting at number 3 in the mobile OS market, where do they go?  Young iOS consumer users will mature into enterprise users in several years.  They won't know what a Blackberry is or does.  I had a fireside chat with my neighbour about our teenage children who don't use email to communicate, function and operate their Me Inc. business.  Introducing them to email in the corporate world will be like telling the faxing generation to use telegram service instead.

Updated October 18, 2011.

Was that Kevin Frankish with his own iPhone 4S this morning?

This month, another outage.  A big one.  Followed by App credits from a company that thinks there's no future for 'native' apps.

This month, new OS.  Will that bring back developers who left the previous OS?

Does this company even have a goaltender to stop the puck?

Updated December 20, 2011:

iCing on the Cake

Michael Grothaus' post on TUAW today really paints an amazing picture of the downfall of the Blackberry.  The title "App Store hypothetical market cap beats RIM's value" says it all.




Updated March 28, 2013:

Blackberry reported a profit yesterday.  Likely a result of 'right sizing', op-ex controls, and some Z10 sales.  Let's face it, the Z10 was long over due and those companies that still use purchasing power to manage technology just did a mass upgrade to their existing Blackberry depreciating assets.

Innovative companies or internal employee lobby groups didn't take long to find out the power of iOS in corporate applications.  BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) is becoming an acceptable practice at many corporations.  Notice how quickly your Exchange email account updates on your iPhone once your Exchange admin updates your profile.  Behold, you can also keep your business and personal details separate on the same device.

Blackberry claims that 55% of their sales are from migrating smartphones.  Unhappy Android users and  corporate purchasing power policy forcing employees to the Z10 perhaps.

I keep thinking of those business analysts that wrote, several years ago, about Blackberry not being affected by the iPhone and other devices.  What are they writing about now?

The bleeding is bad and the Z10 might not be a big enough bandage to stop it.

Just like in hockey, leagues collapse and new ones emerge.



Updated June 28, 2013:

Shares drop 25% on reported losses and the Playbook is done.  Where do they go now?  New technology to be released several years behind other mobile device makers or merger?  Is this kind of like a hockey 'lock out'?


Updated August 12, 2013:

Blackberry announces strategic changes.  Collapse of the WHA?

Related articles

• Why I won't be going back to BlackBerry from iPhone
• Why I'm ditching Blackberry? Because the war is over
• BlackBerry is out of Excuses ~ Z10 and Q10 Smart Phones are Not Selling

• RIM's PlayBook wins fans in Corporate Canada (financialpost.com)
• RIM: 'no need' for native apps; 4G, NFC hinted in BlackBerry (electronista.com)
• So Long RIM: Dell to Dump 25K BlackBerrys; Bank of America, Citigroup Look to iPhone (nytimes.com)
• RIM CEO tells Apple: 'You don't need an app for the web' (telegraph.co.uk)
• RIM's BlackBerry outage: $350 million max hit, but losing enterprise (zdnet.com)
• Blackberry maker RIM offers customers free apps after outage; RIM stock continues to drop anyway (boingboing.net)

A new mobile term - Native Ads

We've been calling it integrated digital or content marketing but the term "native advertising" works too.  A mobile native ad is defined as valuable content, from a brand, presented in a way that is less intrusive to the app user.  It's much like an advertorial in a magazine.

It's not display or banner advertising.  Mobile display ads can still be effective for advertisers (brands) if done on the right platforms and the right apps.  The rates for advertising are very reasonable for any advertiser.

An example of native ads is sponsored or promoted updates you see on Twitter, Facebook and now Linkedin.

An example of a native ad in our own app properties is in the Sharp Sk8s app.  Built into the punch card feature, a user keeping track of their skate sharpenings will come across a subtle product suggestion.  Many of our hockey apps have the ability to integrate creative, sustainable and longevity native ads.  The cost of this is more than a campaign period of display ads however.





Business Insider has put out a report about native ads.
The Emergence Of Native Ads On Mobile - Business Insider

Will your brand be slow with getting into the mobile media space?

It took years after the launch of app stores for several well known Canadian brands to develop their own app.  That's a good start into mobile presence.  However, as more and more time is being spent using smartphones, these same brands are slow to find other ways to engage with their market and customers.  While social media apps does provide some access, there's hundreds of other apps that brands can integrate with if they put their minds to it.

This 680News report provides more proof about our love with our mobile devices.

Smartphone ownership way up, Canadians addicted to their phones: Google study | 680News

Is your phone number published correctly for mobile convenience?

There are reasons why they are called 'smartphones'.  One of them is that they can detect phone numbers on company websites, social media, apps and emails.  With one tap on the phone number, your device will display a message asking if you want to make a call.

Your phone number needs to be published in a string of 10 to 11 characters for this work:

• 14165551212
• 1(416)555-1212
• 1-416-555-1212
• 1.416.555.1212

Notice in our examples we included the country code prefix "1".  This is for convenience for your customers who may need to reach you long distance and don't mind making the long distance call since many mobile voice plans include long distance calling.  If they happen to dial this number locally, most carriers suppress the "1" and complete and charge the connection as a local call.  Without the "1" in your published phone number, your long distance callers are inconvenienced with a carrier message stating that the "1" is required to complete a long distance call and to update their contact information and either pass the call through or ask your customer to redial. 

Go through your digital media (Linkedin, email signature, website, app, blog, social media, etc.) where your number is published and consider making it easier for your customers to reach you.

Digital Marketing and Content Marketing Leaders Use Mobile

I'm borrowing a post that I did on our other blog "Between Games".  

It challenges companies to think digital marketing beyond their website.  Mobile plays a big part.

http://betweenicegames.blogspot.ca/2013/07/describe-your-business-without-using.html

Making the Case for Mobile

Constant Contact (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We're not the only ones promoting the importance of mobile presence.  Have a look at Constant Contact's seminar for Tuesday July 23, 2013

Registration

Is Your Website Mobile Friendly?

Have you visited your website through a mobile browser lately?  Does it appear the same as it does on a desktop computer or is it formatted for easy reading and navigation?

A few things to think about here.  Web browsing on a mobile device only accounts for 20%, on average, of a users total data time.  If your site is hard to read, they won't spend time with it.  Lastly, if it is not mobile friendly, it moves down the mobile search results rankings.

This article explains how and why your rankings will slip.  While they use job recruiting companies as an example, this could apply to your hockey business too.

The Mobile Candidate Experience — It’s Already Too Late - ERE.net

Alternatively, you can bypass all of this by just having your own app.  That's where 80% of mobile user data time is spent...with apps installed on their device(s).

Content Marketing - Take it Mobile

Content Marketing is still new to many companies and even most of our clients.  Some of them are doing this activity without even knowing it or not putting much thought into it.

I put a couple of slides together to help you understand it a bit more and get you thinking of how you can use it in your overall marketing activities.  The emphasis is on taking it mobile of course.

View it here

How Much Mobile Time Does Your Brand Get?

Even if you have your own corporate app, there are other ways to get more consumer mobile time with your brand.  This Flurry report breaks down the average 2 hours and 38 minutes consumers spend on their smartphones and tablets.

Flurry Five-Year Report: It’s an App World. The Web Just Lives in It

It will be interesting to see how this changes year over year.  I suspect that the amount of time with apps will increase and the amount of time with Facebook will decrease as other social platforms develop and us humans integrate with them.  Nonetheless, its been 5 years since the mobile re-invention (read: launch of the App Store).  How long did it take your brand to enter this space...or are you still behind (read: 100% resources on website development and SEO (read: lost in a sea polluted with digital goop hoping to be found)?

Six Years of Mobile Presence

Skate Sharpening (Photo credit: CJMedia)

Great article by @susinsky in The Globe and Mail (Marketing matters: The ‘small’ problem with mobile ads).  If you are a brand manager you need to read this.

With the iPhone in the market for six years now, mobile presence creativity still remains widely open.  It needs to come from brand managers, advertising agencies and even app developers.

Here's one for you.  A small local skate sharpening shop sends you a discount coupon to your mobile device when you visit a competitor.  It can be done.  Geo-location detection and integration into a hockey relevant app.

Digital Marketing for the Hockey Brands

This slide illustrates our view of digital marketing opportunities for brands.  You will see that we have mobile presence on top.

Slideshow: 6 Consumer Trends You Need to Pay Attention To | LinkedIn

This presentation confirms that our company is going in the right direction with mobile presence, quality content marketing and video.  We just need more brands to understand this.  Consumer time spent with TV, radio and newspaper is dropping.  Time with internet (including apps and digital content) is increasing.

I like the reference to 'Touch Here'.  We try not to use the word 'click' that much in our content.  We're not big on 'www' access to info given that there a new mobile technologies emerging that do not require a multi-keystroke commodity platform.

The slide show is short yet to the point with some powerful metrics.

Slideshow: 6 Consumer Trends You Need to Pay Attention To | LinkedIn

The future of social is mobile

"As users flock to Vine, Snapchat and, previously, Instagram, the social platforms are challenged to continue to be the primary provider of these services to the growing army of smartphone users."

That is a part of a TechCrunch article by Keith Teare which really highlights the shift from web-based socializing to "the successes of mobile-first messengers".   If you visit the website for both Vine and Snapchat, you know right away that these social tools are mobile only and launched as mobile-first....not web-based.

Facebook taught us how to socialize digitally (beyond email).  But with so many smartphones around the world, cloud computing, and connectivity new mobile social apps are being created.  The next phase will be integration into your corporate brand apps just like how Facebook and Twitter are APIs in iOS for sharing purposes.

I'd like to see or know how you are using these mobile-first social services for your hockey business, tournaments, retail stores or products.

For more insights into this topic, please use the link below to read the full article.

Related articles

• The Future Of Mobile-Social Could Spell The End For Social Networks

Web App or Native App?

Nederlands: Linked In icon (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

We get a few requests to basically cut and paste website content into a mobile app.  There are many apps out there that do this.  This is good if you just want to regurgitate content with minimal cost, minimal functionality and have the ability launch on several mobile platforms with ease.

Apps should let us create, solve, share, explore, educate, entertain, challenge, save time, connect with people, laugh, play and more.  This cannot always be achieved with web apps.

Take a look at LinkedIn's experience with web apps and the limitations they ran into.  Read this VentureBeat interview with Kiran Prasad, LinkedIn’s senior director for mobile engineering.   They finally developed their app native to the platforms and devices that it runs on.
 

As Mobile Increases, All Other Media Decreases

One of my favourite slide decks that I found on LinkedIn was done by Henry Blodget and Alex Cocotas of Business Insider.  The Future of Digital.

It really paints a picture of how mobile presence is essential to any brand.

• Smartphone sales blew past PC sales
• Internet access via mobile far exceeds fixed internet access by 2015
• Mobile users consume content
• A huge amount of content
• As mobile increases, all other media decreases
• Smartphone users spend more time on apps than web
• Apple is dominating app revenue

Digital is now a 4-screen world.  I read about at least four hockey companies each month on LinkedIn that are launching their new business as a website.  www.20YearOldMulti-keystrokeCommodity.com.  That's all there is.  No social media plan, no advertising dollars and certainly no mobile presence.  Just a website.  I recently went through my years of accumulated bookmarked hockey companies to see how they are doing.  About 25% of them no longer exist.  Some were digital based and some were product based. They all had great products and services but no marketing plans.  Just their efforts and dollars put into a website.

While the slides point out mobile display advertising stats and potential, mobile presence for your brand can exist in other ways.  Development of your own app, sponsorship of an app, social media mobile platforms are a few other ways to be known.

To see the complete deck, visit Business Insider 

Apple - iTunes - 50 Billion Apps Countdown

Mac App Store (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

The App Store is about to reach 50 billion downloads and we are happy to have created 10 of the over 775,000 apps available.

I knew that apps would be successful when we first launched the HockeyGPS app in January 2009.  So successful that we stopped offering this navigation service on a website six months later (90% of the traffic was done on the app).

Apple - iTunes - 50 Billion Apps Countdown

Of the half a billion iOS devices sold and the amount of apps installed on them, I would have to think that no two devices are exactly the same.  Everyone can personalize their device to their own needs, hobbies, interests, job, and brand preferences.

What's significant about this milestone is that users are spending time with the apps they download.  This is time they used to spend on the computer navigating websites with multi-keystrokes and clicks.

Right now, apps are the pinnacle of mobile presence.