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Is Your Site Phone Phriendly?
I had an interesting conversation with a friend a couple of days ago how important my phone has become in my everyday life. I use it to text, Twitter, talk, take pictures and surf the Internet. I feel naked without it, and apparently I’m in good company. Research shows that the amount of people using their phones for things other than talking is growing at an astounding rate. And with 260,000,000 mobile phones in the United States alone (according to Wikipedia), I can only imagine that trend will pick up pace.
What really got me about our exchange was an observation we made about how often we’re using the mobile web to find information on-the-fly. My friend commented about how the other day he was looking for a restaurant’s website on his iPhone so he could give them a call to see how long the wait was. He went to Google, typed in the name of the restaurant, found the result and went to the restaurant’s website. What did he see when he landed there? NOTHING—the restaurant’s website was built entirely in Flash. He couldn’t find the number, the address…or anything for that matter. Frustrated, he went to another nearby restaurant.
Unfortunately, with the popularity of Flash-based websites there are tons of businesses just like this restaurant that have sites that are completely useless to mobile users. They fall into all sorts of categories – restaurants, retail, b2b, entertainment, news, blogs, destinations, etc. But it doesn’t have to be this way…
As part of our typical process when we’re laying out a digital strategy for a client, we consider the different types of users of the site—in most cases one of those types of users is a mobile user. These people have different motivations when browsing a site than typical folks. In the case of a restaurant for example, chances are that if a consumer goes to their website they’re looking for hours, directions, reviews or contact information. Creating a mobile site that functions properly for users accessing a site from a mobile device is a snap for a firm like ours that has these capabilities. If we can help you improve your site’s performance in this or any other aspect, give us a shout! We’d love to help you make sure to satisfy ALL your audiences, even the ones accessing your site from a handheld device.
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Add A Button, Make $300,000,000
I recently stumbled upon a pretty great article written by Jared Spool from User Interface Engineering and was compelled to pass it along because I think it’s a great read for anyone who owns, manages, uses or builds websites. If you qualify, then by all means read on!
The article was Jared’s recount of one specific situation in which a slight change in the design of a form made a noticeable difference in business. In the case of the site he wrote about, the change was a little bigger than noticeable—it was $300,000,000. Whoa.
The issue with the unnamed site was that in order to purchase the items that you had placed in your shopping cart, the site required you to register with the site. The thinking behind doing this was that it would make return purchases much easier because the site could remember all of your payment and shipping information, as well as your preferences. Pretty smart, huh?
As it turns out, the answer is an emphatic no. After conducting extensive usability testing, the interactive team realized that for many first-time shoppers, being forced to register (which involves picking a username/password) was a huge annoyance. As one respondent said, “I’m not here for a relationship – I just want to make a purchase.”
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Who Is Really Using Social Media?
To participate, or not to participate. That’s the question many CMOs and Marketing Directors are grappling with when it comes to whether or not to join the conversation by engaging consumers through social media. For those that target Generation Y and younger, the choice is an easy one.
But what about everyone else? If I had an extra dollar for every time I heard or read about a marketer downplaying the importance of social media to their customers because “they’re too old for that” I’d be looking into putting a down payment on a Fisker Karma or Ronn Motor Co’s Scorpion. Or maybe even a RUF eRUF Greenster - but that’s another story entirely.
Just the other day, a fellow industry colleague told me that she couldn’t get a Facebook account because her son told her she was too old and that it would be lame for her to sign up. I quickly reminded her that he might have his reasons for not wanting her on there (hello, spying parents) and sent her HERE. She quickly signed up.
A couple of days later, @wendyscherer on Twitter sent me this LINK that outlines in detail the demographic data for each social media outlet. The results? You need to be integrating social media into your marketing strategy—All of you.
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Where Do Brands Go When They Die?
John Cassella, our creative director, passed along a pretty interesting link to me the other day about how the credit crisis is snuffing out some pretty huge brands on a regular basis these days. The article points specifically to 15 everyday brands that might not make it through 2009 alive without a divine intervention. Yikes.
Among those brands are some favorites such as Chrysler, Rite Aid, Six Flags, Trump Casinos, Sirius Satellite Radio…and even Krispy Kreme donuts! It’s hard to imagine big, successful companies like these are potentially going to cease to exist—especially after all the millions of dollars and thousands of hours invested in building their brands. We’ve seen it already with Circuit City, Aloha Airlines and Tweeter (not Twitter!).
But what happens to them when they die? In many cases they’re gone forever, destined to live on only as a Wikipedia page and a few bits of memorabilia for auction on Ebay. It’s pretty sad, really, when you consider that so much has been invested to build equity in the brand, only to have it turned to dust when the company shutters. Some really powerful brands (remember Nuprin, the little, yellow, different pill?) are lucky enough to be purchased by companies that specialize in nurturing legacy brands with the goal of bringing them back to life to capitalize on existing brand equity.
I was just thinking this morning about how I really wish there were a place (a blog, perhaps?) that both cataloged dead brands from the past as well as kept the public up to date about brands that are in peril. So far all I’ve been able to find is BrandLandUSA, but that’s not exactly what I was looking for. I’d love to have a resource – a catalog of sorts that would allow me to learn more about what happened in each case that contributed to the death. Kind of like Brand New, but the exact opposite. I don’t think it exists, so who wants to help me put it together?
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A Beautiful Wrench In The Works
Let’s say you work for a company that has a target audience that is spending a lot of time online and you want to reach these people. Where do you go? Logic says you’d try to find out where they’re spending the most time and purchase online ad space in the form of a banner or a box ad so that you can either build brand awareness or encourage them to click through to your site, depending on your marketing strategy.
Unfortunately with an advertising-rejecting society, also comes advertising-rejecting solutions. Ad blockers are among the most frequently adopted solutions, with the most popular, AdBlock Plus being downloaded over 18 MILLION times.
One of the newest, Add-Art, is one of the most exciting in my opinion and could pave the way for a whole new breed of customized ad-blockers. It’s a Firefox add-on that replaces banner advertising on sites with works of art by young contemporary artists, turning your Internet browser into an art gallery. I recommend the download.
So what are the advertisers to do? Well, they’ll have to get crafty and figure out other ways to engage their consumers without relying on the traditional interruptive form of advertising. Maybe they’ll be more apt to embrace social media.
Maybe some will even develop their own pop-up blocker programs that replace other advertisers’ ads with beautiful, artistic pictures of their product. Hmm, wouldn’t it be amazing if Porsche decided to make one? Now that’d be something I’d download in an instant. Just for giggles, we mocked up what it would look like above. ; ) Porsche, are you listening?
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