The Year Of Mobile?
I’ve been listening to technology pundits predict each new year to be the year of mobile for many years now. Some have written so many annual opinion pieces heralding “The Year Of Mobile” that it almost defies belief that they can still write about it with the same conviction. I might be forgiven for filtering this year’s predictions with a little skepticism, but also for pointing out that actually we have been moving ahead, year after year, with the adoption of mobile platforms and the increasing capability of those platforms and the networks that serve them. So, is it “The Year Of Mobile”? Or not?
Jared Reitzin, CEO, mobileStorm Inc., blogging on Mobile Marketing Watch, believes that it is now safe to say 2010 is the official year.
Blogger, ex-Forrester Research analyst and managing director of Dachis Group Peter Kim too blogs “2010: The Year of Mobile”.
Joe Marchese, president of socialvibe, says in his Mediapost.com “2010, The Year Of Mobile — Finally” saying in his piece that “2010 will be the year mobile marketing begins to realise the promise marketers have imagined for so long”.
Even The Times seems to concur that 2010 is “The Year Of The Mobile’ and quotes from December’s Morgan Stanley mobile Internet report, which says that “the mobile Internet is ramping faster than the desktop Internet did, and we believe more users may connect to the Internet via mobile devices rather than desktop PCs within 5 years”.
Peter Kim credits better mobile phone functionality, growing choice of applications and increasing access via 3G and Wi-Fi hotspots with helping to boost the value that consumers get out of their mobile platforms (and new opportunities for marketers). We happen to agree over here at Spot On. We’ve seen social media adoption ramp up in direct relation to the availability of broadband Internet and a decrease in cost of broadband services. And so it stands to reason that an upswing in mobile broadband and Wi-Fi access has got to be good for mobile Internet adoption and mobile marketing.
It’s no secret that the arrival of Apple’s iPhone two and half years ago really stirred up the smart phone market and, among other things, showed device manufacturers, developers and carriers how to make networked mobile applications appealing. Today, Apple, Google, Nokia, RIM and others are all focused on helping to create easier-to-use, more content rich mobile services platforms that have mass consumer appeal. Innovations like Google’s voice search for mobile, new applications based on location based services and m-commerce consumers services using barcodes all point to mobile phones playing an increasing pivotal role in our day-to-day lives.
There’s arguably no “Year Of Mobile”, but an ongoing trend that is changing the communication game. However, if 2010 is the year when we will come to recognise the need to bring that platform into our thinking as marketers, then perhaps it could be, at last, the year! As Peter Kim says, mobile is fast becoming another check box for integrated marketing. As with social media platforms, mobile is going be become increasingly important to marketing and the only decision that marketer’s need to make is when the time is right to go mobile. We’ve already decided and so you may already be reading this blog post on our mobile sitehttp://m.spotonpr.com
Some interesting links
2010: The Year of Mobile (Being Peter Kim)
2010, The Year Of Mobile — Finally (Mediapost)
2010 IS The Year of Mobile (Mobile Marketing Watch)
2010: the year of the mobile (The Times)
Tags: apps, broadband, Internet, marketing, Mobile, predictions, Spot On, spotonpr, VAS
