Insightful articles, opinion and commentary about mobile and web.

Published in Marketing: Monday 09 January 9, 2012

As you work out how to exploit mobile in 2012, you need to start by working out which relevant and compelling consumer problem you’re going to address and how it delivers a benefit to your business.

It’s also important to understand that mobile represents just one of the many consumer touch points that you need to serve as part of your overall marketing strategy. Mobile marketing should not be treated in isolation.

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Shopping data out of the US following the holiday weekend shows a country of frenzied consumers hitting the sales. For all the economic doldrums, Americans leapt into their Thanksgiving, Black Friday and Cyber Monday shopping ritual with real fervour this year.

While retail foot traffic was up and cash registers were merrily ringing, a big chunk of the shopping frenzy came from ecommerce sites. Given the consumer shift to mobile everything, not surprisingly shoppers using mobile devices like smartphones and iPads accounted for more of the purchases than ever before.

As part of its Smarter Commerce initiative, IBM released some interesting data on online spending over the holiday weekend. Its online retail benchmark study revealed that online Thanksgiving Day spending had jumped by more than 39%. Meanwhile Black Friday online sales increased by more than 24% compared to the same period last year.

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With online video consumption continuing to grow, HotHouse Account Director, Anthony Slater, talks to HotHouse’s online video specialist, Kate Ayrton, about the power of online video and how it presents marketers with a huge opportunity to engage consumers. The discussion looks at what marketers need to do to get active in this space and how to make the most of  the demand for richer, smarter and more interactive content.

 

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Alan Curson, Head of Copy at HotHouse, takes a look at how corporate speak is befouling the art of good copywriting.

It’s not swearing I object to. In fact, so long as it’s inventive, interesting or being done by someone bigger than me, I don’t mind it at all.

The bad language bringing me out in a rash, is the incessant, ‘corporate-jargo-speak’ infecting every written aspect of marketing communication.

For instance, when the bank wants to switch you to email statements, they don’t come out and say so. Instead, they tell you for your convenience as part of their ongoing commitment to enhance service offerings to valued customers, they have streamlined administration practices with a commitment to a targeted migration from paper-based communications to digitally focused information streaming, going forward. read more

Despite all the developments in open source technology and delivery, it’s a big step for a business to leave the familiarity of enterprise solutions and embrace the brave new world of open source.

It’s worth doing your homework so you understand what you’re getting yourself into. Not surprisingly, as an IT-driven movement, there are a lot of places on the web devoted to all things open source. Below are some interesting links if you want to know more.

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HotHouse founder Simon van Wyk talks to Peter O’Neill, CEO and founder of 2moro mobile, a mobile development consultancy based in Adelaide. Peter talks with Simon about the iPad phenomenon and why now is the time for marketers to come to grips with mobile applications and mobile sites.

Listen to the podcast below.

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By Simon van Wyk

In How Brands Grow, Byron Sharp writes that “The marketing world is extraordinarily complex, but textbooks fail us when they suggest that this complexity can never be mastered.”

He argues, however, that it’s possible to “come up with some simple rules for ‘branded competition for sales’ (i.e. competition to build a sales base with considerable lasting capability).” Here are his rules, based on empirical evidence:

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By Simon van Wyk

I highly recommend all marketers to read Byron Sharp’s book How Brands Grow check out my podcast with Byron here. His research-based approach to marketing principles is refreshing and challenges a lot of our existing thinking on marketing.

To whet your appetite, here is a selection of the most salient quotes from the book:

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By Simon van Wyk

One of the big buzz phrases in healthcare these days is “evidence-based medicine”. In a nutshell, it means relying on a combination of the best research evidence along with the experience doctors have treating patients as a way of achieving the best outcomes when diagnosing and managing illness.

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By Simon van Wyk

Following on from my last post on marketing case studies that are available online, there are a number of books you can buy if you want more detailed information and need to feel the heft of a book (or a Kindle) in your hand. Here’s a selection of the best-rated marketing case study tomes available on Amazon:

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