Google vs. Yahoo - The Mobile Battle

Mobile seems to be on the tip of everyone tongue but personally, it's still a long while for adoption to kick in and usage to pick up by the masses.

Behaviour is very much task and scenario driven.

For example, how inclined are you to renew your road tax using your mobile?

You will do so only if:

1. It has expired and you need to renew it NOW before you drive off, paying with your credit card.

2. While having nothing to do, you remember you need to pay and you do it while waiting for your daughter's ballet lesson to be over (and just in case you forget later).

Take this scenario and apply it to your email, mobile entertainment and buying a pair of movie tickets at the last minute.

To use mobile services, there are basically main two scenarios:

1. On demand and time sensitive. (I need to do this NOW!)

2. To be entertained. (Watching the news on your mobile while on the train to work)

Barriers to usage:
I have a 50GB mobile data plan and I use my mobile for email, booking movies, watching YouTube to reading news from RSS feeds. The amount of data I chalk up, if not for my data plan hits almost SGD$1,000 per month. (Thanks to my plan, I only pay about SGD$20 per month!)

It's quite clear. The cost of data by the telecommunication providers.

Many users are still not on a data plan simply because they don't need one for work and most do have a habit of using their mobile to get information... yet.

Till the day comes where data cost is low, or bundled very well to ALL mobile users, it may take a while for many to hop on. The survey results by BuzzCity shows that mobile users are unable to 'calculate' the amount of data used, thus uncertain about additional costs to their phone bill. It's easier to measure time.

Google VS Yahoo

These internet giants have both launched a mobile application that runs their suite of services like email, photos and of course, search.

It's hard to say who will 'win' but my take is the one with the most functional features will win.

In my view, Google has what it takes. With Andriod, the first complete, open, and free mobile platform. This has set the stage for more applications and features driven by the community. As I mentioned in my earlier post on the music industry, demand is driven by the community. While Yahoo! claims to be an open application format, it's still not that 'open'.

Presentation wise, Yahoo! boast a well designed and colourful interface. Google on the other hand is plain, simple and faster simply because it's optimised for the mobile (knowing the limited resources on the mobile's hardware). I prefer Google on that aspect.

While we wait and see, mobile adoption may not take place so quickly. Let's give it another year. 2009 maybe?

Here's Google's Video:





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Cosplay, Mobile and Portal Mash up :)

We were at the NUS Digital Media Forum Series and I had the nice opportunity to share about the portal business and how businesses can leverage off a portal to connect with their customers.

I cited a recent initiative by Minitoons, a Singapore owned gift and lifestyle retail store and how they took a relevant route of building an online game platform to drive retail sales, brand awareness and create stickiness for the community. Fans and gamers can buy their characters at the retail outlets and also purchase 'spells' to put on their online 'friends and foes'. The website to check out would be Voodoominis.

Well, personally the highlight was a great presentation on 'Cosplay and Singaporean Fan Culture' by Dr. Thang Leng Leng and Dr. Elizabeth Maclachlan from NUS and "Social Networking and The Mobile Internet...." by Mr. Hisham Isa from Buzzcity.

Buzzcity recently did a survey in Africa, Asia, Eastern Europe, North America and Western Europe and the results were definitely interesting to further understand the behaviour of mobile users. You can view the report on the Buzzcity website.

Mobile is certainly an 'old yet new' market to explore. While telcos are grappling on how to drive usage of their mobile services, behaviourial adoption would be something that everyone needs to learn and study. The survey by Buzzcity is certainly a timely one.

Some snippets:
> Nearly all (91%) members access the site and the mobile internet primarily via their mobile, most are not actually on the move when they log in, with an average 80% accessing the site while at home, at work or at a desk.

> The most cited reason for logging on to myGamma was to communicate with friends, with 75% wanting to "meet" their friends in the chat rooms, take part in networking activities or leave messages for one another.

> 35% of members have made a purchase online, with South Africans and Thais being particularly prolific buyers

Interesting stuff that companies can leverage from.

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The Changing Music Industry...

"In America, according to Nielsen SoundScan, the volume of physical albums sold dropped by 19% in 2007 from the year before—faster than anyone had expected. For the first half of 2007, sales of music on CD and other physical formats fell by 6% in Britain, by 9% in Japan, France and Spain, by 12% in Italy, 14% in Australia and 21% in Canada. (Sales were flat in Germany.) Paid digital downloads grew rapidly, but did not begin to make up for the loss of revenue from CDs. More worryingly for the industry, the growth of digital downloads appears to be slowing." - Quote taken from 'The Economist' -

... and yet Motorola has acquired Singapore's Soundbuzz and Nokia has recently signed a deal with Universal to offer music to handsets set to go on sale in 2008. A sign that music itself is set to get people thinking.

"Will they succeed?"

Online music boutiques are plenty, digital stations that play 'free to web' and 'free to phone' music are everywhere. Some are pretty decent too.

The rules of engagement has changed.

It's time to take the music to the people...by the music community.

The Arctic Monkeys got their break on MySpace and built an incredible fan base. This brings up the question of 'Who needs a record label?'. Sure labels help with the legal stuff, marketing, a budget for tours etc. But really, these guys have done it pretty much by themselves.

It was the community and fans that gave them the publicity they deserved. No one else. We also hear that Radiohead has recently dumped their record label.

So if you're a budding musician who has TALENT. Why not get recognised for your hard work aand remove the costs of everything else (the cost ultimately gets passed on to people buying your CDs - your fans).

Sell your music online, create a fan-base, stream live 'concerts' from your bedroom (or garage), send your music to the radio stations and just rock on.

There will be other things to consider like legalities, prevention of piracy, licenses etc...which you may need help on.

BUT what I am saying is the lines for a record label is going to blur. Soon, industry players like Nokia, Apple, Sony Ericsson and Motorola can (and will?) take that as part of their business.

Just like how Motorola has with Soundbuzz and Nokia with Universal.

In the club music scene, BeatPort has certainly got it going with avid dance music lovers and DJs buying their music online.

It is apparent that the music industry is moving on the bottom up approach (community) rather than the top down approach (music labels etc).

Food for thought....Music labels, it's time to do some serious thinking!



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Do you need a Facebook strategy?

Facebook (sick of hearing this word? Yes, Facebook fatigue may be setting in). It's huge and everyone is talking about it. PR firms are now getting their clients on the 'new media' space and going 'viral'. (Well, so they claim perhaps?)

Millions on board, 50% logging in daily. A marketers playground.

Well, if you're now thinking of jumping on the bandwagon and get millions of 'join this group' sign ups, think again...carefully.

It's already saturated with applications, businesses are already on, and Channelnewsasia did a story on 20th Jan 08 on prime time TV).

Registration is free and well, applications are open to all developers. So, how do you leverage of this exciting social media platform?

Within a span of weeks, the ball game has changed. During the early Facebook days (now that isn't too long ago), it was much easier. As saturation peeks in, chances of an eyeball is going to be hard.

The way I see it, you now need a strategy just for Facebook alone. Look, National University of Singapore (NUS) now has a course on Facebook.

My take is integrating Facebook as part of your online / 'drive to web' marketing strategy. Announce it on your portal or website, use PR as a tool to get noticed and integrate it as part of the overall package.

Be novel with your Facebook applications. Gun for that 'killer application' that is addictive, relevant and fun. Avoid being 'spammy'.

Building a community on Facebook may be easier now that behaviour has set in. Look for opinion leaders, garner the online evangelists for your company and work bottom up.

It's the community that drives it these days.

You just can't avoid social media.