Who has heard this in a conversation, or brief, or spec before?
“We are targeting the youth market, so whatever we make needs to be cool”
The term itself is contradictory. More often than not, it is used by an ageing old school marketer, who thinks cool defines what ‘young people’ like.
I know so many different types of ‘cool’, which is why the term creates confusion.
Jude law is fucking cool. A good looking bloke, with good fashion sense, clearly got the chat, and he is minted. He is traditionally cool.
One of my very best friends is a whole different level of cool. His past jobs include “Medieval Jouster” and “Blackjack Croupier”. He knows the Countries song off by heart. He loves the Blues Brothers and does some of the strangest stand up comedy I have ever seen. He is in his own right ‘cool’, but is a mile away from being like Jude Law.
What I suppose I am trying to say, is trying to find the cool solution just won’t fly. Doing a Facebook fan page, creating an iPhone app or launching a Twitter feed doesn’t cut the cool mustard.
The fragmentation in the youth market is quite significant, but by changing the way we think about cool, we more often than not can identify an obvious solution amongst the foray of cool ideas.
Ladies and Gentlemen, welcome back once again to Mobsessed, the home for all you mobile nuts out there, for another round of the very best in mobile blogging. We have quite an eclectic mix of posts this week, covering a range of different topics, so here is the best for you to get your teeth into.
James Roswell over at The Fonecast writes about the Wholesale Application Community’s mission to take on Apple’s App store. Some big claims made, but with so many operators on board, I don’t doubt them at all! Check the post out here.
Foursquare goes from strength to strength almost every day, and as the number of users increases, making sure you conduct yourself in the correct fashion is important as not to a) embarass yourself, or b) reveal information you do not want to. Eric over at MobileSlate gives you an insight into the cardinal sins of Foursquare, many of which I expect some of you have already done!
Peggy Anne Salz interviews the brilliant Alan Moore about engagement marketing, and how mobile completely changes the way we should understand and conduct marketing communications. In this podcast, the common themes of permission and the relationship gap are explored in greater detail and offers a welcome change to the rest of the text only carnival submissions!
And last, but not least, in true Tomi style, is a lengthy yet captivating piece about understanding the smartphone market by Mr Ahonen. Tomi tackles many common questions and arguments discussed by the industry, and addresses them head on. Grab yourself a cup of tea and a few biscuits for this one!
So thats it, that your mobile reading for this week! I hope you enjoy it all, and please do not forget to share this with your peers
Next week is currently hostless, so if you would like to take up responsibility for the hundreth time, or make your carnival debut, be sure to get in touch with Peggy Anne Salz.
Oh god. I literally never thought this day would come (at least until iPad Mark II). Having watched the beautifully produced Flipboard video, I have found myself wanting an iPad! Flipboard is a social application which aggregates all of your social networking data into a digital magazine format. The execution looks sublime, with Facebook, Twitter, flickr and other feeds that are relevant to you, smoothly integrated into what looks like a wonderful user experience. One of my truly favourite examples to date of the convergence of mobile and social. Take a look for yourself.
In a time when HTML5, Augmented Reality and applications are being dissected by marketers in order to deliver communications to their audience, the oft overlooked art of ‘keeping it simple and relevant’ lies dormant. It waits, hoping that someone who recognises audiences do not need rich media or the latest technology to engage with the brand in question will come along and show just how bloody well it works.
Amongst the hype of the PR machine surrounding mobile applications and technology, NME/Blackberry have quietly launched a competition that could show some of the biggest businesses in the world how ‘mobile’ should be done. Working as a partnership, the competition gives the key demographic the chance to win a Blackberry handset, as well as tickets to an NME gig.
Now here is where it gets even more interesting! Although you can answer the question and submit your details online, you can also join the NME blackberry group on blackberry messenger to submit your answer. The Blackberry market share in the UK is already quite significant, and is no longer just the email enterprise phone for business executives. Facilitated by Blackberry messenger, the RIM brand is now becoming a real force in the 16-25 age range (a demographic shared by NME). So, what is to be learnt from this competition?
Incentivised – Using prizes that the consumer WANT to win, NME and Blackberry are able to collect rich audience data
Permission Granted - With all this data collected in mind, the question is still posed “Would you like to receive marketing…etc” in a clear format. So although being brands that their audience WANT to engage with, they still demonstrate respect for their consumers by asking their permission to continue the conversation
Natural Environment – The BBM element is a stroke of genius for two reasons. The first being the ‘environment’. With its rise in prominence in the youth market, Blackberry messenger (or BBM as it is known in short) exploits the prolific nature of SMS but in an instant messenger format (similar to that championed in the late 90′s/early 00′s by MSN messenger on the desktop). Because youths are participating regularly in this environment, it seems right that a brand should enter this space (with permission)!
Value Exchange - The Value exchange at face value here is obvious. Participants have the chance to win prizes that are relevant to their interests, and at the same time, NME/Blackberry suddenly have data to a very valuable target demographic. But the BBM element gives an EXTRA value add for NME/Blackberry. You see, by building a blackberry messenger group of NME fanatics, suddenly that is access to a massive group of opt-in consumers who own Blackberrys and love NME. You just cannot buy data that specific! And what is EVEN BETTER, is that BBM is free to use (on a data plan), so NME can deliver targeted, relevant marketing messages to opt-in consumers for a stupendously tiny cost!
Imagine if NME bring out a native Blackberry mobile application. Suddenly, rather than spend thousands trying to market it, they have the audience data ready and waiting to send to ONLY the people it is relevant too. Magic.
