Denuology: The Observation and Observations of Denuo. » mstory

Location-Based App Report Card

mstory — Tue, 01 Jun 2010 16:05:37 +0000

After a nice long Memorial Day weekend ushered in the summer, students across the country are taking that last set of finals in hopes of maintaining good grades or bumping up those so-so grades. With the spirit of report cards in the air, I thought it was a good time to give out a report card of sorts to the latest social media/mobile/application craze, location-based apps.

In lieu of grades, I’m taking a more general approach of commenting on: The Good, The Bad, and My Wish. Now bring on the judgment.

BrightKite
The Good: It brings wide range of social media features (e.g. post comments, privacy options, direct messages) to the basic check-in play. These features make for the best ability to communicate one-to-one of the competitive set.
The Bad: Doesn’t provide any addictive features that require you to come back (e.g. badges, points).
My Wish: More friends would join the service to leverage the social features.

FourSquare
The Good: A PR machine at this point. In addition to the badge and mayorship hording, developers are beginning to develop third party applications (e.g. Meet Gatsby) for the teacher’s pet of the category which is always a good sign. Major advertisers (e.g. Starbucks) are “checking-in” to the experience as well. Mayorships actually beginning to mean something in the real world. The most genius feature may be “Off-the-Grid” option which protects privacy which is the largest concern with these apps.
The Bad: With reportedly more than 15,000 people joining daily, the service has seen recent hiccups which is similar to the growing pains experienced by other social media upstarts. These hiccups are felt more so with FourSquare because mayorships and badges are at stake.
My Wish: The points/leaderboard would be fixed to actually mean something. A big opportunity to play up game angle here.

Gowalla
The Good: The GUI is beautiful (e.g. visual representation of venues/locations visited via passport). Collecting/Dropping items make for tough decisions but fun to follow the history of items. Trips are a great way to drive user behavior. Similar to FourSquare, partnerships (e.g. National Geographic and The Washington Post) have been smart and well thought out.
The Bad: The GPS tends to get wonky making the experience painful. Adding locations without using addresses can lead to many duplicates depending on the venue type. The notifications can become overwhelming at times depending on how long you go between log-ins.
My Wish: The ability to swap items with friends or even create my own item.

MyTown
The Good: A true game built around check-ins. It requires actual strategy when selecting which venues to own. The addictive features of collecting rent and daily scratch-offs that yield you points and cash.
The Bad: The game overshadows the actual location-based features and doesn’t really change over time.
My Wish: As a gamer at heart, application available on more platforms than just iPhone. Android please!?!

PlacePop
The Good: Provides overall status awards for the individual places users frequents. Elegantly simple userface that populates twitter and Yelp! feeds for places. PlacePop is stripped down to basic check-in functions, minimizing the gaming aspects. Ability to follow others without friending (could be seen as a bad thing as well).
The Bad: A large amount of emails with updates and suggesting people to follow.
My Wish: The ability to add new places. More platforms than just iPhone.

SCVNGR
The Good: Great interface that incorporates point system (for besting your friends on the leaderboard) that goes past the typical check-in. The use of a status line and pictures keeps you engaged and treks hint at the potential of never-ending real world scavenger hunts.
The Bad: Majority of places are not populated in the listings and it appears the simple dump of google listings (leveraged by competitors) was skipped. It currently lacks a web experience to compliment the mobile on-the-go fun. Adding friends is nearly impossible and requires significant effort which makes the “sharing is caring” potential limited at best.
My Wish: There were more differentiations between a general status update and a tip that would be useful to the community. There is potential to reward additional points for useful tips rated by the community.

Yelp
The Good: Built on top of a well established experience. Obviously extensive user submitted information, recommendations, and built in audience.
The Bad: Built on top of a well established experience. It feels very much like a me-too after thought.
My Wish: Bubble up the check-ins to a larger emphasis for the app.

Those apps receiving incompletes due to limited exposure or audiences: Loopt, Societies, and Whrrl.

The entire landscape could be turned upside down when Facebook makes its highly anticipated entry into this space. With the largest digital footprint, Facebook seems like it has the opportunity to lead the market from day one. As a location-based application fanboy, I’ll be watching closely to see what apps make the necessary changes to move to the front of the class as others get held back or worse yet drop out all together.

Special Thanks (I’d give them a badge if I had one to give) to @SK_All_Day and @iiiTheWizardiii for their help in gathering details for this post.

The Good Ole Sneaker Days

mstory — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 17:47:17 +0000

Fellow sneaker heads, we are not a secret society.

There is a group of us out there that agree there are few feelings better than scooping an exclusive pair of your favorite sneakers (whether that’s Air Max 95s, Jordan Vs, or Dunks in my case). There are numerous sneaker shops throughout the country (and abroad – don’t sleep) that are always good for that unexpected gem that completes your collection (until you come back next time) and leaves you on cloud nine with a reward for your sneaker sleuth skills.

Unfortunately, technology and innovation are ruining that euphoric feeling for me. Whether it’s the traditional email/newsletter or the constantly growing social media landscape, shoe companies are making it tougher to get my hands on their exclusive goodies. A culture once dominated by word of mouth is now fully embracing the tools of the digital word of mouth landscape. Woot for them. FML for me.

As a self-described brand loyalist, I’ll reference the few examples I’ve run into with the only two sneaker brands to grace my feet: Creative Recreation and Nike.

As an up and coming brand, Creative Recreation leverages the traditional email/CRM approach to notify me that I can get my hands on their latest looks. A brand built on unique colors and texture combinations is great for getting that “Where did you get those?” from fellow sneaker-lovers, but that opportunity becomes far and few when they are delivering that same combination to everyone’s inbox. Not to mention the semi-regular offer for 20-60% off of the purchase to sweeten the deal. They make great use of their CRM program with only valuable communications tailored specificly to me (and anyone else clever enough to sign up).

On the other side of the spectrum, the established and loved sneaker giant, Nike, uses Facebook and Twitter across all their categories and regions. Where I was once able to get a heads up from the local sneaker pusher (aka: sales associate) on new shipments, they are now distributing this same type of “insider” information through the digital megaphone known as the internet. The result is longer lines for those limited edition Kobe Vs or, even worse, seeing other feet in my “rare” Air Max 90s. When not engaging in sport conversations, Nike does an exceptional job of giving me relevant “content” for my sneaker-addiction via my social feed of choice.

These brands (and their competition) are doing what every brand wants to do: take trusted 1-to-1 conversations and make them many- to-many conversations thanks to social tools. It doesn’t hurt (them) that these conversations are directly tied to purchasing their products. The (personal) downside for those of us previously in the inner circle is that our group just went from VIP to P.

And I just realized by writing this I’ve just made it even harder on myself to keep that exclusive leg up. SMH.

Brand Sites Are No Longer the Digital Thoroughbred

mstory — Tue, 13 Apr 2010 15:15:14 +0000

For the non-degenerate gamblers out there, the 136th Kentucky Derby will take place on May 1, 2010. Whether you follow the sport for financial reasons or the amazing (and over-the-top) outfits/hats, the Kentucky Derby is truly a spectacular sporting event.

However behind all the glitz and glamour of the event, there are difficult decisions concerning the horses that fall to injury throughout the season. With no other options, many owners are forced to have their horses euthanized.

While this is a regular occurrence in horse racing, are there similarities in the digital advertising world? Are brands running out of options with their work horse, the brand web site?

The digital revolution (cue dramatic music) has seen the brand site play the central role across all types of executions. It started as the last minute add of a URL tag to traditional marketing platforms that grew to driving me to your (hopefully) engaging branded oasis of product information and campaign extensions. We even saw the “build a micro-site for that” fad that brought us a number of one-off entertaining sites (Admit it. You played with the Subservient Chicken).

So why should brands consider retiring the beloved brand site? The answers to the following questions could make the decision necessary:

• Do I ever leave Facebook/Social Media?

Many brands have given in to this shift by replacing BrandX.com with Facebook.com/BrandX. Recognizing Facebook as the “King of Web”, brands have moved traffic to their fan page. The thinking is I am more likely to check out a brand within the comfy confines of FB (vs. clicking out to a new page) because I remain a click away from those all important status updates and constant mobile photo uploads (You know who you are).

• How much longer will I actually use web browsers?

With a quick peruse of the industry headlines, it appears the major players (Apple, Google, Microsoft) are planning for an eventual browser-less future. They may not agree on the approach but they are all positioning for a digital environment not limited to browsers as the only window to internet. Apple’s announcement of iAds is a great example of next generation advertising not designed to drive me to a site but instead engage me within the native media environment. Even Twitter acquiring mobile darling Tweetie (Isn’t it just fun to say?) hints at filling the gap for my tweeting when not using a browser.

• Can a non-entertainment brand win me in the content game?

It is a battle that every brand has had to consider entering. Some battles have been won but over time the war is usually lost for non-entertainment brands. With the proliferation (Buzz Word Bingo!) of content providers and distribution platforms, the lure of “exclusive” content on your branded site tends be a futile attempt at engaging me. Holding content hostage on a brand site in the current environment of digital consumption will hurt the brand before I ever feel the pain of missing out on content.

It will be difficult for some brands to say good bye to their “money maker”. However, they can look forward to utilizing “up and comers” whether they are in social media, applications, content-partnerships or entirely new opportunities. The chance to effectively engage me (and other consumers for that matter) will present itself through these new work horses in ways the brand site never could have imagined. With that in mind, now I’m going back to my Kentucky Derby research.

Marketing’s Future in Fantasy

mstory — Tue, 02 Feb 2010 20:34:07 +0000

After being presented with the opportunity to take a trip to Las Vegas to talk with fantasy sports experts, I realized life can truly be too good at times. I had no idea this “fantasy” trip would also give me insight into the future of fantasy sports. Those same experts showed me that the industry 27 million consumers spend countless hours enjoying is preparing to go into many interesting directions in the future. Because of this fact, I recommend marketers get in the game (poor pun intended) sooner than later.

I had the pleasure of speaking at Fantasy Sports Trade Association’s 2010 Winter Business Conference last week. For those not familiar, the FSTA provides a forum for interaction between the hundreds of existing and emerging companies across the fantasy sports industry. My specific discussion revolved around the opportunity for advertising in the fantasy sports industry but the true insight for advertisers came from the many conversations held following the panel.

In an effort to focus on the key learnings while not revealing highly confidential information shared, I want to share three general areas where fantasy sports are headed that will matter to marketers much sooner than later.

FANTASY GOES CASUAL

Similar to what has happened in the gaming space over the past few years, fantasy sports are looking to the appeal of a more casual consumer to drive growth and business results. Many of those present at the conference talked about the opportunity to reach the non-hardcore fantasy player through simplifying game features, removing the amount of research needed to participate, and eliminating the frequent updates. All of these things don’t appeal to those mulling over stats to set fantasy NBA rosters every day. However, for the fan turned off by the significant learning curve, it could be that push needed to take the pool of players from 27 million to 50 million in a short amount of time.

FANTASY GOES HARDCORE

While many are looking to go for a broader audience, some of the more innovative players in the fantasy sports industry are looking to provide a deeper experience to the hardcore fans based on the most addictive aspects of the game. Currently they are exploring premium pricing models to bring these features to life, but there is obviously an advertising opportunity to bring these to fantasy leagues and players. While the numbers won’t quite be impressive as a reach mechanism, the level of engagement with the core players will definitely be desirable to many marketers.

FANTASY COMES TO YOUR LIVING ROOM

This is actually more of a reactionary trend thanks to the success of the new television show, The League. As media sees the opportunity within fantasy sports, many companies are developing new ways to bring fantasy directly to the living room and its devices. In the near future, fantasy sports will not be limited to your browser on the laptop. With the introduction to the living room, advertising opportunities only become more attractive.

If one of these (or all three) takes off, there are exciting changes coming to fantasy sports that will ultimately extend the engagement and reach of this fast growing industry. It will no longer only be a favorite past time reserved for Tuesday morning water cooler conversations. There are actually no limits to the changes that the industry could undergo. However the one thing that won’t change is the opportunity for me to continue losing future fantasy pools against fellow Denuologists.

Am I a Peeping Tom?

mstory — Fri, 10 Apr 2009 22:14:27 +0000

I have spent my entire life being told the term “Peeping Tom” carried both serious and negative connotations. Because of that, I instantly think of some dirt bag guy in the bushes taking a gander into an unsuspecting victim’s window. It is the reason I will never occupy an apartment/condo on the first floor or in direct line of sight with office buildings. Every so often, I even hear news coverage of police catching these curious fellows, which confirms their existence. Because of these thoughts, we as society have agreed that “peeping” is not a socially acceptable habit. Unfortunately, I’ve recently come to the conclusion that I may be a Peeping Tom or at least a virtual version.

How can you not peep with all of today’s technology making it so easy? Whether it be following friends on facebook, reading celebrity gossip sites, or receiving tweets from complete strangers, I spend most of the day peeping into someone’s life. Granted I don’t think of it in the traditional dirt bag manner of the original Peeping Toms but my behavior (and I’m sure I’m not the only one) is not all that different besides being done over the internet and the fact that no nudity is involved with my peeping. (Sidenote: Never thought I’d get to write a those words. Go ahead and check that off the bucket list.)

There are a number of examples that not only encourage peeping but also prove that society may not frown on it after all.

- Xbox.com/Xbox Live – Allows you to track what games your friends are playing, how long they are playing, and whether or not they beat the game like the bragged about at lunch.

- Facebook’s latest UI – The site dedicated to all of us peepers out there just made it even easier to peep.

- Zappos Order Map (http://www.zappos.com/map/) – Following anonymous online purchases and their destinations is definitely in the dictionary under “peeping.”

- Tweetdeck – Not only can you follow the tweets of Shaq but you can now integrate your real friends’ status updates on Facebook. I call this “Killing two peepings with one stone.”

- Omegle – It goes a little further than a peep but you do get to dive into a complete stranger’s life through random conversation.

As many of these increases in popularity, the peeping bug will continue to grow. Actually as you sit here and read this post, you are peeping into the life of Denuo. However, the Peeping Tom name may never lose the bad perception so we might need a new title for the virtual counterpart.