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Communication of the Social Message: Tips for Business

04/10/2013 by

For every brand, it’s important to think about public perception. How the public, your customers, thinks and feels about your company is vital for maintaining a competitive edge. Companies make impressions through their corporate message and how it’s delivered. As your organization grows, and you add talented players to your team, it becomes increasingly important to ensure that every member of your staff is on the same page. The last thing you want is for a team member to send out a Tweet or status update that’s completely at odds with your company’s overarching social message.

It’s also important to realize that your message may experience some shifts throughout the course of your company’s life. Every company needs technology to help keep everyone up to speed on your company’s branding message. In this post, we’ll discuss some of the resources and tools companies of all sizes should consider and implement.

Tools for Unifying Your Message

—     Collaboration Tools: Collaboration is the lifeblood of the modern business structure. With tools like hosted SharePoint services, companies of all types can stay connected in real time with employees. This is one of the most effective ways to keep everyone up to speed on branding. In most cases, if your employees are engaged with your collaboration platform, it’s easy to disseminate information in a way that is both non-intrusive and easy to access.

—     Cloud Data Access: Another similar way to deliver this information is through an integrated cloud storage service. Not unlike your collaboration tool, a cloud storage platform is a seamless way to deliver complex branding information in an easy-to-access package. While some companies are still wary of the cloud, studies indicate that more businesses are experiencing both the financial and logistical benefits of implementing cloud resources.

—     Virtualization Infrastructure: Regardless of what platform you use to deliver sensitive branding data to your staff, every company needs a powerful infrastructure to make branding data easily accessible for everyone. The problem many SMBs are facing relates to infrastructure itself. Smaller businesses often don’t have the financial resources to integrate and manage a dedicated server to deploy and manage complex branding and messaging information. This is why many SMBs are migrating to virtualized infrastructure solutions like virtual private server technology, which gives you the control and computing power of the cloud without costing what an entire cloud platform would.

Branding Communication is Serious Business

Keeping your team up to speed on your overall social message is no easy task. Not only is it difficult logistically, but you’ll come up against employees that disagree with how you approach your branding. It’s crucial to maintain dialogue about branding processes with your employees. If your employees weren’t on staff, they would be potential customers, so their feedback is valuable. The fact that not everyone is in the same geographic location can muffle this communication. Again, having powerful collaboration and cloud storage tools can serve as the proper remedy.

Filed Under: Social Media, Strategy & Business Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Designing for Social Engagement

03/21/2013 by

Businesses invested in social media are aware of the benefits it can deliver. While social media is a long-term investment focused on increasing brand visibility and recognition through consumer engagement and relationship building, it can pay out enormous dividends over time. A social presence is particularly useful when your website is publishing original content with value to your consumer base.

By creating content designed for social sharing, you can essentially turn a normal blog post into productive inroads with prospective customers, using a shared link to bring new traffic to your website. From there, you have the opportunity to produce a conversion — but only if you have a well-developed website waiting on the other end of the link. I repeat, if there’s no ill web design waiting for users who click through, they’ll bounce faster than the king of the four square courts. Whether you do it yourself or hire some professional Web designers, make sure it looks good!

Ultimately, social media can become another conversion and revenue stream if you use smart development strategy at every point. Read on for tips to make sure your online strategy is aligned to maximize social opportunities.

Creating content worth sharing

Developing a social brand should be the first focus of any company. In the early stages, you don’t need to worry about creating phenomenal, mind-blowing content as long as you keep the quality high and consistent. Instead, start cultivating followings on major social networks, such as Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram and Pinterest, to create a broad base of followers.

Once that base is established, work on increasing the uniqueness and quality of your content. Whether you offer whitepapers, blogs or static Web pages, the things you produce need to be relevant and useful to your consumers in ways that point to the value of your business. These aren’t explicit marketing materials, but they all need to relate to your company’s mission and your value to prospective customers.

As you develop your following and people consume your content, you’ll see more people sharing your content with others. Not only is social sharing a high-exposure, low-cost form of marketing, but it’s a great way to gauge what content is most valuable to your followers.

From content consumer to product consumer

By sharing your website’s content online, you’ll draw followers to your website. When that happens, they become social referrals and potential sales or lead conversions. That’s where your website comes in. As your content is making a case for your company’s value to the consumer, your website should make it easy for them to identify and enter the conversion process.

To do this, you need a simplified Web design that makes your marketing mission clear. Your site’s various links and images need to be simplified so they aren’t distracting — you want consumers to immediately recognize where and how to begin the conversion process. If you can get online referrals this far down the funnel, you’ve got a good chance at securing a conversion.

Efficiency in the conversion process

Once in the conversion process, the trick is in seeing consumers through to the conversion’s completion. This is an efficiency game you have to play well to maximize your opportunities. Online consumers are deterred by seemingly insignificant obstacles. Every line of data you request — address, phone number or email — decreases the odds of potential customers completing the process.

Similarly, every step in the process — every time they have to click “next” or wait for processing to take place — gives them a chance to reconsider their purchase. The more you condense steps and minimize workload, the better. The proof is in the numbers: the easier you make the process, the more conversions you’ll accrue.

By optimizing every point in the consumer process, you can increase the efficiency of your website. From there, focus on creating worthwhile content that engages your consumers. The more useful and worthwhile your content, the more social shares — and, ultimately, referred traffic — you’ll generate from this rich resource.

Filed Under: Social Media, Strategy & Business Tagged With: , , , , ,

How to Create a Business Model

11/19/2012 by

Think of your business model as a football playbook, as a way to implement
and execute your plan of success. The touchdown is your revenue. As the coach
(or small business owner), your job is to sift through the variety of ways
that will show how you are going to achieve your ultimate goal. By “drawing out”
your plan of action, you are simply showing how you will implement your
plans and what outcome is anticipated.
The purpose of a business model is to let others know about your product, the
value it brings to your target market, who that target market is, how you will
compete with similar companies in the same market, and how you will make money
using all of these components. Once you know the components of your business model,
structuring it will be easier to do, but first you need to know what type of
business model you should be looking at. This will be completely dependent on the
product or service you are providing and what you ultimately decide to do with the business

Though there are many different business models to consider, a basic structure
of a business model is a good place to start. Knowing how you will get your product
or service to the end user or customer will give you an idea how to choose the model
best suited for you. For small business owners in this day of technology, creating
a business model that will include social media is a key point for any market.

Traditional business models for example would include:1) direct marketing to customer
(think Dell), 2) retailers or sell to distributor and allow them to sell it for you,
3) exclusivity (rights to certain distributors only, such as music), 4) franchise and
5) advertisers (that sell ads for others). New business models are emerging with the
expanding technology of online. You will do well to utilize the social media platforms,
blogs, websites, content marketing, email blasts, and SEO.

 

Companies like Amazon, EBay, and Dell have captured the online
market with their business model. Some of their components allow the customer freedom
to shop whenever they please and have their items shipped straight to their home.
However, brick and mortar companies, such as Wal-Mart and Best Buy have amended their
business models to give customers the convenience of online shopping capabilities
combined with the ability to same day pick up.

 

So how do you draw out the business model once you’ve finalized your final draft?
Consider using PowerPoint or Google Docs for creating your model. Both
provide the tools you need to create professional looking business model designs.

 

An example of a simple business model created in PowerPoint:

 

 

As you can see, a business model can be as simple or as complex as you like.
Just keep in mind that the most important points of your business model should
be included. If your business is going to place the focus online, include that
as a point. Do not confuse a business model and a business plan. A business
plan is far more detailed and complicated than your basic model. Remember, your
business model is only to represent your plan of action, a visual of your ideas
and the ultimate goal in a simpler way.


Ryan Franklin is a guest blogger who writes about small business issues and technology on behalf of Ordoro.

Filed Under: Contributors, Featured, Strategy & Business Tagged With: , , , , , ,

Mobile OS in Alliance with Social Media

10/04/2012 by

Feature phones… you probably know a few folks that have them, right? In the world of mobile devices, let’s break it down. HTC leads the pack in innovative smartphone coding, Apple takes notes and improves, Samsung copies those notes and Nokia is nowhere to be found. But not so fast. Feature phones may not be all the rage in America, but globally a significant portion of the population still uses them.

Should you try to optimize your mobile plan for feature phones? That all depends on who’s buying your product or, even better, to whom you would like to sell your product or service. The secret to success is hidden within your target market. Getting to know the demographics of feature phone users will be the first step.

Does anyone use feature phones these days?

In the United States, asking after feature phones’ success seems like a reasonable question. Mobile companies practically give them away if you sign up for one of their data plans. But according to a comScore data release on September 14, half of the U.S. market still uses feature phones, and over one-third of the mobile phone purchases in July were feature phones. These purchases are typically starter phones. If you’re marketing to first-time mobile device consumers, you can bet that the percentage exceeds 50 percent of feature phone users. To demonstrate potential target markets for feature phones, statistics on feature phone purchases in the second quarter of 2012 significantly jumped in the 13-17 age bracket. The largest portion of feature phone users is the 65+ age bracket, but purchases have slightly decreased in the second quarter. A majority of smartphone users are found in the 25-64 age brackets.

New global horizons and feature phones

Although the feature phone use in the U.S. is starting to point to the fringe of consumers, that’s not so on the international platform. With 5.3 billion mobile subscribers, 3.8 billion mobile users live in developing countries:

  • Asia Pacific accounts for a ratio of 603:115 feature phone to Smartphone users
  • Africa is the largest growing sector with a ratio of 172:37.
  • Latin America is the smallest portion of mobile users, but still shows a ratio of 139:28 in favor of feature phones.

If you want to target these feature phone users, explore SMS messaging. We aren’t talking about loyalty programs or coupon codes. Many feature phones substitute SMS messaging for a WiFi connection. Large companies like Foursquare, Cha-Cha, Paypal, Google, Twitter, Facebook, Tumblr and RSS feeds all have SMS applications.

Although you don’t have the full functionality of a smartphone, you can still use many of the same features a smartphone possesses through SMS applications. The good news is these third-party proprietary operating systems such as Java or BREW have increased their power to integrate with more features on mobile devices. Companies such as Saya! are banking on it by integrating many of the same smartphone features into a feature phone. The Java-based operating system allows the end user to access social media applications through an SMS plan that costs less than $.01 per month.

Earlier, we wondered where Nokia was hiding. Guess what? We just found them. The company is aggressively targeting regions like India, Indonesia and Africa where countries aren’t able to support the infrastructure required by smartphones. That also means that there is no competition with the cost-prohibitive iPhone or Droid. As the feature phone becomes accessible to developing countries, social media marketing for feature phones still plays an integral part in mobile marketing and we can expect new levels of sophistication to arise.

Filed Under: Social Media, Strategy & Business Tagged With: , , ,

Simplify your Business with Digital Tools

08/02/2012 by

Online tools and apps make productivity a breeze for employees at all levels and can even make the workplace more appealing to employees. When it comes to HR, automating workflows and tasks not only frees up your precious time, it allows employees to access the information they need to know when they need it. From remote access to a quick workday question, digital employees can navigate quickly to the info they need.

Many of these tools are easy to roll out and don’t require extensive employee training, so you can add them into your routine without slowing down. Apps to consider implementing in your workplace include:

  • Online payroll systems – including online check stubs and direct deposits
  • Time management software – such as PTO request forms or project management software
  • Knowledge management tools – such as such as workplace command structure charts and knowledge banks or FAQs

Productivity Benefits
When employees can access their information in one place, they’re less likely to hunt and peck around the website, wasting time, or to need to ask colleagues how to do something. They know where to go for HR resources, software training and scheduling. Side benefits of adding tech tools include opening up the organization to transparency and removing location-based barriers to cooperation between colleagues on different floors or in different departments.

Working Smarter
Tools help employees work smarter by removing barriers. Collaboration is hindered when you need to call or walk upstairs to get feedback. When you can chat with a coworker or write on an internal forum, you save time. Plus, it lets you pose your question or give an answer even if the person isn’t available at that moment, giving you a kind of asynchronous communication system. If your organization relies on teamwork to push ahead, consider adding collaborative tools so that employees have more ways to engage one another. Digital resources that complement one another are easy to access and promote smarter working.

Increasing Connection
As you add tools that allow workers to access payroll, calendar and time management apps remotely, your employees may feel a closer connection to the workplace. Someone who completes a quick online form then receives immediate confirmation it was received–or, better yet, a personalized email from HR noting their time off request, within 15 minutes of receipt–will feel more cared for than the same employee who submitted a paper request and waited days. That connection allows employees who share a project vision in a digital environment to connect in person.

Innovative Intranets
Intranets should be the communication hub for your business, connecting employees to the spokes at the point of need. Tools that innovate intranets promote business needs while allowing a social component that fosters closeness and collaboration. Intranets should offer organizational structure and knowledge to ground new employees and refresh veterans; they should also be responsively designed to grow with the company, not hold up change.

Complement Existing Communication
These new tools should augment workflow and business communication; they are not meant to replace existing communication options. Maintain a culture of openness by reassuring employees that your door is still open to discuss HR concerns, or holding weekly check-ins. Tech channels just offer other options that may be more convenient.

When incorporating digital tools, ask your most tech-savvy employees for recommendations of what they’d like to see. Making them your biggest ally can help get everyone on board when it comes to using these tools.

Filed Under: Contributors, Strategy & Business, Technology Tagged With: , , , , ,

Social Media Conferences: Coming Together to Enhance Communication

07/26/2012 by

Social media is all about communication across a distance. This Internet-aided communication makes it easy for individuals to reach out, keep up on current events and acquire insight into the thoughts and ideas of others. While communication—thanks at least in part to social media—no longer requires coming together physically, many real-world conferences specifically pertaining to this topic are popping up around the country.

Such conferences—many of which are located in Chicago—allow social media users to come together face to face, perhaps enhancing the connections they’ve cultivated online and offering an opportunity for those who value social media to learn more about it and provide input on how it will continue to evolve into the future.

Face-to-Face Interaction

While some contend that the point of social media is to eliminate the need for face-to-face communication, others would argue that social media is in fact only another layer in the modern, multi-faceted system of interaction of which we are all a part. These advocates of communication across multiple channels would argue that connecting via social media alone isn’t sufficient to develop complex relationships and solve problems or reach a consensus for change. By coming together at physical locations, these lovers of—or capitalizers on—social media can add complexity to their interactions, enhance their understanding of the opportunities that social media affords and have a more lasting impact on the development of these channels.

What’s There to Learn

Using social media is generally intuitive, as designers of these online communication platforms aim to make it easy for users to teach themselves to use these tools. Knowing how to take advantages of all the opportunities that social media affords isn’t as simple, however. Through conferences like the Saint Xavier University Conference in Chicago, social media users can receive training in how to effectively utilize all the tools of social media as a communication and advertisement platform.

Such information could prove particularly useful to business leaders trying to use social media as a way to promote their products or services. Any time individuals of like interests converge in one place, the opportunity for networking also presents itself. At the SXU conference, as with other social media conferences, those with social media skills can network with those looking to use social media more effectively, exchanging ideas and potentially trading services.

Location, Location, Location

The Midwest provides an ideal location for conferences on social media; the centralized location makes it convenient for the maximum number of attendees. Unlike a conference on one of the coasts, which would be difficult for those from the opposite side of the country to attend, this Midwest locale isn’t as out-of-the-way for attendees.

As an additional bonus, Chicago offers much for visitors to see, ensuring that, even if the conference doesn’t meet their expectations, they aren’t sorely disappointed by their trip. From the Navy Pierto the Chicago Cultural center, there’s som

Social Media Conference at Harvard

ething to suit anyone’s fancy in this metropolis. With numerous well-appointed Chicago hotels, visitors will spend their time in the city in comfort and relaxation.

Since its eruption on the communication scene, social media has only continued to grow as a Web presence. Because of the pervasiveness of this communication medium, individuals in business—or just those with a refined desire to use and understand this sometimes-complex communication form—are remiss not to take advantage of the learning opportunities, including social media conferences, available to them.

 

Filed Under: Social Media, Strategy & Business Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

Can Social Media Really Work for B2B?

07/09/2012 by

Right now, social media is right at the fashionable heart of marketing. You can’t move for tips and advice on how to utilize this most exciting of play-things, and all of the time the biggest brands are falling over each other to saturate the likes of Twitter and Facebook with their advertising message.

For the B2B marketer however, it can feel like sitting outside the door of a party that you haven’t been invited to. Sure you can hear the sounds of everybody inside having a great time, but you are left wondering how to score a ticket to this most exciting of marketing experiences.

Social media has always been a tough nut to crack for B2B, with the very nature of individuals sharing their likes and dislikes not always feeling very compatible with the world of marketing databases and corporate gifts.

Social networks are where people go to gush about their favorite brands or show off to their friends about the latest cool thing they have bought, and this can leave the B2B marketer scratching their head and wondering what is in it for them.

So brace yourself for some more advice, as we explore what is in it for the B2B marketer, and how they can reap the benefits of the social media world.

Just One Question

Whoever you market to, whether it’s individual consumers or businesses, you should always ask yourself the most fundamental of questions, why do you want to utilize social media marketing? There is only one correct answer, “because that’s where my audience is”.
The answer to this question will dictate everything for you going forward. It will help you to decide which, if any, of the social networks you should be targeting. It will help to dictate your message, your tone, your strategy, whether you are trying to sell to people, whether you are trying to brand build, everything comes down to where your audience are and what they are doing when they are there.
Don’t get drawn into the “fad” aspect of social media, see it as just one tool in your arsenal of communicating directly to your customer base.

Now What?

Once you have completed this process of identifying which social networks your target audience are using and what they are doing there, it is time for you to draw up some realistic expectations, targets and how you hope to achieve them.

Remember the analogy of social media being a tool in your arsenal? Well change that to it being a tool box. Some social networks won’t be suitable for what you are trying to achieve and it is up to you to root through them and find the best ones for you.

LinkedIn is a popular destination for B2B marketers because it is a natural place for business people to meet and discuss more work related matters, whereas Facebook might not be as appropriate given its informal, more friendship based approach.

If you take to Twitter, will anyone really want to listen to you talk about your products and services? Step away a little and talk around your subject and about issues that your target audience will find interesting. Nobody is going to sign up to a sales spiel, become an authority on your target’s subject.

Make It Work for You

One of the main reasons why B2B marketers complain that social media doesn’t work for them is because they find it hard to use it to sell directly to their customers. It is here where they are making their biggest mistake.

Social media is so full of opportunities and if you look at it purely as a sales outlet you are not making the most of them. More than anything else, it is a gold mine of valuable information.

Are you still sending out mailers addressed to “Buying Manager” rather than using LinkedIn to find out their name, address, office, phone number and direct email? Oh look, there is a list of groups that they participate in, I wonder if my target has asked any questions or started any discussions in there that I might be able to contribute to…

Social media gives you the opportunity to know your targets better than ever before and introduce yourself in a non-buying situation before you approach them in a sales capacity. You can use it to improve your conversion rates for other marketing, build yourself as an authority in your industry and communicate more easily than ever before.

The opportunities available all stem from asking that first question, why do I want to utilise social media marketing. Finding where your audience are and what they use social media for will dictate your whole strategy.

If you are still scratching around looking to use social media as your new shop, you are missing the massive opportunities that are available for the B2B marketer.

Guest Blogger: Alan Grainger is a Web Marketing Specialist at The Corporate Gifts Company, a B2B distributor of executive gifts. Follow them on Twitter @corporategiftco.

Filed Under: Contributors, Featured, Social Media, Strategy & Business Tagged With: , , , , , , ,

Mobile Sense and the Twenty Times Rule

06/07/2012 by

In order for mobile device users to remember a product, they must be exposed to the marketing repeatedly, regularly and at least 20 times before they remember it. Though it’s more of a challenge than the consumer would think, it can also be easier than a marketer may perceive it to be, especially using mobile marketing.

Integration is the method used to expose mobile device users to a product enough times for them to remember the product. If a marketing tool is only placed in a single location, odds are not high that potential consumers will have enough exposure to remember the product.

A mobile device user typically uses more than 10 programs. These include operating systems apps, add-ons, social networking and games, and the Internet. Integration is the process of placing a marketing tool in a variety of locations so potential consumers come across it over and over.

With over 4.8 billion mobile device users, (only 4.2 billion people worldwide own a toothbrush) mobile device marketing is booming and showing no signs of slowing down. An important fact to remember is that most mobile devices users are within arms reach of their device 24 hours a day.

So, the driving question is, “how does a company expose their product to the maximum number of potential consumers at least 20 times?”

First, a company must know the mobile device marketing options. Then, the company must know what these fast-moving potential consumers spend the majority of their time doing on their device. For example, advertising on a genealogy site to a market niche that is 50 or older makes sense. Advertising for teenagers (typically more interested in music and movies) on the same site does not. Mobile marketing companies have found that combining marketing channels is a more valuable product for consumers because an integrated strategy is the only way to run a successful mobile campaign.

Rather than put the cart before the horse however, a company first needs to know its options.

Mobile Marketing Options

SMS, MMS, IM, and MoBlog

  • Text messaging, multimedia message service, instant messaging and mobile and blogging services are some of the fastest and most cost effective means of communicating on a mobile device and have potential for mobile device marketing.

Mobile Operating Systems and Applications

  • The OS of each mobile device and the applications associated with it can be used to promote a product if used correctly in a mobile device marketing strategy.

Social Network and Gaming

  • Social networking and gaming provide a large conduit through with a company can reach potential clients. From overt ads to discrete, unobtrusive marketing strategies that do not interfere with the user’s objective, social networking and gaming marketing is almost limitless.

Internet and Search Engines

  • Marketing directly through a website or using search engine keywords, AdWords and analytics to expose potential clients to a product may be the best promising mobile marketing strategy to date.

Integration

The notion that the more diverse your marketing strategy and the more marketing avenues you utilize, the greater the odds that the target audience meets the company is the key to mobile device marketing. Just like individuals, a company shouldn’t put all their eggs in one basket. Integrate.

 

Filed Under: Blogging, Blogging Icons, Contributors, Featured Tagged With: , , , , , , , ,

The Success of Indie Developers

05/03/2012 by

The arcade and console gaming industry was established and spurred on by creativity and true genius in its early years. The late 70s and early 80s saw an explosion of games based on the abilities of individual developers or small talented teams skilled in graphics optimization and backed by conscientious investors. Everyone remembers and loves the likes of Brick Breaker, Pac Man and Donkey Kong. Unfortunately, the industry is in the grip of a decades-long cycle of repeats in concepts and name upgrades. Year after year the “top” gaming prospects are determined by the companies that win by having loudest voices and the brightest colors.

The beginning of the 21st century, however, has seen a rise in more of the buck-the-system styles of independent–or indie–developers. As a result variety is seeping back into the market and there seems to be more of a place for those looking to express creativity.

But why now, when everyone is being driven toward big money? A few possibilities beg for our acknowledgement. Mass platforms like Facebook have become convenient outlets for gamers. No more jostling for a quick demo in an elusive limelight. Developers can now play all the cards. This is the story of smaller squads run by guys like Jonathan Blow, creator of the Braid game. Another reason for the growth of indie game development is the influx of developers from the mainstream sector. This exodus, while not exactly pilfering the mainstream markets of its talent, gives indie game developers a tint of viability.

So, you’re an aspiring developer; and you have enough business sense to understand that skill with coding and stand-out creativity will not be enough to keep you afloat. We have a few tips that may be helpful to you.

Find a Niche

Knowing where you are and what you have offer will give you sure footing in the development game. The strength of indie game production is in niches. The best and brightest produce a game that helps them stand out. Most game devs who go indie are attracted to it because of unique concepts that aren’t available except in the developer’s chosen outlet.

Don’t Go for it Alone

Build a solid team around yourself. Although it could be rewarding to hock out an award winner all on your own, it’s not likely. The best indie games are produced by teams built of passionate experts in their field, and use already-established graphics optimization companies. You may not be the best at what you do and you may not be able to get the best sound developer or designer, but you can put together a solid and dedicated team.

Capital, Capital, and more Capital

Yes “capital” is a dirty word in the world of indie gaming, but you must come up with creative ways to fund your projects. You and your team have to eat. Keep your day job. Try and raise capital investors from interests groups that line up with your concept interests or avid gamers that you know.

Consider Seeking Out and Joining an Already Established Team or Start-Up

If you are confident in your skill level, you may be able to go the route of some of the professionals who got their start in the mainstream. Although you won’t have as much of an appeal there are probably more than a few budding teams that share you drive and determination but lack that necessary ingredient: a team member like you.

Above All, Stay Positive

As the indie industry grows so will the competition. But staying positive will allow you to continue to develop in your skill area, suffer setbacks and move forward until you see daylight. Don’t be discouraged at this, but you may have to go through a few teams and projects before anything chalks up to a worthy gaming experience on the other end. Keep the faith and go forward.

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Future of Mobile Social Media

03/22/2012 by

When Apple released the iPhone and effectively changed the entire mobile communications game forever, the price of entry was so high that only super savvy tech fans and the 1 percent could really partake. Now, the landscape looks much different. Increasing numbers of viable competing devices and falling data prices have opened the market to a larger segment of society. Since the debut of the modern smartphone, they have grown into a piece of society in a real way. When a band takes the stage at a show, how many phones do you see come out? Does anyone even look at another person on the train anymore, or are they glued to their 5 inch screens? Smartphones (and tablets) have become an extension of the body, and one of that function’s most important assets is its ability to connect with social media.

Most smartphones are filled with a stable of social media applications. As the hardware that runs those applications change and evolve, so too must those applications. The release of the iPad 3 this past weekend gives a little indication of what’s next for mobile: high definition and faster speeds. Compared to other advancements, though, that’s not very exciting. What we will see in terms of information sharing, cloud storage and mobile interaction in the next few years – all with regard to social media on mobile devices – is set to blow some socks off.

The Future of Social Media

Researchers at Stanford University envision a world where users can share data between two smartphones, as well as between a smartphone and a computer, with a single action.  Still confused?  Watch this video: Inventing an open-source mobile social media future at Stanford .

From the Stanford website:

They have formed MobiSocial to ask the most fundamental questions about this rapidly burgeoning field, questions that seem obvious now that mobile and social media are firmly entrenched, but which weren’t so obvious as the technologies were entrenching themselves: Can social be done better? Can it be even more social and more fun? Can it be more open? Can it be more secure? And, if so, how?

The idea is to find a way to synthesize the best parts of mobile and social, then streamline them so that switching between apps and connecting with multifarious networks is seamless, whereas now it’s all just collected in a device.

Another example of this new technology is Sparsh, which allows social media users to transfer data from one medium, such as a smartphone, to another medium using only their touch. That means that each person effectively becomes an organic vessel for information.

These new software systems will have to be powered by robust mobile application development platforms. Mobile application development platforms, such as Brew, will also shape the future of social media. Development platforms continue to incorporate new options for creators of mobile applications, which translates into more sophisticated social media apps in the future.

The Issue of Privacy

Social media claimed its coveted position in popular culture so quickly that many social media platforms were unable to keep up. Along with the widespread use of social media platforms came a lack of privacy and increased vulnerability to identity theft and other social crimes. As mobile social media applications move into the future, it’s likely that they will address these concerns as effectively as possible. For example, since new mobile social media applications will allow users to quickly transfer data from one medium to another, the applications handling the transfer will use encryption to prevent third parties from intercepting the data.

Consolidation

One of the common aims of future applications will be consolidation. There are already apps available that consolidate social media profiles into one location, but it is likely that these apps will become more sophisticated in the future. In addition, new mobile apps will consolidate personal data into an “individual cloud” that a person can use to make purchases, share video and photos with other individuals, and swap valuable information. However, in response to privacy concerns, these new apps will protect your data using more sophisticated security measures.

 

Filed Under: Blogging, Contributors, Social Media, Strategy & Business, Technology Tagged With: , , , , , , , , ,
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