I have seen multiple interpretations of Apple’s rejection of a few apps that were accessing the unique device identification (UDID) numbers. It has been said that Apple is under pressure from the Congress and other bodies to prevent developers from accessing the UDID numbers.
Obviously, there are security and privacy concerns that have led to this turn of events. It is expected that this approach will bring about a change in mobile targeting
tactics. Marketing and other business requirements will of course require an alternative, so there are going to be major efforts in that direction. How ‘scrupulous’ those alternatives will be remains to be seen.
iPhone UDID
The UDIDs are being deprecated by Apple – which means that developers are being prevented from accessing these hardware identification numbers. Eventually, it is expected, apps that access UDIDs will be done away with. Developers are in a mad rush in the meantime to find suitable alternatives.
Mobile advertising will suffer initially, as a result. But that it won’t be – scratch that, cannot be – for too long. Advertising is too highly regarded to be compromised. However, users’ privacy and security ought to be bigger issues. Hence, developer and mobile ad companies will find it mutually beneficial to work out a feasible solution.
Other perspectives on Apple’s deprecation of UDIDs consider it a way to encourage developers to come up with other means of identification that focus on the user, rather than the device. Here, perhaps, there is a possibility that privacy will be compromised in the process. Mobile advertising just might get more intrusive than it can attempt to be at present. But that’s just me.
An important distinction to note is that Apple’s regulation applies to apps that transmit the UDID without the user’s permission. So if a user were to provide such permission, what would be the implications for his/her privacy and security?
Developers are already opting to change their code to generate a unique identifier that is app specific, as required by the regulation.
Here’s hoping that the final settlement will figure in the interests of developers, advertisers, and the users, though that’s going to take some doing and I haven’t an inkling about how that might be attempted.
I will keep you posted, however. Stay tuned.
Twitter Trends are all about the most widely talked about emerging topics. So there’s the viral element about every trend for a given region. I looked up trends for the US of A and UK, recently. I found a couple of topics that were common. Wonder what that could possibly mean? Well, think intercontinental demographics.
Twitter users are the fastest lot. They are interacting at least thrice the speed they do on, say, Facebook. Twitter trends change pretty fast too. Here today, gone tomorrow. Velocity and volume of conversation are two most important factors that are responsible for creating a trend.
Twitter Trends
What people are talking about right now is more important on Twitter Trends than anything else. The hottest topics at that given moment are the stuff that Trends are made of. It may also be about popularity, but first and foremost, it is about the present moment.
Ninety-five million tweets a day, imagine! A dramatic increase in the sheer number of tweets on a topic are what makes the topic one of the trends.
So how do Twitter Trends help your business?
For one, they are good for your business blog. A quick look at the topics that are trending and then using the blog to create content on those is an effective way to promote your business or products. If, for instance, you find a lot of tweets for a given trend that are talking about something directly (even indirectly) related to your product or business, you can write blog posts on relevant topics to stoke interest.
The power of blogging on such fav topics cannot be underestimated. Your product or business can become a rage among netizens provided you have put in the work to check out the trending topics on Twitter and created content that is relevant to those.
Twitter Trends is not the only source for topics people are currently talking about. Google Trends is also a great source. Taken together, they can provide an insightful understanding of topics that are currently hot.
Plan your blog posts using Twitter Trends and watch the traffic flow to your blog.
Happy Trending!
A major change has come about regarding SEO compared to social media platforms in the last few years. This change signals a crossover from Web page optimization and blindly running after links to optimization of genuine, fresh content, and the engagement of the audience that it enables.
Thus, SEO and social media now go hand in hand. Both still depend severely on the content used, but the point is that you can no longer neglect to use social media in your quest for success with important keyword phrases.
Organizations that are early adopters of social media tend to dominate, particularly in industries with a low rate of adoption. Web page optimization and link building are still fairly important, but with Google’s emphasis in providing the user with quality content, social media must figure in as an indispensable channel for the dissemination of such content.
Social Media Platforms
Social media platforms enjoy far wider acceptance and use by the audiences than corporate or business websites. Hence, using only on-page optimization and link building is no longer sufficient for the purpose of taking your product to the reader. In turn, the reader would gladly turn to the familiar interface of Facebook, Twitter, or LinkedIn, rather than directly visit the corporate website.
Look at Google’s SERPs. There’s hardly ever any search possible that does not throw up results from social media websites. When you type in a question in the search box for your favorite search engine, it returns results largely from blogs.
The small business therefore needs to start with the following:
- Creating a foundation with a blog and relevant content for the blog
- Maintaining a podcast for blog posts
- Uploading appropriately tagged images, with full descriptions for sites such as Flickr
- Uploading to YouTube videos that offer customer testimonials
- Submitting articles to directories such as Ezine Articles and PitchEngine
- Creating profiles on social media sites such as Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Google Maps, Google Places, and vertical-specific platforms
- Generating positive reviews on websites such as Google Maps, Yelp, and Insider Pages
Above everything else, you must have a strategy in place even before you start out on such social media engagement. That is another ball game, and I’ll be happy to take it up very soon. First, however, think about sourcing quality content and getting your principal website appropriately optimized for the web.
Thus, it is a lot of hard work, but you will be just glad you put in all the effort when customers and their inquiries start pouring in!
U.S. mobile commerce is expected to grow 73% in 2012. In comparison to the $6.7 billion in sales this year, an increase of 91.4% is forecast for 2012, which translates into a significant $11.6 billion.
These m-commerce sales take into account all sales of all goods plus travel and event ticket sales purchased via mobile devices. Digital downloads of apps and POS payments are excluded.
Mobile purchases constitute a habit that is yet to develop fully. However, the rapid growth of the smartphone heralds the arrival of m-commerce. Already, consumers expect a whole lot more info to be available to them any time, on demand, and wherever they are. That in itself sets m-commerce up nicely to become one of the most important aspects of commerce in 2012.
Also, retailers and online business owners have started getting their own m-commerce sites made and deployed, in the hope that that will help them make a sizable killing next year. American consumers have already started shopping on their mobiles.
Add to that the fact that service providers such as Kaushalam are already providing business apps for such m-commerce sites. As penetration of the smartphone increases, the rise of m-commerce will be directly proportional.
Android is expected to garner 50% of the market share by the end of 2012, whereas iOS will not be far behind with its innovation. SMS will lead non-voice communication.
A new study has revealed that it also augurs well on the tablet front because tablet users have a better shopping experience in comparison to mobile users – another reason why you need that other version of your website.
Mobile Application Development
All these facts point to the immediacy with which your business needs to source that app for its website. Early adopters will be the greatest beneficiaries of this opportunity. Once your app has been created and deployed, it will also need to be downloaded by your customers. Starting out early will save you plenty of time as well as create the early-bird advantage over your competition.
Without such a version of your online presence, you stand to lose out on a significant amount of sales since you will be failing to meet the demand of the customers for such a solution.
Have you asked your services provider to create the m.yourdomainname.com for you?
If not, don’t wait to make a New Year’s resolution out of it.
Cheers!
All kinds of theories and their versions are currently prevailing on the web regarding the future of ecommerce. Ecommerce is no longer the classic, staid concept we were used to. It is evolving fast and in myriad ways. There’s technological as well as qualitative change coming its way. Indeed, 2012 promises to deliver a whole new ecommerce environment in most of the online shopping world.
The future of ecommerce is definitely bright. Things are going right for the majority – the consumers. They are also quite cosy for the vendors. But the balance of power is likely to shift toward the consumer, or more specifically, groups of consumers. Virtual communities of shoppers are likely to influence ecommerce in big ways. While the competition is going to get tougher, the more agile among tech-savvy online retailers and businessmen will not be denied their dues.
Delivering a custom-developed, dynamic, consumer-specific experience to the consumer is one of the top priorities right now. There is some competition with the physical markets the world over, but online retail already has an advantage in the busy cities of the world. Relevance for the individual customer will require considerable inputs of customer-centric research and facilitation. If done right, it will bring rich rewards for those who work on it.
eCommerce Future
The Internet has made possible such innovation regarding information sharing, networking, business, and overall business productivity that it is influencing lives and lifestyles on a global scale. You need to take the good with the bad, however, and there’s plenty of time-wasting going on in the name of productivity as well. So we are in a transitive, formative, transformative period in which the ecommerce cauldron is almost bubbling over.
We may very well see a day in the not-so-distant future when online shopping will be the only natural choice over any physical stores and even malls. That seems particularly inevitable when you look at escalating costs of transportation, the sheer frustration of shopping in dense crowds, and the lack of a positive response to the online shopping phenomenon from physical store owners.
If you are a businessman with both an online store and a physical store, you need to make a choice fast. Send in your questions and comments to this post if you wish to consult with us.
Meanwhile, take good care of both your online store and the physical store. Used judiciously, both will pay rich dividends in the near future.
