The following is an introduction to / overview of marketing/advertising on mobile phones.

Contents include:

• Definition of Mobile Marketing (this page)
• Advantages / Disadvantages (of mobile marketing in general)
• Types of Mobile Marketing (with links to case studies)
• Future Trends

Mobile Marketing – Definition

To some, mobile marketing is focused on mobile phone technology. To others, it includes all mobile devices, so not just mobile phones, but, also, movable devices such as digital signage and more. Some use “wireless marketing” as interchangeable with “mobile marketing”. Technically, a desktop, if using wireless broadband, is a wireless device. But user interaction with desktops can be, in general, quite different to user interaction with mobile phones. Static (desktop) as opposed to on-the-go (mobile).

This article is focused on technology that people use on the move, i.e. blackberry, Ipad and so o – but, most importantly, mobile phones (including smart phones – with “smart phones”, more-and-more becoming the default mobile device).

So in this article, mobile marketing means marketing to audiences using hand-held devices on the move.

–> Advantages / Disadvantages (of mobile marketing in general).

RELATED MOBILE MARKETING CONTENT:

• Mobile Web Design – Best Practises
• How to Market Your Mobile App

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SMS – Short message service.

SMS – text messaging is a key part of mobile marketing. It’s the mobile equivalent of email marketing on the internet. But there are important differences (besides the obvious difference in viewable content – with the mobile screen being that much smaller than a computer screen) – one of the most important being that SMS is, generally, less spammy than email marketing. It has to be. Users pay to be connected to a mobile network. They don’t want to pay for something that is interrupted with spammy ads. Therefore there is tight regulation in place for unwanted mobile advertising in general, including SMS ads (however, saying that, spam has still crept into SMS – but is not as bad, generally, as email spam).

- SMS Shortcode. Brands use shortcodes like portalsl for their presence in the mobile world, rather like domain names on the Internet.

- SMS Longcode.

Similar to shortcodes, but longer. Advantages of longcodes (or long numbers) over short codes:

- available internationally
- businesses can have their own unique number
- numbers can be assigned long-term (suitable for long-term campaigns and more)
- cheaper billing than short codes
- more flexibility in throughout (form quiet periods to busy periods of use).

Despite these advantages, short codes are easier to remember than long codes.

Generally, short codes are more suitable for short-term revenue campaigns (i.e. TV shows, voting, and more) where as long numbers are more useful for certain types of brand communication (i.e. help desks, business applications services, and more).

MMS – Multimedia Message Service

MMS is an extension of SMS text messages, involving the sending and receiving of multimedia content, in particular, images but, also, audio and video content.

Location-based Services

This involves technology (i.e. GPS, software, and more) in which mobile networks are able to communicate information and advertising to subscribers based on their current location. Depending on the creative and marketing idea behind a location-based campaign, the scope for location-based marketing is big.

Barcodes / QR Codes
Mobile barcodes enable users to receive more information about a particular product or service. They’re, typically, placed in strategic locations (i.e. shop promotions, outdoor adverts, and so on) so that mobile users can easily connect with them.

Mobile Applications

Mobile apps have burgeoned in recent times, helping to make mobile the success it is today. Mobile apps are, also, used for marketing purposes. For example, they can contain adverts. Also, they have been used by brands in order to connect audiences more with the brand. However, recently, marketers have been focusing, too, on creating a mobile website instead of an app (and where marketing budgets are big enough, focusing on both – mobile website and app). Apps still work well, as long as they enhance the user experience in way a mobile websites can’t.

In-game Mobile Marketing

Mobile games are split into the following categories: interactive, multi-player, social networking, and casual. Brands are very much involved in in-game mobile marketing, via promotions and the sponsorship of games.

Bluetooth

In Bluetooth marketing, a mobile device links into a hotspot with access to high transfer speeds. It is, typically, free of charge. It’s used for example, in shops/exhibitions in order to promote products/services.

Mobile Web Marketing

This involves advertising on web pages designed for mobile technology.

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The following is an outlook for the future of mobile marketing – for 2011 and beyond.

Introduction

There are various reasons why mobile marketing will continue to rise in the next few years (the Mobile Marketing Association predicts mobile marketing spend will rise 124% from 2010 to 2011):

• Smartphone Hardware / software. Improvements in the hardware / software of the smartphone itself (i.e. faster processers, more memory, better operating systems, more apps – allowing for more functionality and better user experience).
• Smartphone Users. Many more people will be using smartphones (Nielson predicts that by the end of 2011, there will be more smartphones than feature phones in the US – a jump from making up about 10% of mobile devices in general in 2008 to about 50% in 2011).
• Social media environment. Mobile is well suited to social media
• Mobile technology/platforms/channels. Certain mobile technologies/platforms/channels will come of age / just continue to grow in importance. See below.

Location-based Marketing
In location-based marketing, marketers are able to reach mobile phone users via GPS and location-based technology – basing their marketing efforts on the location of mobile users. Not only that, but they can refine what they communicate based on knowledge they already have on the user. This all leads to: relevant marketing, on-the-spot marketing opportunities, as well as various creative possibilities in which to communicate to audiences.
We’ve already seen the success of location-based social network sites such as Foursquare and Gowalla. On top of this, Facebook has introduced its location-based Places, Twitter has introduced geolocation, Apple has introduced its iAd (that includes the ability to target users based on location), Google has acquired AdMob (that includes location-based advertising capability), and more. Lastly, the Mobile Marketing Association has published the results of a survey in which “26 percent of that group has used a “map, navigation or some other mobile phone service that automatically determines your current location.”
Looks like geo-location marketing is going to big.

Augmented Reality
In augmented reality, an image of reality is modified in some way to create an altered image. Depending on the creative team behind a campaign using augmented reality, augmented reality can be used in a variety of ways. Nike used it with great success in their treasure hunt campaign to promote the launch of the sportswear giant’s T90 soccer shoe in 2008. Geoffrey Handley of The Hyperfactory (mobile marketing agency), Hong Kong wrote after the huge success of this campaign: “The 3D augmented reality is really taking mobile a step further. .. With all this digital and 3D stuff, you get this little sticker that unlocks a journey into this augmented world, It wasn’t all about selling a shoe. It’s making Nike an innovative brand, unusual and different.” More recently (2010), there have been successes such as: Stella Artois Le Bar Guide, Layar Browser, We Are Autobots, and more. Looks like augmented reality is going to increase in importance, and a particularly useful tool for people in branding.

Apps
Apps are playing a key role in the success of the mobile industry in general. Gartner predicts the mobile app market will increase from $6.8 million in 2010 to $29.5 billion by 2013. IDC believes Apple’s iPhone will have 300,000 apps will have available by year-end.
But apps are, also, important in mobile marketing. Firstly, advertising within apps. Advertising within apps is predicted to be worth $0.6 billion, worldwide, in 2010. And, secondly, branding (i.e. brand-sponsored apps). Many brands have had great success with brand apps. However, increasingly, companies are considering mobile websites instead of apps (unless they have the marketing budget for both). There are advantages and disadvantages to both. Certainly, branded apps will remain important in certain situations i.e. for enhancing user experience of the brand – but success, here, will depend very much on the creative and marketing thinking behind the app.

Barcodes / QR Codes
Mobile (2D) bar codes contain information that can be picked up by mobile phones. The information can be used for a range of marketing purposes (promotions, to activate downloads, discount vouchers, and more). Bar codes can be strategically placed in public areas adding an extra dimension to existing marketing channels i.e. product display, promotions display, adverts, and so on).
QR Codes are the most popular kind of mobile barcode.

SMS
Text message advertising has been around for a while. It’s always, potentially, been attractive to marketers because of its various marketing purposes (promotions, alerts, voting, coupons, and more), can be relatively cheap with relatively good ROI (compared with emails, for example), and more, and has a less spammy reputation than email because of the tight anti-spam regulations in the mobile industry.
SMS Shortcodes. SMS Short Code numbers are short and easy-to-remember SMS Text numbers. They are displayed on many different types of media. This enables marketers to provide product information, promote products, send audiences a link to a mobile site, and more.

Mobile Marketing forecast / prediction / outlook for 2011 – the future of  Mobile Marketing – E. Mahony – spotlightideas.co.uk  – 2010

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How to market your mobile app

Firstly, Choose the right app

• Research your audience (who they are / how they interact with mobile technology / digital media in general)
• If the app is for functional purposes, does it solve a problem? What value is it to audiences?
• If the app is for entertainment purposes, will it capture the imagination of audiences? Is there something special and unique about it?
• If the app is for branding purposes, does it fit in with the overall goals / values of your brand
• Make sure it fits with Apple’s human interface guidelines

Prepare for the launch of the app in advance

In general, successful marketing for apps, doesn’t happen overnight. The campaign need lift-off. Plan your marketing campaign well in advance of launch date, and initiate the lift-off, early on, by telling people about what you’re doing.

Build a website for the app

• Where you can prepare people for the launch of the app.
• Where you can create a story around the app
• Where you can place attractive visual content for the app which people can copy – so helping in word-of-mouth
• Where you can place YouTube videos with content about the app
  And more.

Social Media / Word-of-mouth friendly

• Make your app so that it fits in, as best as possible, with social media – that it’s possible, in some way, to create a story around it
• Build word-of-mouth properties in the app as much as possible (i.e. within your app include Twitter / Facebook icons / Tell-a-friend button and so on)

Participate in social media

• Follow, and participate in, blogs and websites, in general, connected with what you do.
• Forums – visit forums such as Touch Arcade. For a more developer-heavy environment, visit iPhone Dev SDK forums, as well as in app-specific Q&A discussion sites such as – Yahoo Answers, LinkedIn Answers and WikiAnswers

Sumbit your app to review websites

Submit your app to app review website, such as: Freshapps, AppVee, AppCraver, iPhoneAppPodcast, Apple iPhone School, MacWorld, and others.

Facebook

Create a Facebook fan page

YouTube

Create a YouTube video – use tags (and you can use your YouTube video on your website as well).

Email

Think about existing clients – sending them an email with nice design of your app

App Store

Try to get your apps featured in the app stores (Apple App Store, Android Marketplace, Blackberry App World). Your app name in the app store should be longer than the app name on the phone, itself, and it should include keywords.

Advertising

A successful campaign can be run for free. But, paid advertising is, also, an option.

• Paid search
• Promote app from within another app i.e. AdMob Download Exchange (allows new users to discover your app from inside hundreds of other apps), and,also, Medialets.
• SMS campaign

Monitor / Feedback

Find out what people are saying about your app – so you can improve it. You can do this via:

• monitoring social media in general (i.e. Twitter / Facebook / blogs / forums)
• using specialist sites such as Flurry and Appcomments  
• analyzing feedback from review websites

How to market your mobile app – Mobile Marketing – spotlightideas.co.uk – 2010

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Although mobile and web have much in common, they, also, have much that is different. In some instances, mobile is a competitor to web, in other instances, they compliment one another. Here is a list of mobile marketing pros and cons.

Mobile Marketing – Advantages

• Quantity of devices - Sheer quantity of mobile devices (many countries now have 100% penetration – almost double the penetration of people with PCs).
• Personal – For many, a mobile device is like a personal accessory. Mobiles are used in a very personal way.
• On person / on-the-move – Because of their size and use, a lot of people keep their mobiles with them most of the time.
• Experience exposure / location-based marketing – Mobile phone users can be exposed to various experiences in different locations – with the various different experiences offering opportunities to mobile marketers.
• Better ad campaign returns – Often better ad campaign returns on mobile than web. Ad Ad campaigns can be made more personal and interactive on mobile than web
•  Promotions – Particularly good for promotions, coupons, vouchers etc ..

Mobile Marketing – Disadvantages

• Open Standard – Designers are really challenged by users with phones with different viewing sizes, browsers and operating systems.
• Not user-friendly - Well it’s not as user friendly as a laptop, for example, due to its size. This can have limits on user experience in general.
• Difficult to use – Often features / apps are complicated to use and take time / interest to learn
• Ad campaigns can easily backfire – Ad campaigns that are not relevant to audiences and/or are bad can really back-fire because mobiles are so personal, and users don’t want to be interrupted with advertising they dislike
• Brand interaction – Extra way of increasing brand interaction

–> Different Types of Mobile Marketing

• What is Mobile Marketing?

Mobile Marketing – Advantages / Disadvantages – E. Mahony spotlightideas.co.uk – 2010

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Mobile is not the web .. Some important mobile web design best practises / considerations

• Know your audience – Research your audience so that you can design the site around them.
• Minimize Design – Keep Design / content to a minimum, remembering that users are limited to what they can view and do (in the sense of type) with mobile phones
• Sub-domain – It is becoming more common for companies to use sub-domain or separate folder on main domain than .mobi – as centralized content on one domain can be less confusing for users to follow (and more straigthforward for designers / admin , too, although this is of secondary importance). However, there are still some who think .mobi gives the impression you’re focused on giving a specific mobile experience as opposed to mobile just being an extension of the web experience.
• Frames / tables / CSS – Avoid frames (often not supported / causes usability problems) and tables (restricts ability to adapt for various devices and increase page size). Use CSS for layout.
• Coding - Code with HTML / XHTML (the older WML is more-a-less obsolete now in Europe / America).
• Viewing / different phones – Consider how images will look according to mobile phone type
• Buttons – Give users options of buttons to avoid excess typing, as well as using buttons to help in navigation
• Navigation – Not too many links (you only have limited space), add navigation buttons, also, minimize vertical scrolling (scrolling is difficult in mobile environment because of small viewable size) and eliminate horizontal scrolling (having two scrolling directions is really confusing, and horizontal scrolling is more confusing than vertical scrolling). Make sure links and buttons etc .. are big enough so that it is easy to touch them.
• Amount of images – Because of the internet, users in general are accustomed to lots of visual content and mobile internet connections are improving all the time. Nevertheless, designers still have to remember that mobile is not the web (less viewable space / connection issues and so on).
• Colour contrast - Getting colour contrast right is important on mobile, as it’s easy for colours to clash, and as you have limited viewing space sp the content could be difficult to take in
• Pop-ups – Avoid pop-up windows as they can get-in-the-way of user experience.
• Content in order of importance – Put the most important information at the top of the site (simply because you’re limited, compared to web, about highlighting the most important content
• Test – Keep testing – there are lots of testing tools (i.e. emulators) available.

Mobile web design best practises / considerations – spotlightideas.co.uk – 2010

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By E. Mahony – spotlightideas.co.uk – 2010

There are various reasons why / when it’s a good idea to go for a minimalist web design.

• The internet is crowded with clutter. The minimalist web design offers audiences the chance to escape the internet clutter and find a place where they can view web content in relative calm.
• A minimalist web design can send a strong message to your audience about the type of company / brand / product / service behind the website. Minimalism suggests the following: no-nonsense, to-the-point, and more.
• Generally, the less graphics there are, the quicker the website loads. And the speed at which a website loads can now affect Google page rank.
• A minimalist web design is a good option to go for if you’re not too sure what sort of design to go for in general (maybe you just can’t come up with a good web design idea or your business is in transition and you’re not too sure what sort of message to get across to audiences).
• A minimalist web design can be a good way of emphasizing some important new branding design (i.e. logo) or message.
• A minimalist web design allows you to focus audiences to a particular part of the website where you’re trying to promote some new part of your business.
• Many people are just into minimalism whether it be minimalism in art, interior design, web design, and so on.

Are there any negatives for having a minimalist design?

Yes, for example, some people just find minimalist designs boring (they want shape, texture, shade and colour). There’s not a lot you can do about this (not forgetting that for every person that finds a minimalist design, by default, boring, there will be someone who find a minimalist design, by default, attractive). It’s difficult to create a really strong brand identity for audiences new to the site (but not impossible). Some clients might think they’ve been short-changed (need to persuade the client of the positives of a minimalist web design ..).

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By E. Mahony – spotlightideas.co.uk – 2010

As a web designer, how important do you consider branding in the building of a website?
What do you do to incorporate the client’s company brand values into the site?

For most businesses, branding is an important consideration, from one degree to another, in the construction of a web site. If the site is going to be successful, the company’s brand values have to be reflected in it. And in order to reflect the company’s brand values in the site, the web designer has to research what those brand values are.
If the designer gets it right, they’ll be offering real value to the company – as opposed to the website being merely something that functions well or looks nice.

Before researching these brand values, a few considerations:
- How important is branding to the particular company?
- Branding means different things to different companies
- Brand values / the brand story can often be something quite subtle – values that loyal customers “get” after spending some time with that company. But that an outsider, i.e. a web designer fresh on the job, might not get at first.

So what is branding?
Some see branding as a synonym of marketing. For others, branding takes place at every point where a customer comes into contact with the company – with the goal being to provide a positive experience of the “brand” at every point of contact (i.e. sales, the product and packaging, customer service, advertising, logo, website, and so on). In this sense every employee is responsible for the brand. In this scenario, it is the company manager who is responsible for setting the overall objectives and tone for the brand. But many companies have marketing and/or branding managers whose job is to focus on sending a particular positive, unified and clear message to the customer about the company’s brand values – what the company’s all about – and how this benefits the customer – that connects to the customer in an important way.  Part of this will involve close contact and collaboration with the heads or the person responsible for the various parts of the businesses. And the brand manager will, obviously, consult with the manager in the overall brand message – in the company’s overall brand values and what the company is all about (and, of course, in many companies, the manager is, also, the brand manager.)

Do your own background research on the company.
Companies should provide web designers with information about their business, an overview of their marketing / branding goals, and so on. But they don’t always. And, anyway, depending on the size of the project you’re involved with, including whether you’re pitching for new work, here are a few things you should be focused on in your own general research as well as things to think about in discussion with your client.

- What are the company’s goals?
- What is the market place like?
- Who are the customers, exactly?
- Who are the competition?
- If you get the opportunity to walk around the company, then try and see as much of it as you can
- Try and find out as much as you can about what marketing they have done in the past: print / brochure advertising, perhaps a radio or TV spot, microsites, banners, and so on. Are they doing social media? What are they saying on their blog and on Twitter and Facebook, and so on.

What are the company’s brand values? What associations do you think audiences make with the company andor their product/services? How has the company achieved the positive connections they’ve made with their audiences?

Once you’ve done all of this, you’ll then be in a strong position not just to create a website that ties in with what the company is all about and the message they’re trying to communicate, but, also to come up with possible suggestions to enhance the brand (as experienced on the internet) in some way based on your knowledge of web design and the internet in general.

RELATED CONTENT

- What is branding?
- 250 Top Web Design Articles

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Compiled by E. Mahony – spotlightideas.co.uk – 2010

This list covers some of the most important / influential thinkers in marketing in general (traditional and digital marketing, social media, branding, PR, and more).
For “experts” in a particular subject, as well as for those who want a background understanding of all the various parts of marketing today.
Click on orange text in below list to go to video

• On The Tribes We Lead. Seth Godin. 2009
• The Hour. Malcolm Gladwell explains how to create success. 2009
• Losing my Virginity – Richard Branson. Various business / marketing lessons from Richard Branson. 2009
• Creating a Marketing Strategy. John Jantsch – Duct Tape Marketing blog. 2009
• Word Wide Rave. David Meerman Scott of Web Ink Now. 2009
• Startups and Marketing. Dharmesh Shah of Hubspot. 2009
• Basic Social Media Principles to CNN. Gary Vaynerchuk of The Wine Library. 2009
• Rise of the Trust Agents. Chris Brogan and Julien Smith. 2009
• How to be a social media change agent. Josh Bernoff – Vice President and Principal Analyst, Forrester Research. 2008
• Key Traits of Social Entrepeneurs. John Elkington – Founder and Chief Entrepreneur, SustainAbility. 2008
• The Business of Facebook. Chris Hughes – Co-founder of Facebook. 2009
• Mashable. Peter Cashmore – founder of Mashable. 2008
• On the Future of the Social Web. Jermiah Owyang – (was with) Forrester Research. 2009
• Selling Social Media to your Boss. Peter Kim – Managing Director, North America at Dachis Group. 2009
• The Social Media Bubble. Noah Brier – Head of Planning and Strategy, The Barbarian Group. 2009
• How to Blog. Chris Pirillo – founder and maintainer of Lockergnome. 2009
• Blogging in a Micro Blog World. Steve Rubel – Director of Insights for Edelman Digital 2009
• Five Tips for Video Blogging. Robert Scoble – (used to be) technical evangelist at Microsoft. (amongst other things). 2009
• Why Twitter is key to Alltop. Guy Kawasaki – played a chief marketing role in Apple Macintosh (amongst other things, i.e. founder of Alltop). 2009
• Managing Generation Y. Tammy Erikson – President of the Concours Institute. Harvard Business Publishing. 2008
• Relationship between your brand and Google. Jackie Huba – co-founder of Society for Word of Mouth. 2009
• How Starbucks Built a Global Brand. Howard Schultz – Chariman, CEO and President of Starbucks. 2008
• Brand Planning. Kevin Lane – E. B. Osborn Professor of Marketing at the Tuck School of Business at Dartmouth College. 2008
• Public Relations. Harris Diamond – CEO of Weber Shandwick. 2009.
• Putting the Public Back in Public Relations. Brian Solis – Principal of FutureWorks. 2009.
• Interview with Matt Cutts of Google. 2009.
• Web Analytics Q & A With Avinash Kaushik & Nick Mihailovski. 2009
• Search Life Meets Real Life. Danny Sullivan – of Search Engine Land. 2008.
• Everything You Know About Web Design Is Wrong – SXSWi 2009. Dan Willis – Managed the design, information architecture and Web analytics resources for the Public Broadcast Service’s Interactive team. 2009
• Web Design Mistakes. Dave Chaffey – author of Econsultancy’s Web Design Best Practice Report. 2008.

Extra. Social Media Guru. In case you haven’t seen/heard, ending with “Social Media Guru.” Not a live video but a cartoon video – funny take on social media and not taking the “guru” part too seriously.

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By E. Mahony – spotlightideas.co.uk – 2010

1. List of topics (to discuss on your blog / to think about and include in your overall marketing strategy)
2. Dictionary (definitions / help you, in general, to fill in the gaps of your knowledge, and to make sense of what is going on, in digital marketing in general)

- Comprehensive list (generally tried to exclude apps as there are so many, and excluded really obvious words such as Twitter, Facebook and more).
- For both beginners to, and veterans of, digital marketing.
- Will be updating list, continuously.

Top 40

Augmented reality – where physical real-world is blended with digitally-generated virtual world – on, for example, TV, the web and mobile phones.
Cloud Computing – utilizing computing resources over the internet
Email marketing on rise – not on the wane as some might think
Earned, owned and paid media – interactive marketing language (earned = customers communicate brand message; owned = communication via company owned website, for example; paid = pay for ads etc ..).
Environmental marketing. Not just how businesses in general follow green issues but, also, how their digital efforts affect the environment (i.e. the amount of energy that is required to load web pages and so on).
Gmail – popular application – for shortcuts, Labs features, search capabilities, add-ons, and more
iPad – One of the most talked-about topics at the moment. Following article looks at how marketers can benefit (and not) from the iPad:  New Media Age, ClickZ and Search Engine Guide.
Experiential marketing – sensory/emotional brand interaction with customers
Facebook – Retweet – When people think of “Retweet”, typically, they will think of Twitter (and an important part of Twitter’s overall appeal with users). Facebook has now developed its own Retweet with “via”.
Facebook – Privacy policy. Has been a contentious issue for Facebook (for example, see this recent article by Mashable).
Firefox for Maemo – the first version of Firefox for mobile
Foursquare – geolocation-based game and social media phenomenon. The following articles look at what Foursquare means for marketers: Dave Fleet, iMedia andMashable.
Geolocation – most typically used for describing the process of tracking the location of audiences in a digital environment
Google Reader – Popular for a lot of reasons. For example: Search Engine Journal and Mashable
Google App Store – “Google Plans Store for Online Business Software” Wall Street Journal
Google Buzz – messaging service like Twitter, integrated into Gmail
Google Social Search – First released in Oct ’09 as part of Google Labs. Released in beta status in Jan ’10. Lots to recommend it – hows your extended network of online contacts and how you’re connected, shows your published content as it appears in other people’s social search results, you can view pictures from contacts in social circles. But blocked to much of Facebook content.
Google Search – going up (Yahoo and Bing down) –
Google Wave – real-time, collaboration, communication tool
Gowolla – geolocation-based game, the main competitor to Foursquare.
Instore-shopping with Smart Phones – More details here
Lifestreaming – diary of your electronic content as well as a place to view all your electronic content and the content of others.
Location-based advertising – involving tracking devices that target mobile users with location-specific ads
Mobile Analytics – An example of its growing importance: mobile analytics Firm Flurry received $7 Million in funding
Mobile Marketing – general. “Mobile ad spending will rise from $416 million in 2009 to $593 million in 2010” – EMarketer
Mobile Marketing – making your website mobile-friendly
Nexus One – Google’s smartphone, using Android open source mobile o.s.
Retweets – the importance of, and how best to retweet
Serendipity in marketing – it’s getting easier to find what we want. But we still want an element of surprise in what we experience and purchase as well.
Social Media Corporate Policy. A framework for employees to follow. A lot of businesses don’t have such a policy. Should they have one or not?
Social Media Optimization – attracting audiences to website content via social media
Social Media Business Integration. With 2010 being the year going mainstream,
Social Media ROI – social media ROI matures –
Social Media Engagement Expectation – from eMarketer
Social Network Advertising – Trends for 2010 (eMarketer)
Social Search – The rise of social media search and the effect of this on traditional algorithmic search.
Social Media Strategy. For many 2009 was the year for trying out social media. 2010 will be the year for knuckling down – part of this involving a proper social media strategy.
Smart Phones – because smart phones are becoming ever more PC-like, and becoming more and more popular, so they become more of an opportunity for digital marketers.
Twitter Local Trends – Released in January, 2010, offers audiences the opportunity to know what people are saying at city and provincial level, for example.
User experience design –focusing on every aspect and general impression of user experience when designing websites
Web video marketing – web video marketing becoming a popular option for digital marketers in particular for educating customers, in the entertainment industry, and more.
Web Video SEO – How web video is finally coming of age.

And 60 more

Agencies – the future of. Interesting article on this by Forrester.
Behavioural targeting – technique used to increase the effectiveness of online advertising and marketing campaigns
Blippy – messaging service that lets users publish details of their purchases
Blogging – still an effective marketing tool?
Branded TV – brands with their own TV channels i.e. adidas.tv – is this an effective form of branding?
Branded Support Community – came across this on Web Strategy by Jeremiah: “These branded communities are offered by companies and encourage members to self-support each other, or the company will support them directly. The members are often customers, developers, or implementation partners”.
Chrome Tablet – talk that Google is going to come out with its own Tablet –
Chrome (grows) – and at the expense of Internet Explorer and Firefox
Content marketing – general term for attracting audiences via online content
Croudsourcing – getting a general online community to resolve an issue problem instead of traditional employee or contractor
E-Book war – Amazons iPad (and iBook) versus Amazon’s Kindle (with others in the game too).
Enterprise 2.0 – system of web-based technologies that offer quick and flexible collaboration, information sharing, and more in the business/commercial context.
Facebook – Project Titan. Facebook’s plan for a fully featured webmail product (competitor to Gmail).
Facebook and PayPal team up for easy ad-payment method
Free in Marketing – should publishers give away content for free? Should people give away ideas for free? When to offer free in general (including products / services), and how best to communicate it.
Greasemonkey – Mozilla Firefox add-on allowing users to add scripts that dynamic changes to HTML
Guest blog author – guest blogging authors on rise
iPad – Apple Tablet computer, announced January 2010
iPhone search engine (Bing?) – Apple In Talks to Make Bing the Default iPhone Search Engine?
Inbound marketing – attracting audiences because of interesting / useful content, for example, as opposed to finding them via more coercive methods
Intention Web – came across this on Jeremiah Owyang’s blog – telling others about their plans and more
Internet radio – popular – Study: Internet Radio Reaching 32% of Households, Ereaders Are Hot,
Influencers – the people in an online audience who are particularly influential over potential buyers and more.
Newspapers - are they really in trouble?
Kindle – e-book hardware and software, released November 2007
Loopt.com “now offers local content to help you meet up with nearby friends, explore new places to grab food, and find local events happening now.”
Meebo – “instant messaging program which supports multiple IM services, including Yahoo! Messenger, .NET Messenger Service, AIM, ICQ, MySpaceIM” – 110 million unique visitors according to Quantcast – February 2010
Meego – A New Linux OS to take on iPhone, iPad and others
Ning – social network site allows for deep social experiences around brands and things
Online newspaper charges for content – i.e. New York Times to Start Charging for Website in 2011
Offline marketing helping online marketing (more than people think)
OpenID Connect – still necessary / useful?
YouTube Captions – Can now add YouTube Captions
YouTube + HTML5 – now an opt-in experiment for HTML5 support on YouTube
Seesmic “Twitter client for Desktop, Web and Mobile, manage multiple Twitter accounts, Facebook feeds and pages and access Twitter Lists.”
Segment Migration – figuring out Where Your Customers Were, Where They Went, and Why
SEO – future of?
Spiderpic – price comparison search engine for stock photography
Spotify – digital music service
Symbian OS – Open Source (the mobile o.s. has gone open source)
SXSW – South by Southwest Music and Media Conference and Festival, held in Austin, Texas.
Tablets – The rise of tables and why you should care
Tag Links – a barcode that lets paper magazines create visual links to content which can be “opened” by pointing a smartphone’s camera at them
Tribe – Seth Godin. Seth Godin’s term for online communities that form into tribes and the benefits of this from a marketing point-of-view.
Twitter – has it peaked?
Permission Marketing – Seth Godin. Seth Godin’s term for getting the respect (permission – although not formal, stated permission) of audiences, via for example quality online content, first before marketing to them.
Personal Corporate blog – should bloggers in corporate have their own personal blog, or just write as a blogger of the company?
Pepsi’s social media approach 2010. Pepsi made an important decision this year that was an important landmark in social media and traditional marketing: they opted out of Super Bowl advertising, and to spend the money, instead, in social media
plancast.com – sharing plans with friends.
Plugg – “Plugg is a one-day conference with a clear focus on celebrating entrepreneurship and innovation in Europe and raising global awareness for those European start-ups in the Web / Mobile 2.0 field that stand out in the crop”
Post.ly – media sharing for Twitter
Quantcast – Web Analytics Firm Quantcast Raises $27.5 Million
Webinar – web conference that can include question and answers, polling and more.
Woorank – Website analytics tool
WordPress growing as a CMS platform (will it become the CMS platform in 2010 – if at all?).
WordPress for Android 1.0 Release – write / editying posts etc .. on the move
Yelp – gets extra financing
Yelp challenges Foursquare and Gowalla – Yelp Challenges Foursquare, Adds Checkins to iPhone App
Universal Search – covers all search: results from traditional search, real-time, videos, blogs, etc ..

“100 Top Topics that People in Digital Marketing are Talking about Right Now” – Compiled by spotlightideas.co.uk

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