By Nicole Fletcher

According to Wikipedia, I am a member of Generation Y, otherwise known as the Millenial Generation. I’ve always been fairly fond of this categorization but in doing more research I found that my co gen-y-ers range in birth date from the mid 70s to the early 2000s. I was shocked. How could someone pushing 40 and someone who has yet to hit double digits share the same generational categorization? The Spice Girls sang ‘Generation X’ in the 90s, my 30 year old cousin doesn’t have a Facebook account and my 10 year old cousin blogs regularly. No matter what way the cookie crumbles – there’s just no way to categorize nearly a half century of people into one kitschy word.

In a recent Mashable article, author Nick Parish discussed three things brands must do to appeal to millenials online. Millenials want what they want, when they want it. Whether that’s the latest deal on Groupon, cell reception. a new song or reliable 3g, we are the instant gratification generation. In the article, Nick talks about how brands have to be on this because, simply put, if one store isn’t, there are 1000s+more that are ready and willing to snatch that business. The focus has clearly changed from the convenience and location (think the 24 hour 7-11 store) value of yesteryear, to getting what you want exactly when you want it.

Glen Parker, research director at Universal McCann, performed a study on over 350,000 consumers. They found that, “Most (brands) inherently aren’t social, but users are expecting to see them in the same places [the users] are in. For all customers, the one thing they all want is good service, but in all other aspects they are completely different.”

This boys and girls puts us in a bit of a pickle doesn’t it? What they’re saying is this: consumers supersede generational boundaries when it comes to brand presence being where they are, but since they is everyone, then they are everywhere. What that means for us dear brands, marketers, etc, is that we have to be everywhere.

What I recommend is this: really and truly analyze your target market. Where/who does your ROI come from? Are they Baby Boomers, Millenials or are they somewhere in between? Then find out where those people congregate. Is it online? If so, where? Facebook, blogs, forums, Twitter? Find them and reach out, or seek the assistance of a brand communications agency if you aren’t sure how. Ask your community what they want from you, engage with them and eventually, after this relationship builds and grows, they’ll be there waiting as loyal brand advocates. If your market is offline (ie: an older clientele), be wary that the young people of today will eventually be your market that both digital branding and social media will surely be part of your company’s future, whether you’re willing to accept it or not.

As for me and the rest of the marketers out there, a simple lesson lies at the root of this complicated message: complacency killed the cat. So refuse comfort, never settle and don’t give up on being creative, innovative and fresh in this ever evolving, wide world of web we’ve woven.

What Next-Generation Mobile Tools Mean for Your Online Marketing Plan

By Les Kollegian
Jacob Tyler Creative Group
www.jacobtyler.com

With more than 50 million iPhones currently in use, Droid quickly approaching a similar number, and over a million iPads sold in the first month, next generation mobile devices are starting to make a heavy impact on the way we live and work. But while everyone seems to agree that they’re cool, convenient, and cutting-edge, the question for most companies remains: how do we integrate them into our marketing and public relations mix? And should we?

I wouldn’t pretend there is any one answer to that question, but neither would I recommend two of the most popular options I’ve seen: ignoring new mobile technology completely, or going overboard and spending millions of dollars chasing the latest craze. Reaching buyers on iPhones, Droids, and iPads can require a few new tricks, but that doesn’t mean you have to completely change what you’re doing now.

To get you pointed in the right direction, I’d like to offer four tips on marketing to the tens of millions of next-generation mobile device users out there:

Make your content accessible. The most effective thing you can do to iPhone, Droid, and iPad users is also the easiest – make sure that all of your content, from your company’s homepage on down to your blog posts and Tweets, can be accessed by mobile devices. It’s never been easier to stay in touch on the go, and as a result, more customers than ever are coming to you from on the road. The last thing you want is for them to not be able to find what they’re looking for.

Besides, making your online materials and mobile-friendly usually doesn’t require a complete overhaul, although it might mean ditching the use of Flash anywhere on your Web site. Certain technologies don’t play well with mobile devices, and Apple founder Steve Jobs has made it clear that there aren’t any plans to integrate some of them in the future.

Go real-time. The Internet has always been about speed, and today’s mobile devices certainly aren’t doing anything to change that trend. By giving people round-the-clock access to information, they create a demand for instantaneous updates. In other words, if something is happening today, post it today, not tomorrow or later in the week. Keeping up with industry news and breaking developments are one of the biggest reasons people go online, especially when they’re on the move, so try to be a current resource.

Develop apps. Since it’s always better to have people coming to you than vice versa, why not give them plenty of reasons to come in contact with your company every day or week? Other than breaking news and expert advice, perhaps the best way to tie in to your customers’ daily lives is by developing apps that help them do their jobs or manage their time more efficiently. The more programs you have for visitors to download and install, the more often they are going to think of you and your brand – especially if your app is one they can’t live without.

I should throw in a word of caution here though: apps tend to be good for developing client relationships, but bad for generating quick profits. With the numbers of next-generation mobile device users exploding, certain developers have been recommending apps as a way to get in on the gold rush. As great as that sounds in theory, the reality is that most of the millions of apps available cost more to produce than they’ll ever earn back in sales. Keep that in mind as you consider development bids, and consider the investment part of a long-term strategy, rather than a short-term boost to the bottom line.

Think fast. Why not ask your customers what sort of information they’d like to have at their fingertips while they’re on the go? Not only does asking this simple question engage your customers and improve relationships, but the answers can often help you find holes in your current mobile strategy. It’s a classic win-win situation That’s because a lot of the information that people want from you when they’re mobile – like account details, product information, customer service numbers, etc. – could be buried somewhere deep within your site. If that’s the case, consider moving them all to one easy-to-access place. iPhones, Droids, and iPads are all about convenience, so try to make it easy for people who are using them to find what they’re looking for quickly.

If you haven’t thought about what happens when your customers come to you through mobile devices, then now is the time to start integrating some of these strategies into your marketing plan. Not everyone has an iPhone, Droid, or iPad yet, but the trends are clear – with nearly 100 million Americans poised to own at least one of these devices by this time next year, now might be a great time to adopt some of these tips and stay ahead of the curve.

As a long time fan of Apple and sometimes feeling like the most stupid human on earth for not investing in the stock when Jobs came back on as CEO in 1997, I was surprised to see Mr. Jobs post the blog below on Apple.com. Now… as a Web design firm and creative agency, obviously we use Adobe Flash. It has been a tremendous platform for us to build engaging sites with interaction and eye-catching movement.

Now, whether you agree with Steve or not, it’s tough to argue with a guy who single-handed changed three industries (Music, Movies, and Phone). When he stated that Apple isn’t a computer company…it is a “lifestyle” company, he wasn’t kidding. Apple products have changed the way we interact and communicate. As well, he has done guys like us a MAJOR solid by making graphic design important. Now even the average plumber realizes great design serves a purpose. Okay…before I go off on about 50 tangents here, please check out what was written by Steve Jobs. My guess is we should start getting into HTML 5 pretty quick!
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Apple has a long relationship with Adobe. In fact, we met Adobe’s founders when they were in their proverbial garage. Apple was their first big customer, adopting their Postscript language for our new Laserwriter printer. Apple invested in Adobe and owned around 20% of the company for many years. The two companies worked closely together to pioneer desktop publishing and there were many good times. Since that golden era, the companies have grown apart. Apple went through its near death experience, and Adobe was drawn to the corporate market with their Acrobat products. Today the two companies still work together to serve their joint creative customers – Mac users buy around half of Adobe’s Creative Suite products – but beyond that there are few joint interests.

I wanted to jot down some of our thoughts on Adobe’s Flash products so that customers and critics may better understand why we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. Adobe has characterized our decision as being primarily business driven – they say we want to protect our App Store – but in reality it is based on technology issues. Adobe claims that we are a closed system, and that Flash is open, but in fact the opposite is true. Let me explain.

First, there’s “Open”.

Adobe’s Flash products are 100% proprietary. They are only available from Adobe, and Adobe has sole authority as to their future enhancement, pricing, etc. While Adobe’s Flash products are widely available, this does not mean they are open, since they are controlled entirely by Adobe and available only from Adobe. By almost any definition, Flash is a closed system.

Apple has many proprietary products too. Though the operating system for the iPhone, iPod and iPad is proprietary, we strongly believe that all standards pertaining to the web should be open. Rather than use Flash, Apple has adopted HTML5, CSS and JavaScript – all open standards. Apple’s mobile devices all ship with high performance, low power implementations of these open standards. HTML5, the new web standard that has been adopted by Apple, Google and many others, lets web developers create advanced graphics, typography, animations and transitions without relying on third party browser plug-ins (like Flash). HTML5 is completely open and controlled by a standards committee, of which Apple is a member.

Apple even creates open standards for the web. For example, Apple began with a small open source project and created WebKit, a complete open-source HTML5 rendering engine that is the heart of the Safari web browser used in all our products. WebKit has been widely adopted. Google uses it for Android’s browser, Palm uses it, Nokia uses it, and RIM (Blackberry) has announced they will use it too. Almost every smartphone web browser other than Microsoft’s uses WebKit. By making its WebKit technology open, Apple has set the standard for mobile web browsers.

Second, there’s the “full web”.

Adobe has repeatedly said that Apple mobile devices cannot access “the full web” because 75% of video on the web is in Flash. What they don’t say is that almost all this video is also available in a more modern format, H.264, and viewable on iPhones, iPods and iPads. YouTube, with an estimated 40% of the web’s video, shines in an app bundled on all Apple mobile devices, with the iPad offering perhaps the best YouTube discovery and viewing experience ever. Add to this video from Vimeo, Netflix, Facebook, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, ESPN, NPR, Time, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Sports Illustrated, People, National Geographic, and many, many others. iPhone, iPod and iPad users aren’t missing much video.

Another Adobe claim is that Apple devices cannot play Flash games. This is true. Fortunately, there are over 50,000 games and entertainment titles on the App Store, and many of them are free. There are more games and entertainment titles available for iPhone, iPod and iPad than for any other platform in the world.

Third, there’s reliability, security and performance.

Symantec recently highlighted Flash for having one of the worst security records in 2009. We also know first hand that Flash is the number one reason Macs crash. We have been working with Adobe to fix these problems, but they have persisted for several years now. We don’t want to reduce the reliability and security of our iPhones, iPods and iPads by adding Flash.

In addition, Flash has not performed well on mobile devices. We have routinely asked Adobe to show us Flash performing well on a mobile device, any mobile device, for a few years now. We have never seen it. Adobe publicly said that Flash would ship on a smartphone in early 2009, then the second half of 2009, then the first half of 2010, and now they say the second half of 2010. We think it will eventually ship, but we’re glad we didn’t hold our breath. Who knows how it will perform?

Fourth, there’s battery life.

To achieve long battery life when playing video, mobile devices must decode the video in hardware; decoding it in software uses too much power. Many of the chips used in modern mobile devices contain a decoder called H.264 – an industry standard that is used in every Blu-ray DVD player and has been adopted by Apple, Google (YouTube), Vimeo, Netflix and many other companies.

Although Flash has recently added support for H.264, the video on almost all Flash websites currently requires an older generation decoder that is not implemented in mobile chips and must be run in software. The difference is striking: on an iPhone, for example, H.264 videos play for up to 10 hours, while videos decoded in software play for less than 5 hours before the battery is fully drained.

When websites re-encode their videos using H.264, they can offer them without using Flash at all. They play perfectly in browsers like Apple’s Safari and Google’s Chrome without any plugins whatsoever, and look great on iPhones, iPods and iPads.

Fifth, there’s Touch.

Flash was designed for PCs using mice, not for touch screens using fingers. For example, many Flash websites rely on “rollovers”, which pop up menus or other elements when the mouse arrow hovers over a specific spot. Apple’s revolutionary multi-touch interface doesn’t use a mouse, and there is no concept of a rollover. Most Flash websites will need to be rewritten to support touch-based devices. If developers need to rewrite their Flash websites, why not use modern technologies like HTML5, CSS and JavaScript?

Even if iPhones, iPods and iPads ran Flash, it would not solve the problem that most Flash websites need to be rewritten to support touch-based devices.

Sixth, the most important reason.

Besides the fact that Flash is closed and proprietary, has major technical drawbacks, and doesn’t support touch based devices, there is an even more important reason we do not allow Flash on iPhones, iPods and iPads. We have discussed the downsides of using Flash to play video and interactive content from websites, but Adobe also wants developers to adopt Flash to create apps that run on our mobile devices.

We know from painful experience that letting a third party layer of software come between the platform and the developer ultimately results in sub-standard apps and hinders the enhancement and progress of the platform. If developers grow dependent on third party development libraries and tools, they can only take advantage of platform enhancements if and when the third party chooses to adopt the new features. We cannot be at the mercy of a third party deciding if and when they will make our enhancements available to our developers.

This becomes even worse if the third party is supplying a cross platform development tool. The third party may not adopt enhancements from one platform unless they are available on all of their supported platforms. Hence developers only have access to the lowest common denominator set of features. Again, we cannot accept an outcome where developers are blocked from using our innovations and enhancements because they are not available on our competitor’s platforms.

Flash is a cross platform development tool. It is not Adobe’s goal to help developers write the best iPhone, iPod and iPad apps. It is their goal to help developers write cross platform apps. And Adobe has been painfully slow to adopt enhancements to Apple’s platforms. For example, although Mac OS X has been shipping for almost 10 years now, Adobe just adopted it fully (Cocoa) two weeks ago when they shipped CS5. Adobe was the last major third party developer to fully adopt Mac OS X.

Our motivation is simple – we want to provide the most advanced and innovative platform to our developers, and we want them to stand directly on the shoulders of this platform and create the best apps the world has ever seen. We want to continually enhance the platform so developers can create even more amazing, powerful, fun and useful applications. Everyone wins – we sell more devices because we have the best apps, developers reach a wider and wider audience and customer base, and users are continually delighted by the best and broadest selection of apps on any platform.

Conclusions.

Flash was created during the PC era – for PCs and mice. Flash is a successful business for Adobe, and we can understand why they want to push it beyond PCs. But the mobile era is about low power devices, touch interfaces and open web standards – all areas where Flash falls short.

The avalanche of media outlets offering their content for Apple’s mobile devices demonstrates that Flash is no longer necessary to watch video or consume any kind of web content. And the 200,000 apps on Apple’s App Store proves that Flash isn’t necessary for tens of thousands of developers to create graphically rich applications, including games.

New open standards created in the mobile era, such as HTML5, will win on mobile devices (and PCs too). Perhaps Adobe should focus more on creating great HTML5 tools for the future, and less on criticizing Apple for leaving the past behind.

Steve Jobs
April, 2010