After the year of mobile, many are wondering what will come next.
iMediaConnection turned to one of 2010's Mobile Women to Watch, Joy Liuzzo, for answers. A senior director at InsightExpress and a speaker at the upcoming iMedia Breakthrough Summit, Liuzzo is, quite simply, a mobile expert. Check out what she has to say about what lies ahead.
iMediaConnection: What is the most surprising thing people are using their cell phones for?
Joy Liuzzo: I hate to be the jaded person in the room, but I don't think we're seeing much that is surprising us lately. People are using mobile more and more as an extension of themselves and using it to communicate beyond talking and texting. We see a lot of this behavior revolving around the camera function, whether it's taking pictures of a product in the store to get someone's opinion or going into a store armed with a picture of the product on their phone. Even if it's just taking pictures of family and friends and sharing them, mobile is morphing into a way to connect with other people beyond the standard channels.
iMedia: Where will consumers draw the line in terms of brands having access to them on their cell phones?
Liuzzo: Consumers are more open minded to brands and advertising on their mobile when it is in a public setting, such as the mobile internet or an application. On the other hand, consumers start to draw very distinct lines of permission when brands want to enter their personal space (for example, their text messages.)
iMedia: Which demographic is growing fastest in terms of mobile use?
Liuzzo: We're starting to see kids around 11-13 years old increasingly have a mobile phone. This is going to be an interesting group to watch and see how they are adapting the technology to fit their lives.
iMedia: What mobile marketing strategy should die?
Liuzzo: We have all seen mobile marketing strategies that were either poorly thought out or poorly executed due to inexperience. These will die a natural death as people continue to learn and experiment with mobile techniques and strategies. The only thing strategy that should die is the "I did a small test, it didn't work, mobile is not for me" strategy.
iMedia: To what extent is competition among carriers helping or hindering mobile marketers' access to consumers?
Liuzzo: Carriers are very protective of their customers, and rightly so. It's not up to the carriers to decide for a consumer if they should receive a marketers' message, it's up to the consumer. This is especially true when it comes to text messaging.
iMedia: What cell phone is in your pocket?
Liuzzo: iPhone 3Gs, G1, and a Blackberry (yes, all three).
iMedia: Every day it seems like there's another new device out there, and along with it a new process for app development. Will this problem continue to expand indefinitely, or at will we see some consolidation in the development process?
Liuzzo: We'll eventually see consolidation. It's the way of all software and platforms, it starts out fragmented and then standards are developed and it evolves.
iMedia: Where do you think the mobile will be in 10 years?
Liuzzo: Nowhere near what we see today. We're closer than we ever have been before to having content follow us around, allowing us to access it on any device we want. Look at Netflix and Hulu Plus -- it's one main content source that is available to me on my mobile, my tablet, my TV, and my computer. This is going to be where everything is headed.
Lucia Davis is associate editor at iMediaConnection.
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