Fail 1: Forgetting that mobile users are mobile
Marketers love to talk about context, as the question of what consumers are doing when they encounter your brand has a lot to do with the success of the encounter. In mobile, location is context: You not only need to care about where users are when they access your site, but you also need to care about it above all else. When I access the Lowe's site on my Android, for instance, the company figures there's a good chance I need to get to a Lowe's right away. It offers to, uh, sniff my location (still not entirely comfortable with that phrase), and point me to the nearest store. But it also takes the location context a step further, touting its in-store pick-up service so my purchase can be ready when I get there.
Location-sniffing is a core capability of the mobile-friendly HTML5 platform, which means that it's easily and inexpensively within the reach of every brand with retail locations. It's therefore hard to accept the fact that when I visit Ikea on my Android, the company is unable to ascertain which continent I'm on. It forces me to find my country before I can find my store. Could this be narrowed down a bit? I think so.
