MobileStrategyGuide_ModusAssociates

The Mobile Strategy GuideDiscover Your Mobile Business Opportunity

The speed of mobile adoption is far outpacing that of prior technologies. Mobile will soon be the primary digital means that consumers use to interact with brands, friends, retailers and other businesses.”

– Burson-Marsteller, The State of Mobile Communications

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EXECUTIVE BRIEFING SERIES

A PUBLICATION OF

THE MOBILE STRATEGY GUIDE© Modus Associates, LLC www.modusassociates.com 2

Imagine your brand without boundariesThe mobile web is poised to be big. Really big. In fact, Morgan Stanley recently estimated it’s going to be at least twice the size of the desktop/laptop Internet within five years. Gartner went even further, predicting that mobile phones will overtake PCs as the most common web-access devices worldwide by 2013.

In just over ten years, the mobile phone has gone from a voice-only device to one that lets us do it all: take photos and video, surf the web, shop, conduct business, play games, music and movies, connect with friends and colleagues in new ways, and pretty much learn anything that we want to know. All at increasingly rapid speeds.

Innovative organizations from Apple to Zipcar are achieving enormous success with mobile. In fact, a customer with Zipcar’s new iPhone app can have a highly successful relationship with the company without ever visiting its traditional website. The same can be said for Yelp, Netflix and a growing list of other brands. And we’re really just getting started.

Given the growing range of opportunities to pursue with mobile, the hardest part for most organizations isn’t deciding whether to go mobile, but what kind of mobile presence to invest in. This white paper will help you decide.

The world in your pocket: What makes mobile uniqueTo fully take advantage of mobile, brands must conceive experiences that leverage the following three factors that make the medium unique:

• Always on and always with you – The ability to connect to the Internet from anywhere and at any time, with no wires or Wi-Fi hotspots required.

• Total access to anything that lives on the Internet.

• Location-awareness – Knowing where you are and serving up content and experiences based on where you’re standing right now.

User behaviors are also different with mobile. Attention spans are shorter and time is more precious for people on the go. As a result, goals are immediate and simple, bite-sized content is key, and rapid access to information is vital. Mobile users break down broadly into three categories:

1) Time to burn – Killing time between meetings or events.

2) Monitors – Checking in throughout the day to see information that changes frequently, like stock prices, sports scores or their friends’ Facebook updates.

3) Need it now – Looking for timely information right now, such as driving directions, store locations or opening hours.

The Mobile Strategy Guide

Reasons for the explosion of mobile:

• Better, more feature-rich devices

• More and better content and services

• More affordable data plans

• Faster connection speeds


Your mobile users are less likely to complete an entire conversion funnel, such as purchasing a product or signing up for a service. However, they will judge your brand by their initial mobile experience and you may lose conversion visits to your traditional website later if that experience is poor.

Today’s mobile landscape: An overviewKEY DEVICES

Mobile experiences live on mobile devices. So when conceiving your mobile strategy, it is critical to understand the main types of devices in use and their capabilities. The line between devices is not always well defined. The boundaries can shift with each new device and upgrade, but simple guidelines do exist to help you determine which devices to target for your mobile experiences.

Handheld devices:

Feature PhonesTargeted to the general consumer, feature phones are by far the most common device type in use today. Feature phones usually come in candy bar, clamshell or slider form. They have a 12-key layout and typically come with voice, messaging and data capabilities. Most feature phones sold recently also come with digital cameras and media players. If you’re targeting a broad consumer audience with your mobile experiences, then feature phones must be a central part of your strategy.

SmartphonesSmartphones share the same features as a feature phones with three main differences: Larger screens, full keyboards and the ability to run third-party applications, or “apps.” Smartphones typically have more full-featured operating systems and are marketed to consumers as advanced multimedia devices or to the business sector as productivity devices. The most popular smartphone platforms today are the Blackberry, Apple’s iPhone and the numerous phones running Google’s Android OS.

While there are more feature phones in use right now than smartphones, the line between feature phones and smartphones is constantly shifting towards the smartphone category. The newest feature phones today are often equal in functionality to yesterday’s smartphones.

Other important devices:

E-Book Readers E-book readers are designed primarily for the purpose of reading digital books and periodicals. E-readers allow you to carry an entire library of books and periodicals around in a lightweight device, and to download additional works anywhere, anytime. This is a specialized device targeted at serious readers, and so far is primarily relevant to book, periodical and other content publishers. Global eBook reader shipments totaled 27 million in 2011 and are estimated to reach 63 million units by 2014. Expect e-readers to add new features and functionality over time, however. Popular e-reader devices include Amazon’s Kindle and the Barnes & Noble Nook.

Estimated Device Penetration By 2013 (Worldwide)

Internet-enabled cell phones:1.8 billion

E-Readers: 50 million

Tablet Devices: 100 million

Sources: Forrester, In-Stat, Gartner


Media TabletsNot a laptop and not a smartphone, but something in between, Apple single-handedly created the media tablet market when it launched the iPad in 2010 and sold three million units worldwide in three months. To date, the iPad has been used primarily for portably surfing the web, entertainment and non-voice communication. It is still a niche, upscale product for now, but look for this category to grow and evolve rapidly in the coming years as the major hardware manufacturers roll out iPad competitors and new features are added. By far, the most successful tablet device today is the iPad, but other major products in this category are Blackberry’s Playbook and the Motorola Xoom.

TABLET SALES FORECAST (U.S. ADULTS)

While laptops and netbooks are technically mobile devices, they aren’t treated here because their users are usually stationary (even if on a park bench or at a café), they’re not as handy to carry around and use, and they utilize the same websites and applications that desktop computers do.

PROJECTED SMARTPHONE SALES GROWTH (U.S.)

Market for mobile content is expected to double between 2008 and 2012.

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

2008 2009 2010 2011 2012

Source: Yankee Group Research; Magellan Research

Milli

ons

Source: Forrester Research eReader Forecast, 2010–2015 (U.S.)

Total Tablet PC Users (U.S.)Tablet PC Sales (U.S.)

24.110.3

26.0

50.7

67.776.1

82.1

35.139.8 42.3 44.0

Milli

ons

2010 2011 2012 2013 2014 2015


TOP SMARTPHONE PLATFORMS (U.S. 3-MONTH AVERAGE ENDING MAR. 2011)

Tactics for connecting with your mobile audiencesThe methods you use for connecting with your mobile audiences will depend not only on the devices they own and their capabilities, but how they use them. Here’s a summary of the main tactics in use today, in order of accessibility.

• Voice Alerts and Interactive Voice Response (IVR) – A voice alert is a simple automated call to a user’s phone, notifying them of a delayed flight or providing other timely information. IVR works like an interactive phone call, where users call a number and are greeted by a recording that offers a series of selections. Phone-based museum or walking tours are an example of IVR. As are many customer service numbers. While voice alerts and IVR are less sexy than other mobile tactics, they work with any mobile phone and no special knowledge or applications are required.

• SMS (Short message service – or text messaging) and MMS (Multimedia message service) – SMS and MMS are the most accessible forms of mobile communication for a mass audience, and also the most limited in what they can communicate. SMS can be used in a variety of ways, ranging from standard communications to triggered alerts to efficiently posting messages on social networking sites. MMS is a text message accompanied by multimedia object such as audio, video or an image. Both require carrier approval before they can be successfully deployed to the public.

• Email – With more and more people reading email on the go with their mobile devices, email has become one of the most important tactics available for communicating with and engaging mobile audiences.

• Mobile Websites – Mobile websites, or WAP sites, allow for a broader range of content and user interaction than voice, text or email. Depending on the device and carrier, they may also allow access to multimedia content and applications. In order to view a mobile website, users must have a data-enabled phone plan and a handset capable of displaying websites. Some recent mobile handsets, such as the iPhone, can render existing PC-focused web sites quite faithfully. And this may tempt you to skip investing in a dedicated mobile website. However, the user experience of a desktop website on a mobile device is often sub-optimal. The most relevant content for the

Source: comScore MobiLens

GoogleRIMAppleMicrosoftPalm

34.7%

27.1%

25.5%

7.5%

2.8%


mobile user may be difficult to access, some features may not render at all and viewing the site may be slow and expensive.

• Mobile Applications (“Apps”) – These are customized applications developed for use on specific handset makes or models. Apple popularized mobile applications with the launch of its iPhone app store in 2007. Since then, Blackberry, Palm, Google, Nokia and others have opened their own app stores. Mobile applications allow for the richest mobile experiences to date, ranging from sophisticated games to online shopping and banking. Mobile applications require custom development for each individual device and operating system, and typically require more development time than mobile websites.

• Third-Party Sites and Applications – In addition to building your own mobile sites and applications, you can reach mobile users through a presence on third-party sites and apps like YouTube, Yelp, Travelocity and MapQuest. This can allow you to extend your mobile reach beyond your own offerings, or even to have a mobile presence without investing in your own infrastructure.

• Augmented Reality – Augmented reality, or “AR,” is one of the newer tactics in the mobile toolbox. AR is used to overlay digital information – text, images and even video – on top of real-life images, usually through a camera phone. For example, a tourist might use their camera phone to view a city street while an augmented reality application displays information about the businesses and points of interest that she is viewing. Augmented reality is an exciting new technology, but it hasn’t reached critical mass yet in terms of how many people have access to it and use it.

FASTEST-GROWING CONTENT CATEGORIES VIA BROWSER ACCESS

Browser Access Category

Total Audience (U.S. Age 13+)

Used browser

Social Networking

Bank Accounts

General Reference

Sports Information

Search

Stock Trading

Online Retail

News

Movie Information

Classifieds

Total Audience

3-month Average Ending in Apr. 2009

232,000,000

55,503,000

15,708,000

7,801,000

7,246,000

14,033,000

23,266,000

3,214,000

4,968,000

17,597,000

10,295,000

7,039,000


234,000,000

72,872,000

29,835,000

13,154,000

12,084,000

21,549,000

34,912,000

4,817,000

7,326,000

26,003,000

14,895,000

10,181,000

% Change

1

31

90

69

67

54

50

50

47

45

45

45



FASTEST-GROWING CONTENT CATEGORIES VIA APPLICATION ACCESS

Stairway to heaven: 4 steps to a mobile vision Defining your mobile strategy can feel like aiming at a moving target. Devices are constantly evolving, carriers are upgrading their infrastructure and offerings, users are adapting to new features and trends and the media is forever hyping the next big thing.

Thankfully, the mobile design process is very similar to the design process for desktop websites and applications, with a few twists that are unique to the medium.

Step 1.

DiscoverDiscover your opportunities

Step 2.

DesignBring your vision

to life

Step 3.

Test & RefineStep 4.

ExecuteMake it happen

+ Business analysis+ User needs analysis+ Content analysis+ Target device analysis+ Competitive analysis

+ Paper prototypes+ Functional prototypes

+ User validation testing

Perfect your ideas

Application Access Category

Total Audience (U.S. Age 13+)

Used application (except native games)

Social Networking

News

Sports Information

Bank Accounts

Weather

Movie Information

Maps

Online Retail

Photo or Video Sharing Service

Search

Total Audience


232,000,000

54,414,000

4,270,000

4,148,000

3,598,000

2,340,000

8,557,000

3,296,000

8,708,000

1,416,000

3,131,000

5,434,000


234,000,000

69,639,000

14,518,000

9,292,000

7,672,000

4,974,000

18,063,000

6,359,000

16,773,000

2,701,000

5,950,000

10,315,000

% Change

1

31

90

69

67

54

50

50

47

45

45

45



STEP 1: DISCOVER

Discover your opportunitiesBusiness analysis. When considering your mobile business strategy, you should start with the business goals of your organization.

• How will a mobile presence help you achieve your business goals?

• Will it improve your current reach?

• Will it open up new opportunities?

• How might mobile users impact your bottom line?

User needs analysis. Once you’re satisfied that you have a business opportunity with mobile, the next step is to see if your target audiences agree. How your users interact with their mobile devices and the context around them provides the best next step in creating a successful mobile strategy.

• Where do your users engage with mobile?

• What are they doing with mobile?

• When are they using mobile the most?

• How do they interact with each other in the mobile space?

• What tasks will they accomplish with your mobile content?

• At what time and place might they think of or need what you offer?

• How will they benefit from your mobile offerings?

Research providers such as comScore’s mobile metrics solutions are a good source of intelligence on mobile users, trends, and how people are navigating this space, but nothing works better than engaging your users in conversation. If at all possible, talk to them about how they might interact with your organization on mobile devices.

MobileStrategy

Communication Support

Shopping

Information

Entertainment

Revenue

Awareness

Engagement

Support

Kiosks Blackberry

iPhoneFeature Phones

Tablets

Directions

Product Information

Video

Audio

Email

User Needs

Content

BusinessGoals

Devices


Target device analysis. Target device analysis is unique to mobile. With over 5,000 different devices on the market, you can’t design for all of them, so it’s important to identify which devices your audiences use the most and design your experiences around them.

• Which mobile devices are most prevalent in your target market?

• What mobile carriers do they use?

• Do they participate in downloads and apps?

• Does their plan support the mobile web? Is it unlimited?

• At what speeds do they operate?

• What content and applications do they use the most?

• Are they aware of the content and functionality that’s available to them? How much of it are they using?

• Are they willing to purchase plan upgrades, applications and third-party services?

The answers to these questions will quickly show you which tactics will work best for your audiences. Based on your findings, you might decide to wade in slowly with a basic WAP site and text alerts, or go for broke with a rich experience across all of the major mobile platforms.

Market research firms like comScore, Gartner and Forrester publish detailed device penetration data, carrier and data plan information, giving you a comprehensive and up-to-date view of your target audiences’ mobile landscape and behaviors.

Content analysis. Once you have identified your business opportunity, user needs and the appropriate devices to target, the next step is to determine which of your content should be mobilized. Simply having the content and the ability to mobilize it is not enough on its own. You should mobilize only the content that is most useful to your mobile audiences and takes into account how they behave differently from your desktop users.

Expecting to completely transfer an existing PC-based website or desktop application to mobile devices is a recipe for a poor user experience. The best advice for creating a strong mobile experience is to keep it as simple as possible. Limit choices. Take the content that’s relevant to a mobile user and discard the rest. This results in a simple and focused experience that cuts down the risk of users becoming lost and frustrated.

Other important techniques for gathering your mobile requirements include:

• Competitive and best practices benchmarking – Chances are, your competitors or industry peers are already active in the mobile space. Analyzing their mobile experiences will help you to understand what the best practices are in your industry, and what your users have grown accustomed to.

• Website traffic analysis – Most web analytics programs now allow you to isolate and analyze the traffic that visits your desktop websites from mobile devices. With this data, you can identify the top content, entry and exit points, search terms and device types that your mobile visitors use, and what percentage of your users are currently accessing your content from mobile devices.

A project is never 100% compatible across all handsets and audiences, but statistical data allows companies to fine-tune their final product for their most important audiences and devices.

Big Idea

The key is for mobile content to complement your web experience, not simply replicate it. Think of it as one brand experience across multiple places and devices.


STEP 2: DESIGN

Bring your vision to lifeNow that you’ve triangulated on your mobile business opportunity, your next step is to prototype the user experience for each target device and tactic so you can test their usefulness and usability with target users.

Prototyping involves creating mockups of websites, apps and other mobile experiences, with enough detail to demonstrate how the experiences will work and allow users and stakeholders to evaluate them. Prototyping lets you inexpensively test and refine new ideas early in the R&D process, prior to investing in costly programming and development. Paper prototypes can range from a simple sketch on paper, through to those created in sophisticated graphic design packages. Functional prototypes, also called working prototypes, attempt to simulate the actual experience of a website or app, in a scaled back form. Functional prototypes can take more time to create than paper prototypes, but they provide a more realistic experience. Functional prototypes are especially useful in the mobile space, where interaction models are often new and unfamiliar to users.

STEP 3: TEST & REFINE

Perfect your ideasOnce you’re satisfied with your concepts in prototype form, it’s time to validate them with target users to ensure they understand the experience, its value and that it will work. The most commonly used technique for validating design decisions is the design walkthrough. This technique is typically used early in the design process using a paper or functional prototype; however, it can also be conducted using fully developed mobile experiences.

A design walkthrough involves taking a group of participants through the mobile experiences using real-life user scenarios or tasks. Participants are asked to specify the actions they would take and to make comments about their usefulness and ease of use. Results are documented and recommendations for improvement are made.

Design Challenges Unique To Mobile Devices Include:

• Small screens

• Varying screen sizes

• Varying input modalities (key pad, buttons, form factor, clamshell, etc.)

• Varying user expectations Paper prototypes Functional prototypes


STEP 4: BUILD

Make it happenNow that you’ve designed and tested your concepts, you can safely build them out across each of the devices and platforms that you are targeting. Due to differences in device capabilities and screen sizes, this will likely require some tinkering with the experience as you port it from one platform to the next, and in some cases foregoing parts of the experience altogether. But a focused strategy and strong creative concepts will ensure that your mobile experiences remain consistent and valuable for every user, across all devices and operating systems.

A final word: The mobile commitment With over 6 billion mobile phones in use worldwide, mobile may well be the greatest business opportunity of all time. Yet like most opportunities, it will require some investment and experimentation to get it right.

You’ll have a mobile web presence to maintain in addition to your desktop presence. There are new skills to invest in; new technologies and platforms to keep up with; new ways of thinking about your business and your customers. But if you keep it useful, and you keep it simple, your investment in mobile can pay for itself many times over in greater profitability, happier customers and new, previously unimaginable opportunities for your organization.


Case Study: Redefining the friendly skiesIt should come as no surprise that airlines – with their need to be constantly accessible to on-the-go travelers – were among the first and most innovative players on the mobile web. Southwest Airlines is no exception.

Because Southwest’s target audience includes almost every adult air traveler in the U.S., the company has to make itself accessible to the broadest possible range of mobile users and devices. Its mobile strategy reflects this diversity, while also remaining true to its core brand values of simplicity, service and innovation.

Here is a quick tour of Southwest’s mobile presence:

Voice, text and email alerts

The voice alert was the first mobile tactic used by airlines, because it was available early on to any traveler with a cell phone. Text alerts and email followed closely behind as mobile phones added capabilities. Today, these “basic” mobile tactics remain the most popular and effective means for keeping air travelers in the know.

Email Text alerts Voice alerts


Mobile website

In the interest of maximum accessibility, Southwest optimized its mobile website for display on hundreds of different handsets, from older feature phones to the latest smartphones. Compared to the company’s main website, the mobile website is significantly simplified and pared down to emphasize the content most frequently sought by mobile users.

Smartphone apps

Like most airlines, Southwest moved cautiously into the world of apps by starting with just one smartphone platform, Apple’s iPhone, and one tablet, Apple’s iPad. Expect Blackberry and Android versions to follow if the iPhone app is a hit. The features of the iPhone app are similar to those on Southwest’s mobile website, but with a richer user experience and exclusive features that are unique to the app, like special app-only discounts.

Main website Mobile site on Smartphone

Mobile site on Feature phone

iPhone app


Integration with third-party mobile sites and apps

Like most travel companies, Southwest makes its pricing, availability and flight information available through numerous third-party travel sites and utilities, and derives a large part of its revenue and customer exposure through them.

Integration with Southwest.com

To get the word out about its mobile presence and maximize customer adoption, Southwest prominently merchandises its mobile offerings on Southwest.com, where customers can also sign up for mobile flight status alerts via text, email or voice.

Travelocity mobile website

Kayak iPhone app FlightTrack app


Additional ResourcesBOOKS

> Strategic Mobile Design, by Joseph Cartman and Richard Ting

> Mobile Interaction Design, by Matt Jones and Gary Marsden

> Designing the Mobile User Experience, by Barbara Ballard

> Mobile First, by Luke Wroblewski

ASSOCIATIONS

> Mobile Marketing Association: http://mmaglobal.com/main

INDUSTRY NEWS AND TRENDS

> MobileCrunch: http://www.mobilecrunch.com

> MobileMarketer: http://mobilemarketer.com

> Mobile Entertainment: http://www.mobile-ent.biz

> IntoMobile: http://www.intomobile.com

> WirelessWeek: http://wirelessweek.com

OTHER RESOURCES

> mobiForge Mobile Development Community: http://mobiforge.com

> iPhone and iPad Development Guidelines: http://developer.apple.com/resources

> Google Android Development Tools: http://code.google.com/android/devel/implementing-ui.html

> Small Surfaces Blog: http://www.smallsurfaces.com

> Strategic Mobile Design: http://www.strategicmobiledesign.com

> comScore Mobile Measurement Solutions: http://www.mmetrics.com/Products_Services/Mobile_Media

> Nielsen Mobile Measurement Solutions: http://en-us.nielsen.com/content/nielsen/en_us/measurement/mobile.html


ABOUT MODUS ASSOCIATES

Modus Associates helps global brand leaders and visionary start-ups to more fully harness the business potential of the digital age, where customers rule, connectivity is everywhere, and creating value for profit and social impact is the name of the game. Clients include NBC Universal, SIRIUS Satellite Radio, Wyndham Hotel Group, Sony Corporation, Coldwell Banker Real Estate Corporation and Comcast.

Contact UsModus Associates37 West 20th Street, Suite 304New York, NY 10011Tel: 212-255-6768Fax: [email protected]

Founding Corporate Member: Customer Experience Professionals Association

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