Making the Web Work for Your Small Business
Jacob’s Think Tank: Making the Web Work for Your Small Business
There are tons of resources available that probably only a fraction of small business owners know about.
The power of computers in today’s financial world
You may remember my post here about quantum computing. Now read this article:
Internet Bots: Anatomy of a Stock Selling Frenzy - HotHardware
The Wall Street Journal reports that at about 10:45 a.m. EDT on Monday, September 8, “a headline from the outdated report flashed across Bloomberg screens.” At which point, “algorithmic trading mechanisms, which buy and sell stocks based on news headlines and earnings data,” started selling off the United Airlines stock on the mistaken assumption that the company had just filed for bankruptcy. United’s stock plummeted over the course of the next 15 minutes until NASDAQ halted trading of the stock and United issued a statement saying that the rumors of its recent bankruptcy were greatly exaggerated. The Wall Street Journal adds that “UAL’s stock price ended Tuesday’s session at $10.60, down 2.8% on the day and nearly 13% off Monday’s open.”
Never too late to start a business
Edgelings.com » Starting a Business: It’s Never Too Late
Economic downturns, like the one we are in right now, are the very best times to start new companies. The competition is distracted, talent is readily available, and you’re not doing anything anyway.
Triumph of the idiots
Abstract Generator Factory: Triumph of the Idiots
Intelligent people get squeezed out of organisations, given time. For some reason the combination of intelligence and ladder-climbing almost never co-exists. Senior executives of large companies often get described as being intelligent, but this is just mistaking outward signs of achievement with intelligence. Anyone can make money in a rising market, it’s only those who seem to make a company grow when the odds are against them (e.g. Steve Jobs’ return to Apple) are worthy of praise; the rest were just fortunate to be sitting on a boat in the rising tide.
Evidence of this can be seen in the competition between any large companies, this phenomenon explains why Microsoft can never quite do what Google does. It explained why IBM could never quite catch up with Microsoft. Etc. It’s not that they became too large, or too complacent, it’s because they became too stupid. They are collectively idiots. It’ll happen to Google too, given time.
The downfall of Geosign: a sign of the times
A record $160-million VC investment. A rich Web strategy. A quirky founder. For a few weeks last spring, Guelph, Ont.’s Geosign had it all. Then mighty Google stirred. And it was over
Google getting into the music business (more categories to come)
Today I made a search for artist “Isaac Hayes”. The first result in Google took me to a list of albums, which in turn took me to a page where I could buy the album through three different resellers. All was done through Google corporate looking webpages, within the Google loop. I assume thus that Google is already getting a cut out of music albums…I knew it wouldn’t take long.
This is the real power of search engines, and the real power of affiliate marketing. Imagine what this can do for Google’s coffers in the long term, when they get a commission for every single item we buy online, from wine to jelewery to insurance.
In a way, Google is already becoming the “Walmart” of the web. And as Walmart and others do, it won’t take long before they squeeze the margins of their providers to get maximum profit themselves, because they are the main gateway to consumers. Such is their power.
“Being the main gateway for users towards information: interesting. Becoming the main gateway for consumers towards the products they want to buy online: priceless!”
(Hint for future posts: imagine a future in which not only sposored ads are advertising…but every single search result is also a paid listing. Who could stop Google doing this?)
Mobile Marketing at its best: “World Worst War”
Quicktime video about the campaign
http://www.dandad.org/awards08/qt.asp?entry_id=18031&f=000L&title=World’s%20Worst%20War
Team and images
http://www.dandad.org/awards08/entry.asp?entry_id=18031
- Two things to notice here: this is the result of inter-generational marketing teams working together: real marketing dynamite.
- Some people think that this is typically “weird Japanese” but
would not necessarily work in the West, or not to such an extent…
This is not correct. If the game is adapted for local tastes, providing
content that the user can identify with, engagement should occur in
most countries whose youth population has been exposed to technology
(particularly IM, games, www).
Print article about the book “Mobile, Domains & The Future” (long version)
With mobile phones taking a prime spot on the communications stage, some say that
the future is mobile. That’s one of the messages found in futurist and consultant Javier Marti’s latest book, “Mobile, Domains & The Future.”
The book is packed with information on all things mobile, from the recent history of the medium, to the many different ways in which coming developments will make the mobile phone even more important to daily life, whether the goal is to have fun, find friends, conduct business transactions, or even find a partner.
In a very short period of time, mobile phones have changed everyday lives like no other device has before. Mobile phones today are not only the essential means of communication for more than three billion people worldwide, but are also becoming the one and only electronic device most people cannot live without.
“Our phones allow us to not only keep in touch with one another, but also — thanks to the advance of the mobile web — to play, learn, blog and share in real time what we are doing with the world, much as we already do with the ‘regular’ Internet, using our computers today,” says Marti. “In the near future, mobile phones will become our main computers, wallets, virtual secretaries, music players, and much more. To do all this effectively, they will hold our work information and files, our medical records, our passwords, our photos, emails, social security and bank account numbers, chat and SMS messages, and much more.”
However, not everything is rosy in the future of mobile technology and society, according to Marti. Mobile phone technology poses important threats to our privacy. Marti points out that the same technology that has opened these innovations in communication and sharing also poses dangers, especially invasion of privacy. “Even as our phones help us get a myriad of things done with ease, they can be geographically tracked in real time, giving our coordinates to others,” he says.
Marti also expresses concern about the information trail left by mobile phones. “Service providers can ‘know’ much about our phone, like which other phones signals are nearby at certain hours or days. Could this be our spouse? Our boss? Our lover? Using cutting edge statistical techniques, operators, governments or hackers may learn much about us,” he warns. “Additionally, the information held on mobile phones can be stolen, modified or even deleted by unscrupulous hackers at any time, without our noticing it.”
Another risk of mobile phones is the potential for dependence and addiction. The privacy a mobile phone offers allows its owner to access any kind of information, including addictive material, at almost any place and any time, making rehabilitation much harder or impossible.
“As we are currently witnessing in Asian countries, the addiction to our mobile devices is a very important issue that will sooner or later have to be tackled by all of us as a society, before it becomes a threat of epidemic proportions, particularly for the young,” Marti explains.
“Mobile, Domains & The Future” switches gears in the last few chapters to pull back the curtain to the world of the people behind the mobile websites of the future. Marti takes readers into the world of domain name traders, or “domainers” as they are known. He answers the questions, “Why are domain names essential and increasingly valuable in our world today? How much can a domain name be worth and why? Could I become a developer or domain trader myself?” These and many more questions are answered in a jargon-free manner, allowing readers to dream or take action to become players in a world where an asset bought for less than $10 today could potentially be sold for thousands or even millions, based on published domain name sales figures.
Marti assesses that there are still opportunities to make money. “The intelligent investor and the average person have a lot to gain by learning about the mobile world, content development and domain name trading. There are still great opportunities to be had by providing the services or entertainment that millions of users will consume in the near future, ” he says.
In order to demonstrate this opportunity, “Mobile, Domains & The Future” leads the reader through the recent history of the Internet, and how the Mobile Internet is rapidly being adopted. “The opportunities are just staggering. There are approximately three times more mobile phones than computers in our world already as we speak. Already billions of mobile phone users are eager to consume information, have access to their favourite entertainment and communicate with others in the innovative ways that only mobile phones can provide,” says Marti. “My book shows readers — even those without any experience with technology — what one needs to know in order to make the most of this opportunity right now.”
This book is also an introduction to the domain extension that could well be the door to our mobile future: dot Mobi. This relatively new domain extension can be to the mobile future what the .com extension has been in the computer past: the best way to access information, particularly when “on the go”. Although Marti is not directly associated with this new extension, he can see a bright future for it, provided the dot Mobi domain name registry is successful promoting this extension to the general public.
Although phones can browse any kind of website today, the experience is far from pleasant. In most cases, conventional .com websites load slowly, if at all, don’t have the exact information necessary for people who are out and about, and require scrolling on phones. These websites were designed for people at home or work, and for screens ten times the size of mobile screens.
The mobile experience, on the other hand, is quite different. For example, a person travelling for business or pleasure away from home may need to make a hotel reservation in a taxi on the way to the airport. It may also be necessary to make a money transfer from the bank at a time when no computer is available, like from the beach or on holidays. During idle times on the bus or while on the train, people may want to be entertained. For all this, websites specifically designed for mobile phones provide a faster, more targeted experience than a more cluttered website like those made for computers.
Today, leading companies like Wachovia, Mercedes-Benz, Sheraton Hotels and many public institutions like the cities of Barcelona, Helsinki, and Frankfurt have their own dot mobi websites. And more corporate dot mobi sites are going live by the day. The reason? The dot mobi extension gives users the guarantee that the website they are about to see will load quickly, contain only information relevant to their mobile situation, and perfectly fit with their needs on the go.
“Mobile, Domains & The Future” is filled with data, pictures and information that give the reader an overview of why the mobile world is important and how one can best seize the opportunity in the early days of the mobile web.
“Many people have told me that they would have loved to have read such a book at the beginning of the dotcom boom, but that opportunity has gone forever. However, the mobile world is comparatively right now where the Internet was twelve years ago. There is a great deal of opportunity for anybody who wants to get involved, at many different levels. All of it is explained in the book,” says the author.
“Mobile, Domains and The Future” is free in its electronic version, and can be downloaded now from the Trendinews.com website or by contacting the author at JavierMarti@Trendirama.com.
Media changing landscape is not the result of a fad
Gin, Television, and Social Surplus - Here Comes Everybody
Here’s something four-year-olds know: A screen that ships without a mouse ships broken. Here’s something four-year-olds know: Media that’s targeted at you but doesn’t include you may not be worth sitting still for. Those are things that make me believe that this is a one-way change. Because four year olds, the people who are soaking most deeply in the current environment, who won’t have to go through the trauma that I have to go through of trying to unlearn a childhood spent watching Gilligan’s Island, they just assume that media includes consuming, producing and sharing.
Mobile image ads from Google already here
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About Javier Marti
As an independent strategy consultant, futurist, speaker and founder of Trendirama.com Consulting, Javier is dedicated to help organizations, small businesses and individuals to optimize systems, increase profits and make better choices in business and in life. He is the author of the book "Mobile, Domains & The Future"
When not consulting for clients, Javier shares his knowledge and experience through information-packed, yet entertaining presentations in a wide range of subjects in English and Spanish.
Founder:
Trendirama.com
Trendinews.com
Trendirama.TV
> More about Javier
> DOWNLOAD JAVIER'S BOOK
