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Money is mobile, too

Yeah, I do know that title of this piece is a bit misleading, as how most of you would think of it. But on the other hand, it is not. Money is mobile because people are mobile and they have the money, spending it.

I was catching up, after first part of my summer vacation, with the news etc. in this hot office of ours and one story at MobiADNews really catched my mind: eBay’s releases sales figures via mobile phones..

Well, last year mobile phones were used to spend almost $2 BILLION at eBay!!! And not just to buy some cheap crap but real things, expensive things and I mean really expensive things. Items with the price tag of ten of thousands of dollars/pounds, even hundred thousands dollars/pounds, were bought via mobile phones!

Vehicles seems to be one of the top categories, together with the fashion, what people buy via their mobile phones. Ex. via eBay’s basic iPhone app 2000 (!) cars are sold EACH WEEK!!

Yeah, mobile commerce is NOT anymore business of selling ringtones or wallpapers… it’s a real deal, at least for the consumers but still so many (=most) retailers sit and wait… wake up!!! People are mobile, as well is the money!!!

“What you think you know about your users is wrong, and you won’t know until they tell you.”

I was reading one article (Your brand and mobile: How to make it all happen) forwarded to my by my colleague when one of the points in that article catched my mind: Don’t hold back on that beta product.

It says simply that no product is ever perfect the first time around, and I think that applies not only to products but services, activities and actions, too. And if looking back, to one of the latest major changes in our lifes, communication and selling&marketing, web and web technologies/products/services are very good proof of that. We are still updating, upgrading and modifying those services and activities to better serve our customers and clients, to enable more sales and increase knowledge of brands.

As I yesterday blogged that mobile (internet) technology and services should be constant part of companies strategy, same rules applies to it than with “traditional” web based services: it won’t be perfect first time around. And that means its not just one-shot project but should be continuous process, the same way as happens with web. And oh yeah, do not even think that if you have learnt about web users that ALL same rules and learnings applies to mobile phone users.. you just will be wrong, so wrong..

How smart is the smartphone?

Smartphone sales are increasing, everybody wants to have (touchscreen) smartphone to call, to text and to.. eh, what? To install yet another fart application, Angry Birds (well, not so bad idea, though..)..

Nowadays phones have all kind of nice features, tons of applications available, fast network connections and nicer internet browsers.. well, gotta say that sometimes using the new smartphones is not so straight forwarded as more “simple” phones..

Anyway, no more bitching about the use of the phones, but perhaps few words about the smartphones and utilizing them better: why to have internet browser if there’s no mobile phone optimized sites and services? Even the mobile phone networks are getting faster, its still f***ing irritating to try to use site which home page needs to download megs of data, and at the end most of that data cannot be seen and/or the site is just damn complicated and slow to use..

Or why to equip all fieldworkers with nice fancy phones when only practical use, beyond calling and texting, is perhaps email.. where nice mobile internet service or well connected mobile phone application could make field worker real mobile worker, having all the necessary data at hand..

All the statistics show increase in use of mobile data, sales of smartphones, more active use of mobile internet services but still… companies willing to serve customers, clients, their own employees are hesitating, too often thinking mobile activities being one-shot thing to do… NO! Mobile internet, via browser or applications, needs to be taken into an account more seriously, part of the strategy, the same way as “normal” internet. And that means thinking, work and budgets. And realisation of the strategy, better sooner than later.

Ok, enough about the ranting, you know where to call when wanna hear more ;) ..

Statistics could not be ignored..

.. but nobody forces to take any action.. unless you want to do better business and sell more.. like jewelry e-retailer Ziamond:

Statistics told the truth and Ziamond decided to move where their customers are: into the mobile space…