World Tech Update – 5/16/13
IDG News Service
Coming up on WTU this week sending cash via Gmail and more at Google IO, BBM coming to iOS and Android and Windows Blue to restore some missed features.
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10 transformation technologies from the 500
Fortune
A look at the chips, devices, and software that will change the way people will live in the decades to come.
#1 Google Glass
For a product that’s not widely available yet, Google Glass has generated an incredible amount of buzz. It’s not hard to see why. The augmented reality eyeglasses, which project images onto a lense, represent a major step forward in computing, much in the same way the iPad made tablets a common household item. When it arrives later this year, users will be able to snap photos, record video, and otherwise enhance their surroundings, from offering on-the-fly directions superimposed onto the road or reviews for a restaurant someone is looking at.
Which Social Network is Best for B2B Marketing?
Search Engine Watch
Which social network is the best for B2B marketing? Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, and YouTube each offer B2B marketers value. Let’s review these top sites from a B2B social marketing perspective so we can crown an undisputed champion.
The Keys to Social B2B Victory
When it comes to using social media as a marketing tool for B2B organizations, which have an end goal of qualified lead generation, the underlying key to success is to drive thought-leadership and credibility around a desired market position that will yield target engagement. To do so, a B2B organization must first have a solid social media plan that defines the market position and a review of the online competition.
The online brand that will be delivered in social must align with a B2B organization’s brand promise, mission, and value proposition. Choosing the appropriate channel(s) depends on a number of factors including:
IDC: For Mobile Advertising Networks, Era of Dominance Is Over
IDC Press Release
SAN MATEO, Calif., April 9, 2013 – Mobile publishers such as Facebook, Pandora, and Twitter are rapidly taking over the mobile display advertising market in the United States. Where in past years, ad networks such as Google, Millennial Media, and Apple received most of the spending on mobile display ads, now publishers control the segment, thanks to very strong sales growth in the past year. Facebook, Pandora, Twitter, and The Weather Channel all registered strong sales in 2012 and all (with the exception of Pandora) popped onto the scene from zero sales in 2011. As a result, publishers controlled 52% of U.S. mobile display ad spending in 2012, compared to the 39% they received in 2011. This is one of the results from a newly published International Data Corporation (IDC) report, 2012 U.S. Mobile Advertising Market Sizing and Vendor Market Shares (Doc #240311).
Does Technology Makes Us Smarter Or Dumber?
Exhibit A: I was driving up Silicon Valley’s Route 101 in northern California last month when I noticed a strange-looking SUV in front of me. On its roof was a tripod structure topped with a spinning cylinder. Out of curiosity, I sped up and pulled even with the driver’s side. Inside I saw a man in the driver’s seat, kicked back and relaxing with a People magazine. I realized this was one of Google’s self-driving cars, which were being tested in the area.
Exhibit B: Home sick with the flu one day, I was watching The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and his guest was Missy Cummings, an associate professor of aeronautics and astronautics at MIT. She was talking about how drones are changing the future of battle. They’re not only more effective, but also cheaper to build and fly. Organizations that use drones can also save a ton of money by not putting resources towards “an expensive pilot that costs millions of dollars to train.” The professor noted that within a few years, the technology will likely move into the commercial space, where companies such as UPS and FedEx might use drones to ship packages across the United States.
Facebook plans to unveil smartphone; The company aims to dominate on mobile devices the way it has on desktop computers
Los Angeles Times
Get ready for the Facebook phone.
The company is close to unveiling a smartphone whose software keeps the social network front and center. It is part of an overall strategy to advance Facebook’s ambitions to dominate on mobile devices the way it has on desktop computers. Facebook Inc. has scheduled a news conference Thursday at its Menlo Park, Calif., headquarters to show off an HTC smartphone that operates on software called Facebook Home. The social network’s News Feed, messaging, photo uploading and other features will be integrated into the phone, according to reports.
It will be the biggest step yet to re-engineer Facebook into a mobile company. Like Amazon.com Inc., Apple Inc., Google Inc. and Microsoft Corp. before it, Facebook is putting a device into people’s hands designed to tether them to the service.
Facebook is under heavy pressure to capture — and keep — the attention of users who are spending more time than ever on mobile devices so that it can cash in on mobile advertising. And that has forced the giant social network to attempt the most dramatic transformation in its history. It has deployed hundreds of engineers on coding mobile projects. It rolled out new mobile advertising formats and new mobile apps such as Poke, and overhauled its iPhone and Android apps. Facebook also stepped up its focus on Android, which in recent years has surpassed the iPhone to become the No. 1 operating system for smartphones around the world.
At the end of last year, the number of active daily users accessing Facebook on a mobile device exceeded the number logging on from desktop computers for the first time. More than 650 million of its more than 1 billion users check Facebook from mobile devices — and that number is growing fastest in big markets such as the U.S.
“Facebook’s goal is to get its stuff in front of as many people as possible,” IDC analyst Karsten Weide said. The HTC phone is powered by a modified version of Google’s Android mobile software. If successful, the HTC phone could be the first of many, analysts said. “This is a way to get the distribution that they would have gotten through their own smartphone by partnering with somebody else,” Weide said.
World Tech Update Video- 3/21/13
IDG News Service
Coming up on WTU Samsung’s Galaxy S4 incorporates new gesture controls, Apple CEO Tim Cook’s approval rating drops and Google Keep offers virtual sticky notes.
Search budgets rise to accommodate new channels, devices
BtoB daily news
Technology companies continue to ramp up spending on paid search campaigns, driven by such pressures as international expansion and greater investments in content marketing, mobile and video. According to a report by search agency Covario Inc., ³Global Paid Search Spend Analysis,² spending on pay-per-click (PPC) advertising by its enterprise technology, consumer electronics and retail clients rose 15% in the fourth quarter compared with the fourth quarter of 2011; for the year, the increase was 18% over 2011.
Paid search advertising on mobile devices, such as smartphones and tablets, continued to accelerate throughout the year, with mobile PPC spending up 30% in the fourth quarter year-over-year. Last year, 36% of mobile ad spending was for advertising on smartphones and 64% for advertising on tablets.
Covario said there is “higher purchase affinity” among users of tablets.
“We are seeing our tech customers really invest in the mobile experience,” said Mike Gullaksen, Covario senior VP-managing director. “They are building out mobile as a full experience versus just a simplified desktop experience.”
WPP’s Sorrell spells out print vs online advertising imbalance and data technology challenges
Media Briefing
3/4/13
Too many advertising budgets are still weighted towards printed newspapers and magazines, while mobile and online platforms should be getting a bigger slice of the marketing pie, according to Sir Martin Sorrell, CEO of WPP. Meanwhile, success in media in 2013 means developing your own technology to manage and monetise audience data instead of relying on the likes of Google, says Sorrell.
Presenting the company’s preliminary 2012 results on Friday – a good if “ugly” set of results, the key details of which are below – Sir Martin spelled out the progress the company is making in becoming more digital and even more international: one third of revenue is digital and emerging markets make up 29.4 percent. The target for both is between 35 and 40 percent.
“The two big discontinuities are in print, where clearly clients and agencies are spending too much, and internet and mobile, where they are investing too little,” he says. Echoing Mary Meeker’s now infamous slide from last year, Sorrell points out that print has 25 percent of advertising spend but only accounts for seven percent of consumers’ media time. Conversely, mobile devices account of 10 percent of media time but get just one percent of ad spend.