What Do All these SMAC Developments Mean?

The research team at Cognizant has come up with some interesting numbers related to SMAC (social, mobile, analytics and cloud) for us all to ponder:
  • 37% of all media consumption in the U.S. in 2012 was via a mobile device
  • 3 out of 5 searches are done through mobile devices
  • Data production will be 44 times greater in 2020 than it was in 2009
What do you think these numbers mean for enterprises today and tomorrow?

Opinion:

I see digital transformation spinning off many different business trends and technology waves.  Consumers want to consume media on mobile devices. This in turn drives tablet sales, as most media is easier to view on tablets.  Tablets and other mobile devices encourage and promote the digitization of customer engagements and produce more data (code halos) that enables new business models to emerge based on a strategic use of big data analytics tied to marketing and commerce platforms.

The more data and commerce that flows through mobile devices, the more companies focus on mobile marketing and sales channels.  I see no end to the popularity of mobile devices, so this trend is guaranteed to continue.  The question for us now is how this will impact traditional sales and marketing channels and strategies.

Real-time communications and data exchanges on mobile devices, drives the desire for all kinds of additional real-time interactions including collaboration, and commerce.  This in turn requires businesses to transform themselves and re-engineer their businesses to support real-time interactions and engagements.

The competition will quickly move beyond just supporting mobile devices, and re-engineering for real-time commerce and services, to personalizing engagements and enabling context-aware applications and devices (think health and fitness) and Pandora's, Netflix's and Amazon.com's ability to recommend items based on the data they have collected on you.  This same context aware capability will quickly spread into the enterprise where mobile applications will understand you, your role, your task, your location and support your needs without being asked.  There is a lot of work to be done here.  ClickSoftware, as an example, has created context aware mobile applications for field services.  You can read and watch a short video on their ClickButler here.

Another emerging trend is the convergence of mobile and wireless data whether it is from a mobile device or an embedded wireless sensor in your car, home appliance, home security system, oil pipeline, city bus or manufacturing assembly line.  These sensors will quickly be in everything, producing massive quantities of data begging to be used in clever applications for both personal and enterprise purposes.

Recommendation:

I am not reporting anything new here.  This is all happening now. We all see it. Enterprises need to be evaluating their entire "information logistics" systems today to understand where they have problems supporting mobile and real-time environments.  They need to replace any systems that cannot support this quickly emerging world.  They also need to secure this new wireless world and their data from bad guys.

Real-time environments require different management practices.  Companies will need to re-train managers and executives on how to work with real-time data and business intelligence so as not to suffer from decision-making paralysis.  New decision-making tools and methods will need to be employed.  In addition, new business strategies, business models, management techniques, customer service and engagement paradigms all need to be re-thought in this fast moving, mobile and real-time age.

*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mobile Marketing History and Infograph

Mobile is now the first screen of influence for many marketers while adults are spending more time on mobile media than newspapers and magazines.

Timeline of Mobile Marketing

Middle ages

- Town criers are used to spread messages

1876

- First telephone introduced by Alexander Graham Bell

1973

- First mobile portable handset invented

1992

- First text message sent from computer to mobile phone

1993

- First mobile phone that both sends and receives texts introduced

1998

- Term "spam" officially added to dictionary to mean unwanted, junk emails

2003

- First commercial mobile SMS launches. Short codes introduced for use with text message marketing

2005

- Nike and Pontiac launch SMS campaigns

2007

- 2.4 billion SMS users worldwide
- Apple iPhone is released in U.S.
- Texting is embraced: Average monthly texts (218) outnumber calls (213)

2010

- Quick response (QR) codes start being used in mobile marketing
- Cambridge dictionary adds "text" as a verb

2011

- Mobile marketing becomes a $14 billion+ industry, including $9.3 billion worth of music

2013

- Android and iOS battle it out for market share

Businesses embrace new technology for mobile outreach

  • Square-like apps for payment
  • Same-day shipping through Amazon and eBay
  • Mobile fingerprinting to secure payments
  • Augmented reality in which customers can point their mobile cameras at products for reviews and discounts

2014

- Mobile Internet usage will overtake desktop Internet usage

2015

- 81% of U.S. mobile customers will have smartphones
- Mobile marketing will generate $400 billion in sales (a 52% increase in just two years)
- Retailers and marketers will spend $19.8 billion on mobile marketing, up from $6.7 billion in 2012)

2016

- Global mobile marketing spending will grow to $22 billion

We Love Our Mobile Phones - and So Do Businesses

91%

- Adults who have their mobile phone within arm's reach

271 million

- Adults who own some type of mobile device

75%

- Percentage of smartphone market held by Apple and Android

86%

- Users who use their smartphone while watching TV

$22 billion

- Mobile advertising spending
- 2012 - 2010
- $22 billion - $3.4 billion

15%

- Online retail sales in 2013 made through mobile devices

3 in 4

- Mobile users who use their device for shopping

$39 billion

Original Source: http://www.topmarketingschools.net/mobile/



*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Growth of Cloud-Based Mobile Platforms

This morning I was reviewing the preliminary results of my "State of Enterprise Mobility 2013" survey.  Over 210 people have now completed it.  Thank You!!!!! The results are very interesting and point to many changes in perceptions and preferences year-over-year.  Stay tuned here for the complete and final results soon.

I was surprised to see that 34.7% of participants now prefer cloud-based mobile platforms.  That is especially meaningful when you consider 23% don't even use a mobile platform.  If my math is right, 45% of those that use or want to use a mobile platform prefer a cloud-based platform.  That is meaningful.

On the topic of mobile security, 42.7% of survey participants prefer a cloud-based mobile security platform.  Since 10.7% don't choose to use mobile security platforms, that means 48% of those that do or plan to use a mobile security platform prefer a cloud-based one.

Please add your thoughts and opinions to this quick survey here: http://survey.constantcontact.com/survey/a07e81h7ar7hklpypms/start

The preliminary results definitely show a growing preference for cloud-based platforms.  That is good news for cloud-based mobile platform companies like www.FeedHenry.com.  FeedHenry is specifically designed for cloud-based enterprise mobility deployments.  I recently had the opportunity to interview Steve Drake, VP of Business Development at FeedHenry.  You may remember his work at IDC over the past 16 years where he built up their mobility and telecom practice.

The focus of FeedHenry is to provide the next generation, cloud-based mobile enterprise application solution that simplifies the development, deployment and management of mobile apps for enterprises. They believe they have a better platform, that is more flexible and agile than heavy on-premise competitors.  They also believe their pricing is much more rational and better suited to a cloud-based environment than other vendors with a primary focus of on-premise platform deployments.

FeedHenry is popular with telecoms and they have big channel partners in Telefonica and O2.

They also believe there is a big difference between platforms designed from the ground up for on-premise and from the sky-down for cloud.  Their platforms are designed for cloud-based environments, which is a good place to be based upon my survey data.

*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mobile Technologies, Delights and Family Life

The Benedicts
Mobile technologies are having a massive impact on our economy, society and culture.  Much is written both here and in many other places about these impacts and changes.  In this article, however, I am going to share some personal ways mobile technologies are having a significant impact on our family.

I publish articles, videos and newsletters daily about mobile and SMAC technologies and trends.  I can continue writing and publishing uninterrupted no matter my location in the world as long as there is Internet connectivity.  This was not possible even a decade ago.  I am still amazed by it.  Today, I can and do publish content from airplanes via WiFi!

Our son graduated last year from Boise State University and went immediately into training and schooling in preparation to serve as a military officer.  While going through training his class had a social media team that would post updated pictures of their training and exercises to Facebook nearly every day.  This simple act, was incredibly important to us and his friends.  We experienced his life, in a small way, through near real-time pictures and social media.  Every day we would search the faces of sweating soldiers for our son and study the photos intently to understand what he was doing and experiencing.

On most weekends, we were able to catch up briefly with our son via his iPhone.  Sometimes for only two or three minutes, but those minutes were precious and highly anticipated.

As his graduation neared, we visited the Facebook page of his organization to learn the details of graduation, schedules, how to dress, where to stay, rules and advice.  It was extremely helpful!

Now as an officer, with a more regular schedule, he can communicate with us and his friends regularly through texts, emails, Facetime and even voice!  He can easily pay his bills, complete his banking and conduct business in Boise, Idaho while he is located elsewhere.  Nearly all of his finances can be managed via his iPhone.

The distance that separates us is minimized by mobile communications and social media.  In fact, last week he uploaded a photo of some materials in Boise that he wanted to sell and posted it on Craig's List.  He is not currently located in Boise, but that is not a limitation these days.  I love it!

A few months ago our daughter graduated from high school.  This summer, as she was preparing to enter the university, her freshman class developed a Facebook page and everyone starting introducing themselves, their class schedules and their dormitories.  She quickly met her classmates, her roommate, and started developing relationships and preparing according to the advice others were sharing online.  We, as parents, will still feel the pain of separation, but also be comforted by the ability to communicate and witness our daughter's experiences via social media and mobile technologies.

Here is another example of how digital and mobile technologies are enhancing our lives.  This week my lovely wife asked her online community about problems with our dishwashing machine.  She received over a dozen responses full of great advice and recommendations within hours.  Some of the advice actually worked!  Problem solved at no cost!

In another example, a small group of us are very active in helping refugee families integrate and adjust to Boise upon their arrival from overseas.  It takes a surprising amount of organization, planning, scheduling and coordination to help new refugees.  They have a massive amount of paper work, appointments and meetings to attend.  They have language classes, schools, medical appointments and case managers to communicate with.  They are all on a timeline with pressure to get integrated, working and sufficient ASAP.
Integrating our refugee friends
into Boise (State) society

When we started working with refugees, we quickly realized that outfitting the refugees with mobile phones was an absolute priority.  It was critical to be able to find people, ask and answer questions, respond to emergencies and arrange transportation to various appointments.  This became quickly apparent after searching the streets of Boise many times over several days for various families and family members that had missed appointments and transportation arrangements, and experiencing deaths and births among the refugee community.

Today, the refugee families we work with are all organized and outfitted with mobile technologies.  Many of the families are now also communicating via SKYPE and Google+ with family members in their home countries preparing them for the journey to Boise.  Mobile and online technologies enable families to maintain and foster relationships with friends and relatives separated by thousands of miles.

I am not one of those people to pine about days gone by.  I love mobile and social media technologies!  It can and will be abused, but that cannot diminish the benefits and delights these technologies bring to the lives of my family and millions of others.


*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mobile Expert Video Series: Dave Edeal, Part 2

In this short interview recorded in Chicago last week, I explore the meaning of industrial strength enterprise mobility with DSI Global's Partner Manager, Dave Edeal.  Enjoy!

Video Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JzAugPrduJ8&feature=share&list=UUGizQCw2Zbs3eTLwp7icoqw


*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

3 Million Page Views and The Latest Numbers on Enterprise Mobility Trends

August traditionally has the fewest number of readers on www.MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com of any month.  However, despite it being August, we hit a major milestone this year that I wanted to share.  I have been writing and publishing content related to enterprise mobility since 2006, but I started tracking the number of page views in 2009.  As of this month we passed the 3 million page views mark!  This includes over 1 million page views on www.MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com and over 2 million page views on my blog http://kevinbenedict.ulitzer.com.

I want to thank every one of you who faithfully read through my articles, newsletters and watch my video interviews optimistically searching for some small bit of useful information :-)  Thank you!  Thank you! Thank you!

I also want to take a moment and ask a favor of you.  I am currently surveying my community to learn the latest information on how they are viewing and implementing enterprise mobility, mobility trends and how organizations are planning to support SMAC (social, mobile, analytics and cloud) solutions and platforms.  Will you take 5 minutes and complete the survey?  Pretty please!

Enterprise Mobility Survey: http://survey.constantcontact.com/survey/a07e81h7ar7hklpypms/start

In return for taking the survey, I will provide you with the final results FREE.  Thanks in Advance!!!!

*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mobile Expert Video Series: Telstra's Amardeep Toor

In this interview with Telstra's GM of Enterprise Mobility Solutions, Amardeep Toor, we discuss Telstra's full enterprise mobility strategy for Australia including cloud based mobile solutions, MEAP/MADP and delivery strategies.  We also talk about Telstra's nearly $20 million investment in Kony Solutions.  Enjoy!

Also, please, please, please don't forget to take my enterprise mobility strategy survey today!  By taking it you will get the final results for free!

Survey: http://survey.constantcontact.com/survey/a07e81h7ar7hklpypms/start

Video Link: http://youtu.be/1K8vTXBGbFo



*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Mobile Expert Video Series: DSI's Dave Edeal

This week I am in Chicago speaking on mobile strategies and trends.  While in Chicago I was able to interview DSI Global's Partner Manager, Dave Edeal.  In this interview we discuss mobile trends, Oracle and mobility in manufacturing.  Enjoy!

Video Link: http://youtu.be/BVuy6GGLuqs


*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

SMAC, Code Halos and the Good, Bad and Ugly of Tracking Data

As a SMAC (social, mobile, analytics and cloud) Analyst, I spend my days researching, writing and presenting ideas to companies and audiences.  One of the most important subjects these days is how to develop and implement the best possible information logistics systems.  That means utilizing and processing collected data in the most advantageous and efficient manner possible to further the ambitions of the business.  That goal is perfectly understandable for a business - collecting business data and transactional data is expected, but when it is your personal data (Code Halos) that is being collected we often feel differently.  For example, I love having my TripIt, Marriott and Delta mobile apps know about me, my preferences and my past, present and future travels, but I don't want that information shared with other vendors (or home burglars) without my permission.

In this article, my colleague Ben Pring, Co-Director of the Center for the Future of Work at Cognizant is kind enough to address the good and bad of having your data (Code Halos) aggregated and tracked online.  I have included two embedded videos - first, a video interview that I filmed with Paul Roehrig and Ben Pring on the concepts of Code Halos, and a second far more professional clip on the role of Code Halos in our everyday life.
***
The response to our articles around Code Halo-thinking is overwhelmingly positive.   I and my co-authors, Malcolm Frank and Paul Roehrig, have spoken at dozens of client and industry events and engaged in numerous post-presentation discussions with a wide array of  senior IT and business leaders who when presented with  the Code Halo idea and follow us through our Crossroads Model tell us of  the opportunities Code Halo-thinking offers (including the risks of “extinction events”) are very real in their industry or market.  For  example, the narrative resonated with a major soft drink manufacturer that saw a new way to think about the social network around its soft drink; with an international airline which is beginning to socialize and internalize the new metaphor of a Code Halo to rethink how it moves customers from point A to point B; and with a leading financial services institution that admitted it was  only too aware of the “ionization” happening all around it as new ideas from start-ups begin to change the competitive dynamics the company faces.

Video Link: http://youtu.be/ctycYs18dyk


The second major reaction though – which may or may not surprise you, if you’ve read any of the previous pieces here, is that many people immediately internalize the Code Halo story and find “the dark side of the Halo.” Rather than focusing on the positive transformational commercial opportunities Code Halos  present, they land on the dystopian, Orwellian world of constant surveillance by Big (and little) Brother that Messer’s Assange, Manning and Snowden have brought to the fore in recent weeks, months and years.

Typically we hear a torrent of worst-case scenarios. “I don’t want to share my information with retailer x”, “I don’t want the government to have even more information on me that they do already”, “this is just going to make hackers’ lives easier”, “I get bombarded by enough advertising already; this is just going to make it even worse”, “I don’t want to live in 1984”, “I am not a number”, “how can I control who knows things about me”, “this is the final nail in the coffin of privacy”, “these ideas will never take off.”

The prism that people have is perfectly understandable.  Their concerns and fears are, of course, entirely valid and understandable. We share many of them. As digital immigrants ourselves we are at times as dazed and confused as any set of middle aged men by the emergent and volatile social mores of the new world and have to fight back the temptation to wallow in nostalgic revelries of how “this wasn’t the way we used to do it back in the day/old country.”

The grand experiment that we are all engaged in – creating a world of unprecedented hyper-connectivity of time, space, and culture - which the Code Halo phenomena is supercharging, is, by its very nature, unknowable and logically contains good things and bad.  Lots of good things are going to happen in a world of Code Halos, as are lots of bad things.

In short, we have no intention to deny that bad things will happen as a result of code meeting code. We fully expect they will. There is a very real dark side of the halo. All of the worst-case scenarios with which we are presented will happen, and are happening now.  People will get hacked. Government intrusion will grow. Advertisers will create new ways to embed advertising into every nook and cranny of our lives through every IP addressable form factor we use. Privacy will recede. The nefarious will have new opportunities to hurt us. Many innovations enabled by Code Halos will have unexpected consequences which will compound over time to produce unanticipated negative outcomes.  And yet we firmly believe these fears, concerns and objections are overblown, irrelevant or moot. Every objection is entirely the same objection that people raised as Al Gore’s Information Superhighway was entering the public consciousness in the middle of the 1990s; “I’ll never put my credit details onto the web,” Average Joe said in 1996; now Joe is routinely spending thousands of dollars online.

The Internet has been a crime scene in the last 20 years -- repeatedly. And it still is. And it always will be. But, today the Internet has 634 million websites and 2.4 billion users, according to uptime monitoring company, Royal Pingdom, and is here to stay. Nobody is going to un-invent it.
In 2013 so much of our lives are already online – shared, visible, transparent, open, all proffered voluntarily through Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tumblr, et al, or less voluntarily via our credit score, phone records, movements, and key strokes that the government can impound without warrant -- that privacy is already an illusion, hackers already hack, advertisers can already advertise within our email, pharmacies already send our 16-year-old daughters coupons for diapers when neither they nor we knew they were pregnant; we are numbers, we are code.

The world that we are describing is already here. The Code Halo era is not imminent. It is now.
Just as the upside of the Internet has won over the downside we believe the upside of a Code Halo world will win over its downsides. The “give to get” ratio of the Code Halo world will be so positive that, in the same way that the cost and convenience of Internet era 1.0 triumphed over its doubters, the new Internet era of Code Halos will similarly see it detractor’s voices diminish and disappear.  

And one last thought; the ultimate value of Code Halos will originate out of the openness of data that is shared and this, of course, will mandate good behavior and accountability.  Just as lousy service that once went unpunished is now broadcast on social media with sometimes devastating impact, individuals or corporations that misuse or exploit information exchanged via Code Halos will struggle to enrich and inflate their Code Halo and to generate commercially material sparks. Bad Code Halo behavior will exist in a world of instant high visibility and will push some towards their extinction event. 

Thoughts?  



For more information on these concepts please visit www.unevenlydistributed.com.

*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

Kevin Benedict on Saving Money by Implementing Enterprise Mobility

In this short video, recorded last week in Sydney, Australia, I discuss how investing in enterprise mobility solutions can save you money and capture more sales. Enjoy!

Video Link: http://youtu.be/WFU627n98ag




*************************************************************
Kevin Benedict, Head Analyst for Social, Mobile, Analytics and Cloud (SMAC) Cognizant
View Linkedin Profile
Learn about mobile strategies at MobileEnterpriseStrategies.com
Follow me on Twitter @krbenedict
Join the Linkedin Group Strategic Enterprise Mobility
***Full Disclosure: These are my personal opinions. No company is silly enough to claim them. I am a mobility and SMAC analyst, consultant and writer. I work with and have worked with many of the companies mentioned in my articles.

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