A deep dive into digital marketing

Mobile, at least there’s something to be bullish about

Posted by Chris under GPS, Google, Mobile, Technology, privacy

I continue to be more and more bullish on the so called third screen, the mobile phone. I’m up to 10 pages full of icons=app’s on my iphone and while some are played with and casually tossed away, most are becoming a daily part of my life.

The area I’ve most be intrigued about is location services. Sure there’s dopplr and brightkite and app’s like Loopt, Cellspin, etc. as well as service app’s that don’t just connect you to people but to product like Where and Urban Spoon. But when Google gets into the game with a service like Latitude, you know the game is changing.

As an advertiser and marketer for my clients, data is becoming increasingly important. Well not just the data but the analysis, use and marketing through it, that’s the important part. For years we’ve talked about: the right message, in the right place, at the right time to the right person. It would seem marrying: mobile, data and, on the fly/flexible creative messaging are we’re just about there.

Sure it’s a little bit out there and not the least annoying to others unless those voices are in your head (or bluetooth headset) is the advertising scene from minority report. But are we really that far away from it.

Take a read to the latest Business Week article for their take on mobile marketing, privacy and where it’s going

saying good bye to .mac, hello mobile.me

Posted by Chris under Apple, GPS, Mobile, Technology

Tomorrow is the day that .mac shuts down to be switched over to the new and exciting .me. The .mac service will be going dark at 6PM PT, Wednesday, July, according to the .Mac support page.

“Members will be unable to access www.mac.com or any .Mac services during this time with the exception of .Mac Mail accessed via a desktop application, iPhone, or iPod touch,” the support page warns.

But never fear .mac user (like me) we’ll be upgraded to .me “seamlessly” according support to the FAQ

I for one am really excited about .mac, especially as I get to stand in line Friday morning to snag a 3G iPhone for my wife. She currently uses a blackberry curve, ical and PocketMac Sync Manager. We’re She’s excited about the over the air syncing between her macbook pro, ical and iPhone. So no more, oops forgot to sync her blackberry so can’t schedule a patient until she checks her computer.

iPhone, back and better than ever

Posted by Chris under Apple, GPS, Social Networking, Technology, iPhone

Think yesterday was a big day for Apple with all of the WWDC announcements. It certainly was but perhaps it was a bigger day on the blogosphere and the web. Why, well let’s start with taking a look at Google and see what we get, as of this morning:

iPhone 2.0 10,500,000
iPhone 2.0 applications 41,900,00

And that’s just Google. The webchatter was at a froth on sites like MacRumors and of course fanboy sites like Gizmodo and Engadget kept their head to head competition going via their WWDC reporting.

But lost in some of this is a deeper look at the applications and some of the features. I for one am really excited about GPS for the iPhone. Having been using a blackberry curve for a while I love the GPS and applications like FindMe, NeoSistec’s CarFinder and of course the driving app like TeleAtlas. I’m expecting this to go to the next level with the iPhone.

For example it’s rumored that TomTom is ready to roll their software on the new iPhone (via Engadget Mobile). Being a huge fan of TomTom, since my Father-in-law got one in the UK years ago, that to me is a great indication of good things to come on the iPhone. Like better location based social networking, as if BrightKite wasn’t sort of weird enough.

More to come I’m sure.