50% markdown is still 200% too much for the intern's budget. (Though I do accept gifts.)
The abundance of chatter this week about the release of the new iPhone has posed an interesting question to marketers. Mobile Web browsing has increased about a gajillionfold over the past several years (vague enough for ya?) and users are eating up video content from the latest YouTube foolishness to video streams from Qik and Fixwagon. So how to marketers capitalize on the influx of mobile web use?
Not an easy answer, to be sure. I don’t claim to know the answer, but I’ll offer my insights with this one disclaimer: I don’t use mobile video. I would if I had something cool like an iPhone — any smartphone, really — but alas my salary as an intern, while above par to be sure, still bars my entry into such rarefied strata. But don’t worry. When I get there, I’ll throw a coming out party. Consider yourself invited.
Back to the issue at hand. Here’s what I know: I know that streaming video to a mobile device is still in its infancy and offers a gigantic range of growth opportunities. I know that no one seems to be capable of creating computer-quality video feeds, even if the smartphone can access those feeds via wi-fi. I don’t know whether this is a case of the phones not being able to handle the feeds or the feeds being incompatible with smartphone technology; either way the fact remains that streaming video to an iPhone is a choppy endeavor.
Furthermore, I’m not convinced that mobile video creates new buying opportunities for a consumer. As mobile Web culture stands right now, video is a bit of a novelty. To say that people can shop on their phone is to leave out the fact that people are more comfortable, for whatever reason, buying from their laptops. So if we have to evaluate mobile Web video in a B2C capacity from a ROI standpoint, the current marketing opportunities would probably earn low marks.
If, however, we are to evaluate mobile Web video from B2B point of view, there may be more leeway. After all, iPhones are most popular among the older professional set, exactly the kind of people who participate in (both ends of) B2B marketing. Because the B2B buying cycle is longer on average than its B2C counterpart, mobile Web video marketing makes more sense as a B2B tool. Mobile Web video can serve as a baited hook to lure potential buyers to a website and, eventually, into the buying cycle. Beyond that, the possibilities seem limited.
Until, that is, AT&T allows iPhone users to stream video from their iPhones. Now, technically this is already possible: some people jury rig their iPhones, others seem to have created software to do so. But I’m betting that AT&T isn’t all that happy about it. Still, the prospect of streaming video from a phone is appealing, especially to those people who organize marketing events, those who attend the events, those who cover the events, and so on. Really, streaming video from an iPhone cuts some significant webcast expenses, and makes the iPhone itself even more appealing (if you can imagine such a thing). The ability to interact directly and publicly with buyers and industry personalities is invaluable, and marketers should be lining up for the new iPhone for this eventuality alone.
Provided the apps work, of course. But that’s another story altogether.
The Marketing Intern 