Good to be back to work after a great MIDEM. Lots of good meetings, people, ideas, and work. I Thought I’d have more time to see cannes, but as it was with most people i talked to, I didn’t leave a 5 block area and was mostly inside at meetings!
I spoke on a panel that was very early on the first day, and I enjoyed all of my panelists. The panel never quite found its groove, although there were moments.
10 billion apps downloaded from Apple, vs 7 trillion txt messages sent in 2010. Which is more powerful? Which gets more hype? How should you talk to your fans on mobile?
The app store hitting 10 billion downloads is impressive, and it happened fast. There is no denying apps have been the story of 2010, and probably 2009. So its no surprise when most bands and managers ask me about mobile, it is about an iphone app.. But lets take a look at the big mobile picture.
MAKING A PLAN: THE NUMBERS
This info is widely available but I’m pulling my core stats from a great in depth article on year end stats over at courtesy of Communities Dominate Brands. (A blog you need to read if your involved in mobile).
The CTIA site also has good us numbers for the US market:
http://www.ctia.org/media/industry_info/index.cfm/AID/10379
SMS
Globally SMS reaches 79% of mobile users. The US is closer to 70%
4.2 Billion active users of SMS text messaging worldwide. In the US, 12 months ending June 2010, more than 1.8 trillion text messages were sent and received (or 4.9 billion per day).CTIA stats
MOBILE WEB
26% of mobile users world wide access the mobile web. In the US it’s 38%. This translates to 1.2 billion people worldwide, close to 100 million in the US.
APPS vs MOBILE WEB
Worldwide:
1.2 Billion mobile phone users surf the web on their phones. 500 million use apps. Mobile web has more than twice the reach globally.
But its closer in US according to comscore:
In August, 2010, 75.6 million mobile subscribers ages 13 and older used downloaded applications, with Smartphone users representing 60.4 percent, up from 43.6 percent in August 2009. For the same period, 80.8 million mobile subscribers used their browser, with Smartphone subscribers comprising 55.5 percent, up from 41.4 percent a year ago.
So how do you make a plan?
REAL WORLD EXAMPLES IN MUSIC
The numbers I’m seeing show more music fans are on the mobile web. I’ve launched over 15 artist apps and have data on over 50 artist sites. The monthly uniques from mobile web beat the total app download numbers for each artist.
For major artists, downloads of 100,000 apps is not a given, but considered good, even when the app is free. I’ve seen the same type of artists deliver over 200,000 unique mobile visitors to their site in just one month. Out of the top 20 artist sites on WBR, most have 20-30% uniques from mobile already.
App downloads vs uniques is not an exact comparison, but it shows the number of fans already using the mobile web is too big to ignore. I’m not surprised many music fans are already getting most of what they need and want from the artist mobile site. New tour dates, photo, classic fan drivers that work perfect on a mobile website, with a fraction of the cost and development.
None of this should stop you from an apps strategy as long as you use the info. Apps need to go to the next level. They need to be more than aggregators or they will simply be integrated by more powerful aggregators.
MAPPING OUT YOUR MOBILE PLAN
Start by making sure your site works on the most popular handsets.
Optimize for mobile. Deliver a light weight mobile specific sites to fans, content optimized for at least the main handsets.
Make sure content tailored for the behavior of mobile users. Less options are better, focus on core news, tour dates, and photos.
Build SMS lists. It’s hard. Start now. Use SMS as a viral mechanism along with your “tweet” this buttons.
Learn what your mobile users want and optimize again. Making the experience tailored to fans is even more important with mobile so make sure your watching behavior.
App upsell – figure out how to use the unique properties of apps to take your fan further down the “path”. Recognize them if you have an app on their platform and push them from mobile web with choice of app “upgrade”. Make sure its worth it if they take you up on it!
Talk to apps – finally – make sure your web site and social networks properly feed mobile aggregators with mobile links (facebook app, rss apps) so you can capture your fans everywhere!
Jack Isquith brings his real world expertise to the digital music blog scene. It is needed. I’m biased as I used to work with Jack, but It means I know this is a very real look at the space from someone who’s been in the trenches. Theories? Yes. Speculation? Yes. But I guarantee it’s coming from someone who’s dealt with the reality of digital music from artist and managers big and small, to the business models of “startups”, down to being responsible and under pressure to deliver real dollars. Your getting the real deal, realer than real, and realer than most others blogs out there.
One of the most popular series on this blog is my experiments with QR codes. Since my first campaign with Green Day in 2009, the use of QR codes evolved. 2010 saw the “official” explosion of smart phones and apps, and the number of innovative and user friendly QR campaigns. These factors combined to make 2010 the year QR codes moved from early adopters to mainstream social users.
CALVIN KLEIN
Great play on censorship!
http://mashable.com/2010/07/13/calvin-klein-qr-code-billboard/
IRON MAN
http://2d-code.co.uk/iron-man-qr-code/
BEST BUY
They are really trying to tap into customer needs here. And as a retail technology powerhouse this makes total sense for Best Buy.
VIBE MAGAZINE COVER LINKS TO EXCLUSIVE CONTENT:
http://www.vibe.com/posts/vibe-digital-cover-jay-z
See the mobile site the VIBE QR code links to from their cover:
http://icreatenergy.com/vibe06_JayZCvr/
Even the creative nature of code presentation is becoming polished as transmedia art! While this campaign is not technially a pure QR code campaign, it shows the art of the medium:
Universal Pictures Repo Men movie sells organs via bar code scanning
You can see QR codes are happening! And this is a global trend…
But what are the results of these campaigns?
I first deployed QR codes on the green day campaign for 21st century breakdown in 2009 and while it was cutting edge at the time, the results showed a very small with a low number of users activating the code. So I’m out to be innovative in 2011, but also to show the goods worked!
Metrics and benchmarks are new territory for QR Code campaigns. 2011 will be the year of both, with enough adoption for the numbers to justify the expense and targeting.
Ill have more to share in 2011, with at least 2 new QR projects kicking off before the summer!