Mobile is something I am guilty of forcing down people’s throats at any given opportunity. Be it mobile search, mobile advertising, mobile optimised sites, mobile apps or overall mobile strategy, I’ll talk about it all day given the opportunity. In fact I am sitting on a panel at mini Sascon next week on this very subject.
And mobile will undoubtedly be something we continue spend a lot of time discussing in the next couple of years as the hundreds of large companies who find themselves having to rebuild, re-educate, and refocus based on a new world of always on connectivity.
But mobile is not the future, not beyond the next couple of years anyway. That’s because as the world and technology continue to evolve the future is a platform neutral environment. One where the device you access content on is largely irrelevant. Device fragmentation in the market will ensure of this. Whether it be smaller tablets like the iPad mini, or larger phones like the Samsung Galaxy Note, the device is becoming less predictable and in many ways less relevant.
Of course there is a clear distinction between a machine which is fixed in a location, to one which is used on the move, but the lines here also begin to become blurred as favourites, files and actions become shared between fixed and portable devices. How do you treat somebody on a desktop if their activity can be easily transferred to a portable device and completed there? Are the desktop, mobile, somewhere in between?
The challenge here is having an approach which suits all devices and meets all needs, simple! OK maybe not. With web analytics struggling with cross platform tracking and the possibility of users intentions changing as they switch device it becomes particularly complicated to know how to treat them.
But this is the future challenge marketers face, how to interact with a user who has so many potential online interaction points with your business with varied needs at each interaction. It’s a challenging future, but an exciting one too, as it opens up a whole host of new opportunities that we are just becoming to realise.
Mobile may not be the distant future, however it is the present. Xcite Digital (the marketing company I work for) have seen that mobile-friendly experience can be beneficial to websites through the use of responsive web design and mobile apps. However, I agree with you that there is a blur between which platforms people mainly use which can span from tablet computers to mobile phones.