Keeping Up: Chronicling Technology Innovation Online

Mobile search - A totally new ballgame

The Mobile web world is growing daily and you should be maneuvering now to be a part of it.  Whether you are an online marketing type like myself or a Web property owner, its the time to prepare for the enormous wave of mobile traffic that will hit the market in the next 2-3 years.  I am a big believer in making strategic moves career-wise to put myself in the middle of favorable trends.  This is how I ended up in online marketing in 2000, despite my early career originating in the finance world as a CPA.  I personally plan on making deliberate decisions to get in on the front end of the mobile Web trend.  Part of that process includes educating myself as it relates to the technology and user behaviors. During that search for information, I ran across a very informative blog post on mobile Web search behavior written by Bryson Meunier.  I encourage you to read the whole post as it contains rich information from top to bottom.  What I glean from this information is that the mobile Web is in its early adoption phase with content being consumed based on what is available right now.  Not surprising, there is a heavy concentration of adult content usage on the mobile Web today.  This is similar to the early stages of the desktop web ten or more years ago. The demand for more mainstream content use is there and it will be surging as the carriers open their networks to different phones and browser interfaces. The content needs to grow to match the demand and those that fill that need first will be positioned to be the next dominant force in the web market.  This could be where the next Google emerges or where Google solidifies itself as the dominant force on the Web for the next 20 years...that is until something even more disruptive and exciting comes along and replaces it. 

Facebook Beacon Update

So I tested a post on Typepad roughly two weeks ago and waited to see if I could identify the post rippling through my Facebook profile.  I also consulted with several friends to see if they could see the post in their news feed.  The only place the post showed up was on my profile page on the day I posted it so the Beacon integration did not organically generate incoming traffic to Keeping Up.  I figured I may see more of my Facebook Friends coming by to check out my blog with this integration but the visibility that I expected to generate did not transpire.  What I did notice about Beacon through my news feed was that my friend Sam Decker at Bazaarvoice posted some favorites on Zappos that rippled through his profile and my news feed.  It landed me at this page  Zappos' Facebook Welcome Page.  I noticed at the bottom of this page, it now has an opt out link that prevents the update to Facebook.  Fascinating stuff! Given the fact that Facebook yesterday changed every thing to an opt-IN rather than an opt-OUT due to major privacy concern backlashes and 50K people who signed a petition against Beacon, I imagine this will change again and again.  I will keep watching and let you know if I see anything new and interesting.