Google Bows "In-Stock Nearby" for Retailers

Google promised to bring local inventory data to online and mobile shopping and the company has started to roll the program out. According to a post on the Google Mobile Blog today:

if you're searching for a product that is sold by participating retailers, including Best Buy, Sears, Williams-Sonoma, Pottery Barn, or West Elm, you can just look for the blue dots in the search results to see if it's available in a local store. If you see a blue dot, you can tap on the adjacent "In stock nearby" link, and you'll be taken to the seller's page where you'll see whether the item is "In Stock" or has "Limited Availability" near you. You'll also see how far away the stores are from you -- as long as you've enabled My Location or manually specified your location.

(Emphasis added)

It's big boxes and major retailers for now, but Google is inviting any and all retailers to participate. This is the "killer app" for Google Shopping, which has generally been a lackluster destination. 

This is currently available only for mobile and on high end mobile devices, specifically iPhone, Palm and Android. It's also US only.

There are others that already do this in the marketplace, including Krillion and its various distribution partners, Milo.com, NearbyNow (although its model has changed) and Channel Intelligence (for a few retailers). It's very much a feature consumers want and will use so this is a smart move that will send Google's major competitors scrambling to match it. 

Update: I've spoken to Google about this and have a more detailed post at Search Engine Land. 

Target to Mainstream Mobile Coupons

Mobile couponing has been something of an exotic and unfamiliar beast to both retailers and consumers until fairly recently. However, now, just like American Idol mainstreamed (if I can use it as verb) text messaging for US users a couple of years ago, Target is potentially going to do the same for mobile couponing.

The company has launched what it calls the "first-ever scannable mobile coupon program." The announcement has been widely covered, but the release explains the mechanics of the program: 

Guests can opt-in to the program on their PC at Target.com/mobile, on their phone at m.target.com or by texting COUPONS to 827438 (TARGET). After opt-in, guests receive a text message with a link to a mobile Web page that contains multiple offers, all accessible through a single barcode. Offers are single use and expire on the date listed.

Issues with the POS and redemption, which have historically plagued mobile couponing (outside SMS), have reportedly been resolved with a technology upgrade that permits the retailer to scan barcodes at the register:

Target's point-of-sale scanning technology makes mobile coupons possible, and Target is the first major retailer with the ability to scan mobile barcodes in all of its stores. 

Retailers are on the vanguard of mobile marketing and finding success in early trials with advanced, as well as integrated, digital marketing approaches. Witness also Placecast's geofencing SMS marketing program with retailers. 

Perhaps no other retailer, save Wal-Mart, has the kind of clout and visiblity to push mobile couponing quickly into the mainstream. Target it must also be said is not a mainstream retailer from a digital marketing perspective. The company has been very systematic and progressive in developing digital strategy, including mobile.

YouTube Launches Ads on Mobile Website

Google announced the launch of display ads on YouTube today in the US and Japanese markets:

[T]oday, we're launching ads on the home, search, and browse pages of the American and Japanese YouTube mobile websites (m.youtube.com from your mobile browser). This is a great way for advertisers to reach YouTube viewers across multiple platforms. In fact, at launch YouTube will immediately provide one of the largest audiences for a mobile ad campaign anywhere on the mobile web. And because YouTube mobile attracts early adopters, the site can deliver to advertisers a coveted demographic of tech savvy trendsetters. 

YouTube has always been part of Google's display advertising story, now extending into mobile. The company has moved to acquire leading mobile ad network AdMob, which has not been finalized. Interestingly, the YouTube iPhone app doesn't feature any ads. And I wonder if Google is trying to avoid running afoul of Apple's somewhat murky policy against doing geotargeted ads against non-geotargeted content (assuming that geotargeting is available).

The Mazda ad on the homepage that you see below appears to be a pure national awareness ad without even a dealer locator. The image below (on the left) is of the mobile Web version of YouTube and (on the right), the iPhone App:

Google reported that traffic to the mobile version of YouTube was way up:

The . . . site traffic grew by over 160% in 2009, and now millions of people all over the world are streaming tens of millions of videos every day on their mobile phones.

Android Growing, 29% Accessing Mobile Internet

Android has seen some impressive growth over the course of the past quarter, according to new numbers out today from comScore. CTIA counts over 270 million mobile subscribers in the US; comScore argues there are 234 million ages 13 and older. Here are the subscriber figures for the four largest US carriers:

• Verizon -- 91.2 million
• AT&T -- 85.1 million
• Sprint -- 48.1 million
• T-Mobile -- 33.8 million
• Others -- 13 million (approx)

There there isn't likely a causal connection, Android's gain is just a little greater than WinMo's loss.

Here are the big data points from a usage standpoint in the chart below:

• 63.5% doing SMS (this number may be low)
• 28.6% using mobile Internet (with some degree of regularity)
• 19.8% downloaded apps  

You can see in these numbers very directly the caparative reach of each of these "platforms."

If we use a compromise figure of 250 million mobile subscribers, then number of mobile Internet users in real terms would be 71 million people in the US. 

Top US handset makers:

Skyhook: Location a Gateway to Community

I caught up with Ted Morgan, CEO of Skyhook Wireless, and he gave me a preview of some exciting stuff to come out of the Boston-based firm. However I'm forbidden from discussing any of it right now.

We also spoke about the state of the major smartphone platforms and Morgan gave me some visibility into app developer perspectives on each of them. "It's not that different writing code for HTML5 apps vs. a native app." 

We also got into Windows 7, the iPad, Apple vs. Google and some other juicy and off-the-record topics. 

Skyhook provides location technology for the iPhone and most of the major location apps on the various smartphone platforms, although most of the action, from Skyhook's point of view is still on the iPhone. Skyhook in one way or another is seeing the activity on 80 million devices across North America, Europe and Asia and the company is sitting on a mountain of interesting data as a result. 

Morgan told me that Skyhook's servers see 300 million location lookups every day. Yet only about 5% of the apps across the apps stores are location aware. In particular Morgan said that there were about 8,000 location-enabled apps in the iTunes store, out of roughly 160,000 total. That's a kind of a paradox if one operates from the premise that location is at the heart of the mobile experience. 

Morgan discussed another more subtle and complex use for location on mobile devices, beyond finding places and people. He sees a location layer or location awareness as a way to build community: for example, news apps or music apps that show what's popular in a particular geography. Location is a layer or aspect but not the center of the experience necessarily. 

Morgan believes that learning about what people near and around you think is valuable or interesting can help these apps and sites build community and loyalty. Location becomes a basis for community because it makes the abstractions of news, photos, music more concrete in a local or offline context. Location offers a shared circumstance that can enable people to discover and connect with one another. 

With community and loyalty, Morgan believes, come new opportunities for monetization as well. 

Where Launches 'Hyper-Local' Ad Network

uLocate, which operates popular mobile site/app Where, has launched WHERE Ads, which it's positioning as a new "hyper-local" ad network. Last week I spoke to Where marketing kingpin Dan Gilmartin about it.

Gilmartin told me this initiative grew out of the company's (and it's users') frustration with conventional mobile display advertising and third party networks that too often supplied ad inventory wasn't very relevant, he said. The company has thus created its own solution and is going to make it available to third parties. As part of that Where also distributes local ads from other networks and sites (e.g., CityGrid).

The ads are geographically and usually contextually relevant. They appear at the bottom of pages, fairly unobtrusively -- one might even argue almost too unobtrusively:

The release says that "Click Through Rates (CTR) on WHERE Ads has exceeded other mobile ads by as much as three times." Gilmartin discussed this better performance during the trial period with me fairly extensively during our earlier call.

I'm narrowly avoiding the cliche that relevant ads are "content" when I say these ads don't appear to be "ads" because of their immediate relevance to the category and location. Although they're not contextually relevant all the time. (I don't recall if there's behavioral targeting going on however.)

The more relevant the ads the more consumers will respond; it's pretty simple.

The general challenge has been getting the LBS inventory to provide enough fill. Now, networks such as CityGrid, V-Enable and Where are providing more specific LBS ("hyper-local") ad inventory, beyond the more conventional geotargeted inventory from traditional mobile ad networks. 

Dan Gilmartin will be on my panel on LBS monetization at Where 2.0 on April 1. Also on the panel will be Google, Placecast, de Carta, and Citysearch. 

HP Slate Readying iPad Attack: 'The Full Web'

Adobe is in full damage-control mode as it seeks to convince the world that Apple and not Flash is the true pariah in the new world of mobile computing. In the first new imagery since its introduction by Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer at CES, HP and Adobe present the forthcoming HP slate device and demonstrate how it provides users with access to the "full Web and not just a part of it" -- as opposed to Apple's "incomplete" Web capability.

Notice in the video below, which is a "preview of Flash player and [Adobe] Air on HP's slate device," the repeated indirect critical references to the iPad without the mention of Apple or its anti-Flash devices:

My belief is that the iPad will be a success and devices that merely reproduce the PC experience on a slate without a keyboard will fail because they're a weaker version of a laptop -- that is unless they're very cheap.

Survey: iPhone 'Addicting' for Some Students

A Stanford University anthropology professor conducted a survey of student iPhone owners (n=200), most of whom (70%) had owned the device for less than a year. Many of these student-repondents expressed the idea that the device had become indispensable to the point of "addiction" for some.

Here are the top-level findings: 

• Nearly 85 percent of the iPhone owners used the phone as their watch
• 89 percent used it as their alarm clock
• 75 percent admitted to falling asleep with the iPhone in bed with them
• 69 percent said they were more likely to forget their wallet than their iPhone when leaving in the morning
• 74 percent said the iPhone also made them feel cool

Ranking the addition on a five point scale, "with five being addicted and one being not at all addicted":

• 10 percent of the students acknowledged full addiction to the device
• 34 percent ranked themselves as a four on the scale
• 6 percent said they weren't addicted at all

And among those who didn't consider themselves completely addicted:

• 32 percent expressed worry that they would become addicted someday.
• 15 percent of those surveyed said the iPhone was turning them into a media addict
• 30 percent called it a "doorway into the world"
• 25 percent found the phone "dangerously alluring"
• 41 percent said losing their iPhone would be "a tragedy"

Next up: iPhone Anonymous

4G Will Really Be 3.5G

Next generation broadband -- commonly referred to as "4G" -- is technically supposed to deliver download speeds of 100Mbps. Current 3G speeds are about 2-3 Mbps. The first 4G mobile network is being deployed in in Sweden and Norway by TeliaSonera. Users in those markets will experience download speeds of 20 to 80 Mbps.

In the US all the hype surrounding mobile 4G is mostly just that -- hype. Speeds that mobile users in the US will experience will be a fraction of those now being offered in Scandanivia. Verizon's LTE deployments, rolling out later this year and next will offer actual speeds of 5Mbps to 12Mbps. Sprint WiMax promises "average download speeds of 3 to 6 mbps." Still that will be a meaningful improvement over what exists today.

Meanwhile US cable ISP providers are seeking to upgrade their networks to offer true 100 Mbps speed. According to an article in CNET, 100Mbps exists today.

From a technical standpoint, 100Mbps is achievable today. In fact, Cablevision is already offering a 100Mbps service, and Comcast, which has been offering 100Mbps to business customers since September in one test market, is about to launch 100Mbps service to consumers in several markets in the first half of this year.

Verizon Communications, which has deployed fiber directly to people's homes, doesn't offer 100Mbps service right now, but a company spokesman said such a service will be available soon. And Cox Communications, which is also upgrading its cable network, said it will have 100 Mbps service this year as well in some markets.

The article goes on to discuss the key issue: consumer pricing, which will make 100Mbps too costly (at least in the near term) for most US households. Prices will come down over time as competition heats up and consumer expectations evolve.

As speeds improve consumer behavior will continue to change, especially among mobile users. The faster that mobile (and WiFi) networks become the more people will turn to their handsets and other mobile devices (think iPad) before they go to the PC. 

AT&T Renews Big Mobile Campus Challenge

This is the second year that AT&T has run what it calls Big Mobile on Campus Challenge. Essentially students develop mobile apps and AT&T owns them.

The winner or winning team gets $10K. Runners up get $5K and devices of their choice. This is very smart because AT&T gets lots of free/cheap development for mobile apps by a very mobile-savvy population. The company gets good PR and the winning app(s) may actually be useful and capable of implementation.

 Here's video of last year's "Rover" local-mobile app winner:

Google Should Integrate Latitude and Buzz

There's an article in eWeek that discusses the potential integration of Google's somewhat controversial Buzz service with the pre-existing Latitude friend finder:

[Google PM Steve] Lee said that while these features showed how Google is "pushing boundaries in terms of sharing location," they are hardly the last stop for innovation with Latitude. "We're still investing in Latitude and we think it's extremely important. You'll see more and more great stuff around Latitude."

"Down the road, there might be points of integration between Buzz and Latitude, but they are separate products and have different use cases." Lee declined to provide specifics, but noted, "we're thinking of what apps we can build that have certain compelling use cases and how can location enhance those apps."

Google now has many location-oriented "point solutions" (Buzz for mobile, Local for mobile Web, Maps & Street View, Navigation, Latitude, etc.). As Lee says Buzz and Latitude are different offerings with different use cases; however the company should find a way to combine them into one or at least cross-pollinate them.

I imagine that Google's view is that these are effectively all "layers" within Google Maps and so they are integrated in a sense. I would also imagine -- though Google won't share specific numbers -- that Latitude has lost some momentum to newer rivals in the market: Foursquare, et al. Indeed, Yelp, Foursquare and the other location-aware mobile offerings have both a way to notify friends of your location and also see what others have said about the particular location or business. 

Google also now owns Aardvark, which offers a real-time advice or recommendations channel and has a very heavy local or real-world dimension. How the company will integrate that (or not) into these other layers remains to be seen.

Google has a kind of embarrassment of local riches but it needs to bring more of these capabilities together in an elegant and useful way. 

A Wave of 'Kindle Remorse' As iPad Approaches

Recent ChangeWave survey data shows considerable demand for the forthcoming iPad and, interestingly, a wave of "buyer's remorse" among some of those with other tablets and eReaders. According to the survey of "3,171 consumers, conducted in the aftermath of that Apple announcement (Feb 1-10)," 57% of eReader owners are either uncertain about their purchase or would have bought an iPad.

Here are the data: 

Here's ChangeWave's "bottom line":

While the iPad launch is likely to strengthen overall e-Reader demand, the survey suggests Amazon and its competitors could well find themselves relegated to playing catch-up within just a few quarters if they don't preemptively move quickly to upgrade their own e-Readers.

Smaato: iPhone CTRs on Ads Decline

When it comes to mobile search and paid-search clicks the iPhone still drives most of the volume. However, ad aggregator and optimizer Smaato says that iPhone and iPod Touch display click-through rates (CTRs) have declined and that Windows Mobile has now pulled ahead. Symbian is the king. 

The data in the chart below represent concentrations in the US and Asian markets. Smaato is looking at "performance" in 35 mobile ad networks covering "more than 3000 registered mobile publishers in February 2010."

An index score of 100 is the average CTR. So in the chart above, Symbian, Android, "featured phones" over-index -- meaning their users click more -- and those below 100 are under-indexing; their users click less. 

Smaato comments on the decline in the iPhone/iPod Touch CTRs:

One of the big surprises is the continuing decline of CTR Index from iPhone and iPodTouch with a rate of 89; it’s the first time Apple devices have dipped below the average Index of 100. In December 2009 the iPhone posted a CTR Index of 119, sliding to 104 in January 2010.

There will be a good deal of unreflective discussion of these findings. It's important to point out as a fundamental matter that clicks as a display metric are inadequate and fail to capture the real influence of dispaly advertising online. There is now a substantial body of evidence that display ads influence purchase behavior despite a lack of clicks. 

So while these data are interesting, they don't necessarily correlate with actual purchase outcomes or brand influence on consumers from mobile display ads. 

Taptu: Roughly 1/3 of Sites 'Touch-Friendly'

Building and optimizing a site for the "mobile Web" is a lot more difficult than doing so for the PC. You've got a conventional HTML site, which may not work if it's flash-heavy. Then you've got apps, which publishers and brands may or may not need, and then you should have a "touch-friendly" iPhone-optimized mobile site. 

Most sites are not well designed for the mobile Web and many marketers are simply unaware of how critical this is becoming. Gomez, in a self-serving way, has documented that poor mobile performance can affect sales and have a negative impact on brand impression. 

Mobile browser Taptu now has released a report that analyzes the degree to which sites are set up and optimized for what it calls the "touch Web" -- basically for smartphones with touchscreens. The company examined 113 million sites and found that roughly a third were "touch-friendly." 

By category, here's Taptu's breakdown of the percentages of sites that are touch-friendly:

Taptu defines "higher quality sites" as those "which as used as the basis of our category-level analysis are defined as those with above average quality score for either visual quality or information quality."

The shopping sites are best positioned, with social networks not far behind. Mostly that means Facebook, MySpace and Twitter. Facebook is very well set up for mobile of course, across devices and platforms. What's a bit surprising is how poorly configured the "places, travel & local" category is. Only 9% of "higher quality" sites in the category are optimized for touchscreen smartphones. Yet this is content heavily used by mobile subscribers with data plans. 

Over the next 12 months every major brand and publisher will need to upgrade for smartphone owners. 

Mobile Becoming Focus for Social Networking

According to data released by comScore, 30% of US smartphone users access social media sites via mobile browser (they're not counting access via apps in the data). Facebook says it has 100 million are "active" mobile users around the globe. That number is destined to grow, as is the number of mobile Twitter users. 

Here's the top-level comScore data:

In January 2010, 11.1 percent of all mobile phone users accessed a social networking site via mobile browser, an increase of 4.6 percentage points from the previous year. Much of this growth has been driven by smartphone owners, 30.8 percent of whom accessed social networking sites on their mobile browsers, up more than 8 percentage points on the year. By comparison, just 6.8 percent of feature phone users accessed social networking sites on their mobile phones.

Here's Nielsen's parallel demographic view of US mobile social networking (in the aggregate):

Note that the female audience is larger and that older users comprise more of the mobile social network user base. The largest single group is over 35 (probably owing to the economics of mobile data plans). However what's very clear is that mobile devices are becoming a primary tool for social media access and status updates for ever larger numbers of people. 

Vlingo Adds Speech-enabled E-Mail and SMS to the iPhone: More Speechable Moments

Today Vlingo introduced an upgrade of its speech-enabling software for the iPhone that has a totally new look, but more importantly adds the ability for owners to dictate and send email and content that can be pasted into SMS messages. I said "owners" as opposed to users because the new capabilities are being introduced as features that can be purchased "inside" the application. Individually, each feature carries a $6.99 price, but can be purchased as a bundle for $9.99.

Once purchased, the new features are nestled seamlessly within the Vlingo application, which means that Vlingo has largely cracked the code in terms of user convenience and reduction of application latencies. Its nearest competitors, on the iPhone at least, are Dragon Dictation (from Nuance) and ShoutOut (from Promptu).

All three applications are comparable in terms ability to accurately render utterances. The big difference is Vlingo's ability to differentiate between commands and content. Where others require users to choose their delivery mechanism either before or after dictating content, Vlingo is designed to "understand" that when I say "Text Dari Barzel I'm going to be late coming home", I mean: Send a text to the wireless phone of Dari Barzel saying "I'm going to be late coming home."

After rendering the dictation, it takes me to the messaging app in the iPhone where I double tap in order to paste the message in an SMS. It is a tiny bit clunky, but is still a time saver. Promptu, by contrast enables its users to choose the recipient from the phone's contact list and then sends the SMS through an email gateway. It is fairly convenient for the message originator, but comes through with some strange heading information for the recipient to interpret (including some "smiley faces" in the place of punctuation in some instances).

Like Vlingo, Nuance's Dragon employs the native texting capabilities of the iPhone, meaning that the user exits the application and double taps the text entry bar to "paste" the rendered text before sending. Unlike Vlingo, Dragon starts with a screen designed for the input of dictated text. It then prompts users to designate whether the message is to be sent via email, SMS or simply stored to the iPhone's clipboard. After selecting the designated option, it exits Dragon and goes to the native messaging app, where, unlike Vlingo, users must choose the recipient manually from the phone's contact list. Thus Vlingo, in this case is a time saver.

By adding SMS and email, Vlingo is adding to the "speechable moments" on the iPhone. Google had done much the same by speech-enabling the search box in the Google application, as did Microsoft with Bing Mobile. Collectively, they are making voice input to a phone "cool" again, and the result is more frequent use. In the aggregate, Vlingo's Hadley Harris told us, the average rate of usage is "five times per day". It varies by region and "platform" but it spans Search, Messaging, Voice Dial and Social applications (like updating Twitter or Facebook). On platforms that offer it, "text messaging" is the most common. On the iPhone, the most common use has been generic search.

As Harris explained "We we differentiate around our vision of being anything to the phone and Vlingo recognizing it and taking action." That means that the application recognizes the users intent in real time and takes action on it. Accuracy is getting better, but more importantly "task completion" has been steadily improving as well. Completion of tasks, which ultimately culminate in a trasaction, broadens the spectrum of prospective revenue models in the speech-enabled mobile world.

Gartner Has No Idea How Many iPads Will Sell

IT consulting firm Gartner said today that global PC shipments will increase by 20% this year:

Worldwide PC shipments are projected to total 366.1 million units in 2010, a 19.7 percent increase from 305.8 million units shipped in 2009, according to the latest preliminary forecast by Gartner, Inc. Worldwide PC spendingis forecast to reach $245 billion in 2010, up 12.2 percent from 2009.

That kind of projection is relatively safe given that the economy is improving and there's pent up demand among consumers and enterprises (especially) for new machines. But Gartner goes on to say:

Apple's announcement of its upcoming iPad has created much discussion in the marketplace regarding market opportunities for traditional tablet PCs and next-generation tablet devices, such as the iPad. Gartner's initial thinking is that vendors could ship up to 10.5 million traditional tablets and next-generation tablet devices worldwide in 2010.

Here's where it all breaks down and falls apart.

Tablet computers have historically failed. The Kindle is a hit but it's not a PC. The many competitive eReaders (also not PCs) have yet to enter the market (except Nook and Sony effectively). The iPad (also not a PC) will be successful in my view but its success is highly speculative at best right now. 

There will be a range of Android tablets (Nook is one such device) that may succeed (depending on price). These are also not PCs.

True tablet PCs -- flat panels or slates running Windows 7 -- are again destined to fail. That's because people will opt for Windows 7 netbooks or laptops instead, which are more functional. Tablet computers such as the HP Windows 7 device unveiled at CES are not going to sell (unless they're dirt cheap).

As for the non-PC iPad and its non-PC slate competitors (other than Kindle and Nook), any projected sales figures are completely speculative and pulled from the ether or someone's posterior. 

Google Offers 'Gestures' As Search Input

Google is experimenting with various ways to get queries and content into the phone that take advantage of native features of the mobile handset (voice, camera). Now comes touch-screen gestures as a way to call up contacts or content on the device:

Today we're pleased to announce Gesture Search, a new Google Labs application for Android-powered devices running Android 2.0 or above in the US. Gesture Search lets you quickly find a contact, an installed application, a bookmark or a music track from hundreds or thousands of items, by simply drawing alphabet gestures on the touch screen.

This is another innovation that recognizes the limitations and challenges of keying in queries on the keyboard. It also shows how the PC and mobile experiences are diverging, although gestures will be a part of tablet computers as they penetrate the market to varying degrees. 

Currently this only works for contacts, apps and other content resident on the device (as opposed to the Internet).