Reports

In late 2009, Yahoo! & Microsoft’s Bing announced a strategic partnership, better known as the Search Alliance, which would effectively consolidate the search landscape by allowing Bing to power both paid and natural search results across the Yahoo! network.  Last week, Yahoo! officially announced that the transition to Bing-powered natural search results was complete for U.S. and Canadian (English only) Yahoo! properties. Other languages and regions will follow in the coming weeks.

This latest report from 360i covers:

• Changes search marketers can expect within the Yahoo! search results page
• New features within Bing’s Webmaster Center interface
• Key recommendations for brands to consider now that the integration has fully taken effect

Read & Download: Impact of Search Alliance on SEO

Facebook has announced its much-anticipated location feature, appropriately named Facebook Places, which allows users to let friends know where they are in real time via their mobile devices.

So, what does this mean? For one, checking in has just gone mainstream. If you weren’t convinced that a couple million Foursquare users checking into businesses mattered, what about over 500 million Facebook users? Facebook Places made the strongest case yet that location will play a pivotal role in mobile social media.

In our latest POV, we take a look at Facebook Places — how it works, where marketers might fit in and what the new feature means for Foursquare. You can read and download the full report below.

360i POV: Facebook Colonizes Locations with Places

Today, we released our seventh and last report in our summer-long series on mobile. This final installment addresses the challenges that marketers might face while embarking on mobile efforts – and presents a better understanding of these challenges so you can plan for them and, in the best case scenarios, use them to your advantage.

Download the full report below.

Mobile Marketing & the Challenges that Lie Ahead
Mobile challenges include:

• Less accessible insights – Research for mobile programs is not as robust as what’s available for websites and Internet users.
• Data overload – Mobile presents another source of data to monitor. Marketers need to analyze how mobile users are accessing their mobile sites and how those behavior patterns match up with what users are doing online.
• Fragmentation – Among all of the devices and operating systems, publishers and ad networks, and various mobile channels, it can be difficult to execute campaigns that tailor to your target customer base.
• Scale – Closely related to the challenges posed by fragmentation are those related to scale. Mobile search is anticipated to grow at a faster pace than global web searches, but even in 2012, mobile volume will be about a quarter of web search (source: RBC).
• Uncharted territories – New mobile opportunities require new creative and new thinking for how to best use them. The biggest challenge is the learning curve to understand how these very new marketing opportunities can tie in with marketers’ overarching strategies.

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If this Summer of Mobile series has been largely bullish on mobile marketing, that’s because the vast majority of marketers can be doing more to reach consumers who are increasingly turning to mobile as the first screen, not the third. You can read previous editions right here on the blog, where you can also subscribe to receive more updates on mobile and digital media.

Mobile commerce is in its infancy, with relatively few consumers making purchases directly from their mobile devices, and relatively few retailers and marketers offering an easy way for consumers to do so.

While they may not be purchasing (yet), consumers are increasingly shopping via mobile handsets, such as researching products and services before completing transactions in stores or online. Coupons delivered via mobile media are sending more consumers to stores, and several competing formats of mobile barcodes are delivering product information largely to smartphone users.

The accelerated intersection of mobile, local, social and commerce is erasing the distinction between online and offline environments and holds major promise for retailers. In this sixth and penultimate POV in a series on mobile marketing, we review the state of mobile shopping and some notable ways marketers are using barcodes and coupons.

360i POV: Mobile Shopping, Coupons & Barcodes

Today we shared the results of a six-month study tracking Twitter usage by consumers and marketers. This whitepaper, Twitter & the Consumer-Marketer Dynamic, analyzes the current state of Twitter when it comes to how consumers and brands relate. Why are people using Twitter – and how? And given these insights, how can marketers use the service to create deeper connections with consumers?

Just four years after its founding, Twitter has more than 100 million registered users that log a collective 65 million tweets each day. Beyond that, the site records 190 million site visitors per month – indicating that a large volume of people are reading content on Twitter, even if they aren’t participating in the conversations themselves.

The surge of consumer interest has inspired brands to follow suit, and today, businesses great and small are signing on in force. Our whitepaper looks at where brands fit in — and how they can make the most of opportunities on Twitter.

Download the full report: http://www.360i.com/TwitterWhitepaper

Read the executive summary »

Up next in our summer mobile series (this is our fifth installment) is a report on mobile applications.

Applications have become an enduring form of mobile media, thanks in large part to the ease of buying apps from Apple’s App Store and the increasing usage of apps on Google Android handsets. With apps’ popularity come new challenges for marketers, as consumers’ attention is split between apps and the mobile web. Marketers will have to prioritize and make tough decisions when allocating finite resources. You can learn more about the challenges and opportunities by reading or downloading the full report below.

360i POV on Mobile Applications

Key Takeaways

• Mobile app usage is on the rise. One of the biggest drivers of app usage is smartphone penetration. In fact, by late 2011, roughly half of all US mobile subscribers will use smartphones (source: Nielsen).  Other studies from AdMob have found that consumers spend about 80 minutes a day engaging with apps.
• How can marketers get involved? Marketers have three primary options when it comes to mobile apps: advertise (via ad networks), integrate (to develop custom experience within established app providers) or build (custom apps).  We also dive into how marketers can prioritize when it comes to building a mobile-friendly website or creating an app, and what’s in store given the recent release of the iPad.
• How marketers are using branded apps? We look at specific case studies from Universal Pictures, Kraft and Tiffany & Co.

For the foreseeable future, apps will only consume more of consumers’ time and attract wider audiences, especially as smartphone penetration keeps rising. The competition for attention within the app market is daunting, and standing out requires a marketer’s steadfast commitment. If creating a branded experience isn’t the best fit for a marketer’s plans and goals, there are still other ways to reach app users. Marketers will increasingly want to explore such options as mobile applications attract more of consumers’ media consumption.

Read the blog and follow us on Twitter to learn more about how you can make the most of mobile marketing through apps in the future.

Today, we released the fourth POV in 360i’s summer mobile series – a comprehensive report on Mobile Social Marketing.

Mobile social media, any form of social media accessed through mobile devices, has much in common with online social media: the power of building relationships with consumers, the large and rapidly growing user base, and the potential to incorporate sharing and community functionality into every form of content. In this report we dive into the new opportunities created by mobile social media and how marketers can make the most of them.

360i POV on Mobile Social Marketing

Key Takeaways

• Introduction to Mobile Social Media: A look at what mobile social media is, as well as the challenges and opportunities it presents to brands
• By the Numbers: Social networking is the fastest growing mobile content category – here we take a look at some stats on consumer adoption rates
• Categories of Mobile Social Media: There are many different kinds of mobile social media, including extensions of online social networks (like Facebook for mobile), mobile-central social networks (like MocoSpace), location-based check-in services (like Foursquare) and more
• Location-based Check-in Services: We take a deeper dive into one emerging field within mobile social media that has garnered significant attention from consumers over the past several months
• Developing a Mobile Social Strategy: So, where should marketers begin? Hint: It’s time to bring back the strategic lens as described in our Social Marketing Playbook

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Social media is driving much of the growth of mobile media, just as it has fueled much of the growth in online pageviews and content. New sites and applications seem to sprout daily, while business models of existing players continually evolve to meet marketers’ needs. Marketers should continue to turn to the strategic lens to evaluate opportunities, as it can increase the chances of success for any social marketing program, mobile or otherwise.

Read the blog and follow us on Twitter all summer to learn how you can make the most of mobile social marketing in the future.