Marketing in Thailand
Dr. Ian Fenwick on locationally
intelligent mobile phones
By Jon Fernquest 
Dr.
Ian Fenwick is a professor at Chulalongkorn's prestigious Sasin
School of Business.He is an expert on digital marketing and has authored important books, papers and presentations in this field (Study his presentations).
He is also a regular contributor to the Bangkok Post business section and also to Twitter (See his Twitter feed).
Several years ago Dr. Fenwick also participated in an interview on the Sasin School of Business for the Bangkok Post education section (Read article).
In today's article Dr. Fenwick discusses how locational intelligence is becoming a standard feature of smartphones.
He describes how locational intelligence will change the way consumers purchase products and services.
This will create a new business reality that companies will have to adjust their marketing efforts to.
(Photo on right of the HTC Magic Smartphone running Google's Android operating system with a GPS system as discussed in the article)
Sasin School of
Business, Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration
of Chulalongkorn University - top business school in
Thailand with partnership arrangement with Kellog School of Business in
the US (See website).
prestigious - respected and admired by many people
digital marketing, digimarketing - "the practice of promoting products and services using digital distribution channels to reach consumers in a timely, relevant, personal and cost-effective manner" (See Wikipedia and Dr. Fenwick's presentations)
a regular contributor - a person who writes articles for a newspaper or publication every week or month
locational intelligence - when a computer uses knowledge of where you are to help you find something or do some task
smartphones - mobile phones that offer advanced features so they become a lot like a computer (See Wikipedia)
GPS System, Global Positioning System (GPS), GPS navigational system - a computer system that shows you where you are on a map by using satellite signals, can be used to help you find directions to a place while driving in your car (See Wikipedia)
consumers - people who buy things (individuals and families)
purchase - buy
marketing - the process and study of how to promote the sale of goods and services (See Wikipedia)
efforts - the work done towards achieving some goal
prestigious - respected and admired by many people
digital marketing, digimarketing - "the practice of promoting products and services using digital distribution channels to reach consumers in a timely, relevant, personal and cost-effective manner" (See Wikipedia and Dr. Fenwick's presentations)
a regular contributor - a person who writes articles for a newspaper or publication every week or month
locational intelligence - when a computer uses knowledge of where you are to help you find something or do some task
smartphones - mobile phones that offer advanced features so they become a lot like a computer (See Wikipedia)
GPS System, Global Positioning System (GPS), GPS navigational system - a computer system that shows you where you are on a map by using satellite signals, can be used to help you find directions to a place while driving in your car (See Wikipedia)
consumers - people who buy things (individuals and families)
purchase - buy
marketing - the process and study of how to promote the sale of goods and services (See Wikipedia)
efforts - the work done towards achieving some goal
DIGI MARKETING
Location, Location, Location: The next computing cycle
18/11/2009Ian Fenwick
I have already written about the rapid growth of mobile devices: no longer merely phones, but multi-function, highly portable digital devices. For marketers, one of the game-changing features of mobiles is their locational intelligence: your mobile knows where you are, even if you don't. This opens up new possibilities for personalising marketing, suiting the location of the potential customer.
Location, Location, Location - common
saying that meaning: when choosing real estate location is the most
important factor to consider
Dr. Ian Fenwick - marketing professor at Sasin graduate school of business at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok (See webpage at university)
mobile devices - a pocket-sized computing device including Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), Smartphones, and data capture devices like barcode, RFID and smart card readers (See Wikipedia)
multi-function - can do many different kinds of things
portable - can carry with you and take anywhere
game-changing features - new things (features) that a product has that change the industry or business
locational intelligence - when a computer uses knowledge of where you are to help you find something or do some task
personalising - meeting the special needs of one person
Dr. Ian Fenwick - marketing professor at Sasin graduate school of business at Chulalongkorn University in Bangkok (See webpage at university)
mobile devices - a pocket-sized computing device including Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), Smartphones, and data capture devices like barcode, RFID and smart card readers (See Wikipedia)
multi-function - can do many different kinds of things
portable - can carry with you and take anywhere
game-changing features - new things (features) that a product has that change the industry or business
locational intelligence - when a computer uses knowledge of where you are to help you find something or do some task
personalising - meeting the special needs of one person
Your mobile doesn't even have to have GPS (global positioning system). Try an application like Google Maps on your mobile. Choose the menu item "My Location". A dot will appear to indicate where you are. Google claims it's accurate to within 500 metres. In my experience, at least in urban areas, it will nail you to within about 100 metres. All done by triangulation between the different cell towers that are conversing with your phone.
Google Maps - a web
app for mapping from Google, powers many map service, including the
Google Maps website, Google Ride Finder, Google Transit, and maps
embedded on third-party websites via the Google Maps API (See website, for
mobile, and Wikipedia)
X indicates Y - X shows that Y is true
will nail you to within about 100 metres - will locate you within about 100 metres (like driving a nail into a board at your location)
triangulation - in trigonometry and geometry, triangulation is the process of determining the location of a point by measuring angles to it from known points (See Wikipedia)
cell towers - the towers scattered across the country with antennas that carry and transmit mobile phone signals
conversing - talking with, having a conversation with
X indicates Y - X shows that Y is true
will nail you to within about 100 metres - will locate you within about 100 metres (like driving a nail into a board at your location)
triangulation - in trigonometry and geometry, triangulation is the process of determining the location of a point by measuring angles to it from known points (See Wikipedia)
cell towers - the towers scattered across the country with antennas that carry and transmit mobile phone signals
conversing - talking with, having a conversation with
Mobile web access: As mobile devices become more powerful, so mobile internet access soars. Mary Meeker, the managing director of Morgan Stanley, in her annual address to the Web 2.0 Summit recently termed mobile internet the "next major computing cycle".
She predicted that mobile web access would become 10 times greater than desktop access and that it would grow far faster than traditional access. That means more potential customers using locationally aware devices to browse the web. That means an opportunity for marketers to provide locationally relevant messages.
As we have already seen, search is now the entry point to the internet for most users. Even when users know the website address (URL) they want to go to, they often type it into a search engine. The search engine will fix any typos and spelling errors, and get them where they want to go. As mobile web access grows, we can expect mobile search to grow.
internet access -
being able to connect to and use the internet
Web 2.0 Summit - a conference held in October by O' Reilly Publishing that brought together tech and media people for discussions on the future of the internet (See webpage and Youtube Videos)
mobile internet - the part of the internet that mobile phones can access and use
"next major computing cycle" - the next big thing in the computing world
desktop access - using the internet from a desktop computer
locationally aware devices - devices that have GPS and know where they are
locationally relevant messages - messages and information that use your location to help you
typos - mistakes in spelling words in a printed document or publication
Web 2.0 Summit - a conference held in October by O' Reilly Publishing that brought together tech and media people for discussions on the future of the internet (See webpage and Youtube Videos)
mobile internet - the part of the internet that mobile phones can access and use
"next major computing cycle" - the next big thing in the computing world
desktop access - using the internet from a desktop computer
locationally aware devices - devices that have GPS and know where they are
locationally relevant messages - messages and information that use your location to help you
typos - mistakes in spelling words in a printed document or publication
Mobile local search: Already the major search engines offer mobile versions, adapted to the needs of mobile users. That doesn't just mean a different layout, more suitable for a mobile screen. It means a change in the search algorithm itself.
A search for pad Thai from a desktop yields encyclopedia entries, lots of recipes, some pictures, and a few restaurants from around the world. The same search in the mobile version yields restaurants close to the searched that serve pad Thai.
These localised search results are likely to provide greater customer benefit (probably the mobile searcher is not looking for recipes) - and, at the same time, they provide a low-cost vehicle for small businesses to get noticed.
So make sure you have a website (no matter how small your business) and that the mobile version of that website works, looks good and carries informative content about what you do, and how you do it better than others. And consider buying advertising in mobile search results.
The market for mobile advertising is set to explode. No wonder that Google just spent $750 million to acquire AdMob, one of the largest mobile advertising platforms. AdMob claims to have delivered mobile ads that have been seen more that 126 billion times. But remember, in digital it's not impressions that are important: it's participation - active engagement. One way to get engagement is to harness the power of social networks.
layout - arrange
information on a mobile phone or computer screen
AdMob - one of the leading mobile phone advertising companies, recently bought by Google (See Wikipedia and website)
impressions - "An online advertisement impression is a single appearance of an advertisement on a web page. Each time an advertisement loads onto a user's screen, the ad server may count that loading as one impression. However, the ad server may be programmed to exclude from the count certain nonqualifying activity such as a reload, internal user actions, and other events that the advertiser and ad serving company agreed to not count" (See Wikipedia)
participation - when a person joins an activity, instead of just watching
engagement, active engagement - actively doing an activity
harness the power of Y - use Y to achieve some goal
AdMob - one of the leading mobile phone advertising companies, recently bought by Google (See Wikipedia and website)
impressions - "An online advertisement impression is a single appearance of an advertisement on a web page. Each time an advertisement loads onto a user's screen, the ad server may count that loading as one impression. However, the ad server may be programmed to exclude from the count certain nonqualifying activity such as a reload, internal user actions, and other events that the advertiser and ad serving company agreed to not count" (See Wikipedia)
participation - when a person joins an activity, instead of just watching
engagement, active engagement - actively doing an activity
harness the power of Y - use Y to achieve some goal
Mobile social networks: Social network sites are the success story of the web. Now they are going mobile. Once countries reach 3G levels of mobile access (as most have already: hint, hint), mobile social networks take off.
eMarketer, a leading digital marketing research company, recently predicted that more than 600 million people worldwide will access social networks from mobile devices by 2013.
Japan's leading social network, Mixi, already delivers two-thirds of its page views to mobile devices. Accessing social network sites from mobiles gives some very major user benefits. If I choose (giving permission), the social network will show my location to my friends, and allow me to see their locations.
It can also display items in the neighbourhood likely to be of interest to me. If I have joined groups on the social network that are interested in art, the mobile social network site can display nearby art galleries. If my profile mentions an interest in Japanese food, it can display nearby Japanese restaurants.
What's more, the mobile social network site can harness the power of my social networks by displaying my friends' reviews and comments about those art galleries (or restaurants). It also provides a vehicle to provide relevant, locationally specific, information both from my social network and from digimarketers. Locational relevance will become a major factor in digimarketing success.
Dr Ian Fenwick is an adviser at the Sasin Graduate Institute of Business Administration, and founding partner of digiAindra Co. He recently co-authored 'DigiMarketing: The Essential Guide to New Media & Digital Marketing' (Wiley 2008). e-mail ian@digiAindra.com or see his presentations at http://www.SlideShare.net/Ian.Fenwick. Follow him at http://www.Twitter.com/DrIanFenwick
3G - third
generation mobile phone, the next level of mobile
phone services beyond the current second generation (2G), supports
broadband internet, supports greater numbers of voice and data
customers especially in urban areas (See Wikipedia
on 3G)
..hint, hint.. - used to say something indirectly (like Thailand has taken a very long time to get 3G)
take off - become popular with many people
eMarketer - a marketing research firm specializing in the internet (See website)
Mixi - one of the top social networking websites in Japan, "as of May 2008, mixi had over 10 million users and an 80% share of the social networking market" (See website and Wikipedia)
profile - personal information on a website (a description of who you are, your work and your personal interests, likes and dislikes)
..hint, hint.. - used to say something indirectly (like Thailand has taken a very long time to get 3G)
take off - become popular with many people
eMarketer - a marketing research firm specializing in the internet (See website)
Mixi - one of the top social networking websites in Japan, "as of May 2008, mixi had over 10 million users and an 80% share of the social networking market" (See website and Wikipedia)
profile - personal information on a website (a description of who you are, your work and your personal interests, likes and dislikes)
(Source: DIGI MARKETING, Location, Location, Location: The next computing cycle, 18/11/2009, Ian Fenwick, link)
