What people want from mobile services.
The astonishing truth about mobile services is that people use them when they are mobile. It may be an obvious statement, but it is something many service developers forget when implementing their ideas. Bearing in mind mobile environment where people with mobile phones are placed, the first thing you have to think of is how fast and easy your service can be accessed and used. Not how many features it can provide.
Mobile service should serve one particular task, and it helps if this task is unique. It’s not a necessary condition but it can certainly be good for your pocket if you occupy a new niche. However, as said this is not essential.
What essential is user experience. There might be dozens of weather forecast services, but if you make one where you have to press less buttons it can have success. Look at Google and Apple, for example. Companies with no mobile background released just one phone each and now nobody can touch them in terms of sales. Nowadays there is no lack of functionality. What separates the best from others is user experience. No matter how many options and features your service have, if it doesn’t provide convenient and easy experience its doomed to be left unnoticed.
People don’t want to dig out hidden “gems” you carefully placed for them. In fact, they don’t want to spend more than 10 seconds to find out how service works. They are busy with their lives, standing in a queue or driving a car and they really don’t want to think hard about their mobile phones. Its there to ease their lives, if they want to get some info fast, or entertain them if they have some time to kill. Both these functions presume efficiency so your primary task is to make user experience of your service efficient.
What you need is to come up with an idea and implement just the minimum to make it work. Don’t add some stuff just because you can. The function of any service should be crystal clear as its interface. Imagine a car where a steering wheel, pedals and gearshift are replaced with just two buttons – go and stop. Thats what we call a proper user experience. Make effortless UX the primary thing to achieve and results won’t take long to appear.
We’ll explore user experience more in the future. Contact us at info@eyeline.mobi if you want additional info.
[photo: flickr/kirainet]
The Great iPad fever. Early diagnosis.
Yes. The new Apple device is announced and gadget freaks are smashing their heads against the wall. “No multitasking, no cameras, no flash, no this, no that” – these are the main symptoms on the Internet blogs right now. Some, though, are quite immune to the illness and draw sober conclusions about why iPad is cool.
So, why on Earth Apple would make such useless device (according to geeks) which costs at least half a grand? What is the audience for it? As always, Apple thinks different. And with iPad, they are probably thinking of your mom, dad, kids and maybe even your grandma and grandpa.
When it comes to user experience, seems like iPad is the best thing ever created, to get people with no knowledge about computers to the digital world. Browsing web, watching movies, emails, photos – all common tasks are executed in this device with ease and elegance. Your mom is likely to appreciate the slick and showy look of it. Using fingers to manipulate certainly adds to the appeal, as it significantly improves user experience. It is almost like in a Sci-Fi movie, i.e. cool as hell.
These people don’t need multitasking. They don’t need to read The New York Times and watch Youtube simultaneously, while looking through photos. They want just casually do one thing at a time, like reading a newspaper in the kitchen, or watching movie while on a train. And all that is without the complications of PCs.
Let’s leave aside comparison to Kindle – reading books is just one of the functions that iPad have, and it is not the main one. Though Apple is exploring the new market with iBooks, it is likely to succeed with it. iPad have this aesthetic appeal, as all the products that Apple designs. Ignoring technical characteristics, imagine, what your girlfriend would like more as a present, a bland Kindle or a trendy piece of glass with a lovely apple on the backside? And still, if she doesn’t want to read books she can enjoy other functions, which Kindle doesn’t have. And the price is not that different – but iPad is not only a book reader.
As always, Apple fans will be buying it, just because it is Apple. It may also be the first introduction to Mac OS for Windows users. They may finally follow the hype, as 499$ is not that much. And many people will buy it as addition to their home PCs and notebooks.
There is also this niche, people new to computers, which can be quite considerable. Creating services for them, one should follow the prime example – the iPad itself. Simplicity. The NY Times demonstrated the new app for reading their web site at the iPad presentation that perfectly represents this philosophy. Even inexperienced users can learn how to use it in two minutes. Easy and useful web sites and apps are likely to have big success with this market.
Bashing every new Apple device seems like a nice tradition. We, however, think that Stevie will again make loads of cash, and very much deserved, as iPad is truly an innovative gadget. Just wait and see.
This Reading World
A bit unusual post today. I know I have not been plentiful lately… Anyway, this one is big. This one is about books. I hope those who read my posts like books in any form, and I found this author’s article very well written and covering well the direction of development for books.
Enjoy!
Source in Russian: http://www.computerra.ru/vision/423520/
This Incredible Reading World
Author: Anton Nekhaenko
Published 30 April 2009
Regular online readers of Computerra have a skeptical attitude towards distribution of legal content via the Internet. Indeed, why pay for something that can (on a count of one-two-three) be taken via a torrent? Similar attitude is characteristic of a much larger group of people – practically of everyone who has figured out how to use torrents. Giants of the content industry understand this very well and bypass the Russian market, but for some timid steps just for experimental purposes.
Despite existence of such “islands of liberty”, global trends point directly towards iTunes-like models which are targeting mostly mobile platforms. If it itches to listen, you take the device out, press the button, buy, download, and, viola! – you listen. The same is true for films, videos, and TV series. I have to admit all these media are consumed most intensely, whereas books, the subject of today’s post, hold a rather unimpressive position at the first sight. Simply speaking, it is assumed that in developed markets people do not read books. I will never forget Steve Job’s remark from about a year and a half ago directed at Amazon Reader, which was introduced back then: “It’s not important whether this product is good or bad. The fact is that people do not read anymore. 40 percent of Americans read less than one book a year.”
Steve Jobs: “Do you still think that people read???”
Well, Apple has always targeted the needs of American market so arguments about the armies of highly educated, reading Europeans, Russians and Asians are not valid here. Does it mean that the market for electronic books will not be “iTunes-ed” (I mean not the dominance of one company with an attitude but the concept as a whole) as it happened to music, video and programs? Absolutely not. But it will be done by completely different companies which, not without difficulties, are finding their key to the market. In order to understand how this will happen, let’s study the market and check whether Jobs is right in his contemptuous disdain.
Let me note, for a start, that the 40% number was taken by the master of “mirror marketing” almost from the air. The real report, prepared half a year before the famous quote, by Associated Press, gives the number of 27%. Overall, the downward trend is characteristic for the market of paper books which in small steps moves in the direction of “elite” goods – following vinyl discs (love them!) and other physical storage. The new generation in developed countries is not used to physical storage – this fact is well seen by comparing the readership of paper and electronic newspapers by various age groups (there was a curious report on this by Comscore). According to researchers from British Library, electronic books obviously lead to a more superficial, “diagonal” reading but the fact is the fact – this year the market for electronic books in “non-reading” USA will be more than 5 billion dollars, Europe will add another 2.76. By 2010 the global market, by a forecast of Global Industry Analysts, will grow to 9.5 billion.
Developed markets attract all classical “paper publishers” – Barnes & Noble, Penguin, Random House… At the moment they all launch incompatible projects, but this will change soon. What about developing markets? China is interesting in this respect. It seems like China will pirate everything and big publishers have nothing to do there. But this is not true – if legal sales comprise 1-2% of the total volume, in absolute numbers it can be a very significant market. At the moment, book majors just try the waters there. One of the most brave is Penguin Group, which debuts a pilot project in May to electronically distribute English language books in Chinese market.
The project has been developed in cooperation with a local monopolist – Founder Apabi – which controls almost 80% of the local market for e-books, offering half a million titles in Chinese. Of course, there were concerns about illegal copying but expertise of Founder Apabi shows that with the right pricing, stealing is very small – too much work makes too little sense. Taking into account the fact that last year the market has grown to 50 million pieces and 33 million dollars (up 15 and 34 percent respectively), the game is interesting – an average price is growing but stays affordable. 79 million readers (last year data) won’t be left without food for their brains.
Russian market is not that interesting yet – it is still very small. Recently there was an article, in which CEO of OZON, Bernard Luke, complained that the share of electronic books in total sales is less than one percent, which is not surprising given the total number of titles is 3,000. But the director of our “е-book Gazprom” – LitRes – Alexey Kuzmin is very happy – half a year ago he sold 1,500 books a day, now he sells 6,000. An average price of 32 rubles per title may seem high for someone, but if you compare this to the explosion of prices of paper books (non-lengthy books like novels by Erlend Loe at 200-300 rubles apiece), it seems like a good deal.
If it is more or less clear with the market, but how will the books be read? I think that reading from a desktop monitor and notebook has been and will remain an entertainment of a selected few. There are two obvious competitors: on the one hand specialized electronic books like Kindle 2, Sony Reader and others, and on the other – leading smartphone platforms. The former, for their advantage, have a large screen, long battery life, and lesser load on the eyes. The latter do not require any additional spending, are compact and have permanent Internet access through a cellular network thus a powerful channel for spontaneous buying – for situations when you decide you need this book right now.
A unique position is taken by Amazon which fiercely disagrees with Steve Jobs and tries not to give him any chance to catch up. The company has a pretty good Kindle 2 reader, which, by the way, has the problem of permanent Internet access solved – at least for the US. Moreover, the company does not reject smartphone support – there is a client for iPhone, there are plans to support other platforms as well. Moreover, the supply of titles is more than abundant – there are about 300 thousand titles, price for which is moderate – 10 dollars for hot items, 4-5 dollars for the rest.
Last week the company stirred a little turmoil among those who like to read on iPhone with a purchase of Lexcycle company which is known by its Stanza reader. The main worry of regular free-riders readers was that Amazon acquired the company with a secret idea to sink the competitor and to stop people from downloading free books from the computer. Personally, I am doubtful about it – the reader Amazon Kindle 2 allows loading of “guerrilla’s” TXT files, as well as conversion of PDF files into the native AZW format. If free Stanza features will be taken off, I am sure there will be plenty handy men who will code the same in a new program, moreover, Stanza is not the only software reader for iPhone. But the idea to impose control on a competitor through acquisition is quite apparent – Stanza had direct access to catalogs with 50 thousand books for sale and the same number of free books.
Of course, Amazon is not alone in thinking about capturing the reading public – Google has similar plans. But the Corporation, as always, has chosen an unusual distribution model, and it seems like they have erred with it. The company has created a search module, Google Book Search, through which the books can be searched, bought and even rented. Moreover, book authors can choose one of the two: either include their books in the search index for free, and then catch viewers when they go to their site, or join the “Library” – a database which contains a brief book annotation. Moreover, for a fixed fee readers can get full access to the scanned books from the browser. From the collection of such fees, Google is going to pay copyright holders.
Theoretically, all of the above makes Google a full blown competitor of Amazon, but I personally have difficulties with three moments: first, it is inconvenient to read on mobile devices! There is no normal reader even for the native Android (except for FBreader). Second, copyright holders under such model will not sleep well – theoretically, it is possible to make a browser plug-in which creates an offline version of the online book. Third, last Tuesday by a decision of American judge Denny Chin effective date of the Google contract with copyright holders has been put off for 4 months because many of the interested parties had received 334-page contract not long ago and demand more time to get acquainted with it. In a 4 month time Amazon will introduce an Android client and Google will have no right not to let it in the Marketplace.
Voting Using USSD
What if we implement e-voting machines and empower them through USSD? It is one of the possibilities discussed in Nigeria, in African IT. It could be an interesting idea, all in all. For every country.
Source: http://allafrica.com/stories/200904070454.html
MTS in 2008
I have downloaded the latest presentation from MTS prepared for press (mind this). I want to put some numbers here in the blog because these numbers always change and it is hard to keep up with them when citing. But! Some numbers are really telling. I will tell you what at the end.
So… FYI, those are the end of 2008 numbers.
# of subs in mln.
| 2007 | 2008 | abs chg | prct chg | |
| Russia | 57.4 | 64.6 | 7.2 | 11.15% |
| Ukraine | 20 | 18.1 | -1.9 | -10.50% |
| Uzbekistan | 2.8 | 5.6 | 2.8 | 50.00% |
| Turkmenistan | 0.36 | 0.93 | 0.57 | 61.60% |
| Armenia | 1.4 | 2 | 0.6 | 30.00% |
95.7 mln total (if Belarus is included with its 4.32 mln.)
CAPEX
Forecast for 2009 – $1500, of which $350 million are planned for network support ($700 is a rollover from 2008, and $450 is planned for EDGE/3G upgrades). In millions of dollars.
| 2007 | 2008 | abs chg | prct chg | |
| Russia | 918.8 | 1399.3 | 480.5 | 34.34% |
| Ukraine | 544.8 | 595.6 | 50.8 | 8.53% |
| Uzbekistan | 30.1 | 139.7 | 109.6 | 78.45% |
| Turkmenistan | 31.8 | 58.2 | 26.4 | 45.36% |
| Armenia | 14 | 34.6 | 20.6 | 59.54% |
| Total | 1539.5 | 2227.3 | 687.8 | 30.88% |
| % of revenue | 18.70% | 21.70% | 3.00% |
OIBDA (unofficial terminology, Operating Income Before Depreciation and Amortization, which in official GAAP reports by MTS is reported as EBIDTA, though the two are different by definition) in mln. $
| 2007 | 2008 | abschg | prctchg | |
| Russia | 3152.7 | 3924.3 | 771.6 | 19.66% |
| Ukraine | 781.8 | 759.3 | -22.5 | -2.96% |
| Uzbekistan | 157.8 | 242.9 | 85.1 | 35.03% |
| Turkmenistan | 93.5 | 77.6 | -15.9 | -20.49% |
| Armenia | 37.7 | 136.3 | 98.6 | 72.34% |
| Total | 4223.4 | 5140.3 | 916.9 | 17.84% |
Operational Indicators (in $)
Russia
| 2007 | 2008 | abs chg | prct chg | |
| ARPU | 9.2 | 10.5 | 1.3 | 12.38% |
| ARPU excl. Guest Roaming | 9.0 | 10.4 | 1.4 | 13.46% |
| ARPU from VAS | 1.3 | 1.6 | .3 | 18.75% |
| VAS as % of ARPU | 12% | 15% | 3.00% | 20.00% |
| MOU | 157 | 208 | 51 | 24.52% |
| Subscriber Acquisition Cost | 26.3 | 27.3 | 1.0 | 3.66% |
| Dealer Commission | 12.6 | 14.3 | 1.7 | 11.89% |
| Advertising & Marketing | 13.7 | 13.0 | -.7 | -5.38% |
| Churn | 23% | 27% | 3.90% | 14.44% |
Ukraine
| 2007 | 2008 | abschg | prctchg | |
| ARPU | 6.6 | 7.2 | 0.6 | 8.33% |
| ARPU excl. Guest Roaming | 6.5 | 7 | 0.5 | 7.14% |
| ARPU from VAS | 0.7 | 1 | 0.3 | 30.00% |
| VAS as % of ARPU | 11% | 14% | 3.00% | 21.43% |
| MOU | 154 | 279 | 125 | 44.80% |
| Subscriber Acquisition Cost | 12.1 | 11.1 | -1 | -9.01% |
| Dealer Commission | 4.1 | 2 | -2.1 | -105.00% |
| Advertising & Marketing | 5.8 | 7.4 | 1.6 | 21.62% |
| Phone Subsidies | 0.6 | 0.4 | -0.2 | -50.00% |
| Cost of SIM and Payment Cards | 1.6 | 1.4 | -0.2 | -14.29% |
| Churn | 49% | 47% | -1.70% | -3.59% |
More to come… (ARPU from other countries, VAS break-down, analysis)
Is Everything So Bleak?
It was a nice way to end my week here, in Russia, so I thought it would be good to share it with you!
As a side note it was nice to connect with people from TruTeq (South Africa) (on our USSD Expert Group) and Myriad Mobile Software (former Esmertec/Purple Labs) -- a French Company, all in one day!
Are Missed Calls Your Missed Opportunities? Learn Dry Facts.
It was the end of last year. I was asked to prepare a description for one of our products called Missed Calls Alerts. Not that we don’t have one. We just wanted to update to a better version.
A good news for me was that we hired a new girl to help me with writing and I though it would be a good first task for her. She did fine as to describing but…
What is the real selling point for this service, I asked myself?
(For those unfamiliar, the service sends an SMS to a subscriber who was unavailable to take the call about missed calls (who, when, how many times). The service can be extended to send SMS to both parties (the caller and the called), to send SMSes as if from the called party so it is easier for the called to call back, to identify callers from the phone book, etc.)
Well, right off the top of my head, I thought we shall be looking at at least 1 percent ARPU increase.
And you know, that’s what I found asking people from all over the world. But it is really good news! Because it means that every operator should have it (the cost of the solution compared to the benefits says: GET IT!)
And indeed, this product is rather common in mobile-developed parts of the world (meaning NOT the US).
Below are answers to my question about the service on a LinkedIn VAS Professional group:
1) Where it is used:
Felipe Huete, Founder and CEO at MZZO Chile S.A.
Here in Chile we have the service, it works quite well. I don’t have numbers but operators consider it a key service.
Ronen Mense, Interactive Mobile Channels – Mobile Marketing, Advertising, Search
I’ve seen this service here in Thailand for a few years, quite common in fact, and I believe its operator centric. Yet to see what Felipe mentioned as the addition of VAS ads, this is a great ad inventory… Would love to get some of that ad inventory!!
Refik Naccur, VAS project expert/Norconsult Telematics/at STC Kuwait “VIVA”
Talking about the MCA service in the Middle East, it is know in different names like IClip, Super Clip, Majoud “Which means: I am present” and so on. … Any way, this service is very common is the Middle East and I believe it is very essential service for the operators in the area …
Bartlomiej Chmielewski, Product Manager at PTK Centertel
Hi everyone! I’m a Product Manager for MCA-like services in Poland. I do confirm that MCA as well as Notify Me services as performing well and have a great accommodation on the market.
Frederic Ankaoua, VAS Account Manager at Comverse
Hi Ivan, I’m an account manager in Comverse and we have more than 140 operators worldwide providing this service.
Ankur Srivastava (ankur.srivastava31@gmail.com), Product Manager – Cellebrum Technologies Limited
Hi, I have implemented MCA (only called party) for one of the largest operator in India.
2) Now, let’s talk numbers. In order to calculate, we need several statistics and assumptions. That’s what people have contributed:
Bartlomiej Chmielewski, Product Manager at PTK Centertel
In terms of numbers I can say the ‘twins’ [MCA + Notify Me (when user available) - I.K.] can increase your MoU by 10-15% and I have it confirmed with numbers.
Frederic Ankaoua, VAS Account Manager at Comverse
I can tell you that figures from some Western European customers show that there is between 15 to 20% call return due to the Missed Call service.
Raul Castanon, Experienced Product Management / Product Marketing Professional
Typically I built the business case with estimate 10 to 15% which I think is a realistic rate of call return. … Statistics from different operators that have deployed missed call alert support an average of 12% call return.
Ankur Srivastava (ankur.srivastava31@gmail.com), Product Manager – Cellebrum Technologies Limited
No. of messages recvd by the subscriber in a day – 4 (avg)
Calls made after receiving of message – 50-60%
Service Penetration – 10-12%
Price point – INR 15 = 30 cents
Business Model – Revenue Share/ Managed Service with the vendor
Dmitry Mezentsev, Head of VAS R&D, CBOSS
We have in stats 10% of incoming calls that can be notified only by means of MCA and about 40% of call returns which gave 4% total calls increase.
The only question here is service penetration which is in spite of MCA is free is not 100% but sometimes only 5% (we had such a case).
So taking in consideration fair 25% penetration (or 10-12% like in Ankur case) we’ll get 0.5-1%, but it’s really great figure for such a service.
My summary will be the following:
Besides the incomplete voice mails and unreachable, our statistics show that out of 100% sent MCAs only a third are delivered (within one day, that’s the lifespan of the service here in Russia’s MTS). Also we have 100% penetration since the service is on by default.Also: what would be a percent of missed calls in general? I saw 40% somewhere but this seems too high. With our service always on, we have the *perfect* number of about 10% of all calls that are missed and alerted of. Of which, only a third of MCAs are delivered within one day, thus we have a 3% potential increase in voice traffic. If we combine this with Raul’s 12% call back stats, we get 0.3% increase in ARPU. I think the return rate is three times higher (about 40%) thus we have a 1% increase in calls. Thus an estimate of 1/2 – 1 % increase in ARPU as compared to the situation of no such service seems to be a pretty good approximation.
However, this calculation assumes that the calls made after the alert (let’s call them “MCA calls”) would have not happened otherwise (i.e. without the alert). It seems to be a pretty restrictive assumption and it depends on how impulsive and important were the calls. Would they have happened in any case? Let’s hypothesize: I think about a half of MCA calls are a pure increase (impulsive, non-important), whereas the other half would be made anyway (called until one delivers the important message).
We then get a 1/2 percent increase… within the (lower) range of others, seems reasonable altogether.
To make it sweeter and to support the proud name of a marketer, I would say (because of all other assumptions which can take on higher values as well) 0.5-1 percent ARPU increase. Viola!
(Of course, there are additional complications like minute-bundles: may be that’s the reason why the US does not need this service — they probably care for LESS MoU for unlim plans)
Mobile Marketing SWOT Analysis and C2S
I found this SWOT analysis at my subscription to Mobile Marketer. Although SWOT is said to be for 2009, it is nonetheless rather general. Editor in Chief of Mobile Marketer Mickey Alam Khan is the author of this.
Why I want to present it here? Because during the presentation, I want to discuss possibilities opened by our new (in beta) initiative called Call2Service. If you want to know what it is, drop a comment to this post, leaving your email.
Strengths
Most personal marketing channel available on the market
C2S is also the easiest — a simple call from one’s mobile!
Completely permission-based, with opt-in required for marketing text messages
Ubiquity of channel – 260 million mobile subscribers nationwide, 3.5 billion worldwide
Measurable for ROI purposes
Many consumers giving up landlines for mobile
Sales of smartphones with Internet capability booming
For C2S, any phone model will do. Therefore, it is truly reaching 3 billion users and NOT (though it can!) through mobile web! Can anything match that? Read more
Mobile Coupons Presentation
mobileStorm from LA has had a very interesting webinar about mobile coupons. You will have to register to watch it.
As a sidetrack albeit very important, read about why SMS is a preferred medium for mobile marketing by Marcus Anderson, president of Broadplay, a Toronto, Ontario-based interactive and mobile marketing agency.
Mobile VAS in India
Very good details about Indian Telecom!
