Power of mobile web for newspaper publishers

February 26, 2010 Leave a comment

The power of mobile websites

Half a year ago I finally got myself a smartphone. Hooray for the “laggards” (referring to Rogers Adoption of Innovation studies)! Since then I’m able to browse the worldwide web on my mobile phone. My preferred mobile websites are social network sites and a website of a newspaper. Why? Both have done their best to create a website (or even an iPhone app) that is optimized for mobile devices.

The power of a good news website
I never read that financial-economic newspaper before. However, I started reading it on my mobile device for usability reasons. After a while I noticed that I also browsed their website for news on my laptop. I liked the website for providing news very fast, the e-book feature, etc. That website also offered the printed version for free for 2 months… I agreed… Now I read the printed version of a newspaper that I disliked before!

Reading on paper is a habit / ritual

The marketer of the newspaper truly hopes that I will enjoy the printed version that much that I will sign up for a year. Maybe a 2 months free trial will not be sufficient to get me as a full-time reader. Nonetheless, providing free time to learn to read on paper, to enjoy the paper, to make a habit of reading a printed version while drinking your morning coffee, etc… might prove to be effective. Maybe the romanticism of reading on “yellow, dirty” paper will empower the effect?

What’s the power of mobile web for a newspaper?
It got me reading a printed newspaper (for at least 2 months!) that I’d never bought or read before.

Filed under Business, Economy, Marketing, Media, Society, Software & Technology Tagged with , , , , , , ,

The Kölner Starbucks Effect

February 25, 2010 Leave a comment

Starbucks coffee at Köln Dolm

Starbucks coffee at Köln Dolm

Starbucks: a McDonalds story?

Thoughts automatically focussed on the marketing strategy of Starbucks. I don’t know it particularly well. However, in the first instance, it seems like a McDonalds story. This means: geographically expanding by buying properties or buying out others in order to create some sort of “experience”. For Starbucks, I would call it the “New York Coffeehouse from Friends Experience”.

Why didn’t I have that Coffeehouse Experience?

I believe exporting a product from one culture to another isn’t that easy. Maybe Europeans are used to drinking coffee elsewhere? Maybe Europeans want better coffee (I did not like the coffee that I ordered, tasted like carton)? Did Starbucks create the wrong expectations in my head? Was my view biased by Rachel, Ross, Monica, etc. ? Whatever might be the reason, I won’t be a Starbucks fan on facebook – millions already are!

Filed under Business, Culture & Arts, Marketing, Society Tagged with , , , , , , ,

Search engine optimization as a PR tool

February 24, 2010 1 Comment

Search engine optimization

SEO is about tricks to put web pages on top of Google’s search results. It has proven to be a fruitful marketing technique in order to attract more visitors to your website. Another nice feature about Google manipulation is the way it has changed the PR game.

SEO for PR

The thing is: journalists are human beings as well and try to obtain the maximum result with a minimum of efforts. In their “search for news” they also rely on the internet. And most of the time they just “Google” for news. You suppose they would double-check that information. But due to lack in time, they often do not.

Means-end-chain: SEO for Thought-leadership

One of the great PR goals in today’s society is being the “thought leader” within the sector or industry. Studies have shown that being on the number 1 Google result page evokes the psychological effect of “the best, the biggest, etc.” For PR people today SEO could be a means to the end of thought-leadership.

Filed under Business, Marketing Tagged with , , ,

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