EVERYONE'S DOING IT. NO ONE IS GETTING IT. / OPINION
26 July 2011
Rei Inamoto, AKQA's chief creative officer shares his thoughts on why using is believing for mobile
Everyone's doing it.
It's the first thing we look at when we wake up. Many of us check status updates even before we get out of bed. It's often the last thing we check before we fall asleep. We even tell the world that we are going to bed. Everyone has one in their pocket, wherever and everywhere they are. And even when they are on the go - on streets, cars and buses, on trains and planes, we stare at it literally everywhere.
Brands are in the business of connecting with consumers. If there is one medium that's perfectly suited for connecting with people, there is nothing better than mobile. It's intimate, immediate and inimitable.
Yet, in the marketing and advertising world, no one is getting it.
Coming out of the last few months of this award season, it is painfully obvious that very few, if any, brands or agencies are getting mobile right.
iPhone was the revolutionary new product that would change everything - and it did. Android is slowly but surely taking over and is becoming 'the Windows' of this decade. New tablets are being released every week. It was in 2008 that mobile access to the Internet exceeded desktop computer-based access. And in this day and age, that's a long time ago.
Through decades and even centuries of the history of media, whenever there was advancement in technological evolution, there was a leap in creative expression in our communications industry. Whether it was the printing press during the 1460's, proliferation of televisions in the 1960's or popularization of the World Wide Web in the 1990's, our industry has been able to capitalize (and monetize) these surfaces and screens as media to push messages and 'build brands'.
With mobile, we are in midst of another technological evolution in history. Great innovations are happening all over.
However, they are coming from startups, not brands and marketers.
The irony is that the big part of marketers' job is to communicate and connect with consumers. Mobile, the most pervasive medium of our time, is the perfect vehicle. And what's even more ironic is that marketers do have the budget to do it. For instance, Instagram, the hot darling of the mobile world, was started with less than a million dollars (subsequently and very quickly money did flow in for them) and it was four people.
Imagine if, for instance, a company like Kodak had the foresight to create a similar tool. Or if they hired a couple of young, bright, entrepreneurial developers and UX designers and let them invent a tool.
As an imaging company, that would have been such a brilliant marketing move for Kodak (or any brand in the similar space). Not only could Kodak have provided a new avenue to engage consumers, it would have raised awareness about its brand AND improve its image. Isn't that what 'marketing' is supposed to do?
So why is no one in marketing and advertising getting mobile right?
In many advertising campaigns, mobile is often treated as one of the check boxes, if at all - and so were websites or even digital at large for a long time. In the agency-client dynamic, the work gets shown to clients in meetings and presentations - often as words, pictures, and as slides. Or even as films. That's where mobile suffers - in client presentations and in award show judging.
Mobile is best when used. It's great at enhancing the moment on the go. When human psyche is fused with human behavior in context, it can be magical. But it's never shown or presented in that context.
We can all claim that we build brands by telling stories. But increasingly, instead of telling 'a story' to consumers, we need to provide 'a place' where consumers can form and tell their own stories. That's exactly what Instagram is doing. And as what we do shifts from telling stories to enabling stories, how we sell and present an idea also needs to adapt.
Often, what we are selling to our clients may be closer to software than to stories. But clients are not yet used to buying software ideas.
So, when selling a software idea to our marketing client, what we at AKQA do is this: Put the user experience into a story.
First we sketch out - mostly by hand - a few screens, no more than five. Just like an idea of an advertising campaign, an idea for software needs to be simple in order for the final product to be elegant. There is usually one screen that captures the essence of the "idea" of the software.
We then design it and prototype it - not pixel perfect but realistic enough so that you can 'feel' what the user journey could be. And this journey is told as a story. Storytelling is a fantastic technique to illustrate a point - or communicate an idea.
But the more usable the prototype is, the more believable it is. So the 'seeing is believing' rule no longer applies. The new rule is 'using is believing'.
I wonder how many years it'll take for an integrated campaign that is led by mobile to be recognized at award shows like Cannes. And as long as we as an industry are stuck in the 20th-century definition of brand-building through stories, the industry will continue to miss this opportunity in the most pervasive medium of all time.
It's the first thing we look at when we wake up. Many of us check status updates even before we get out of bed. It's often the last thing we check before we fall asleep. We even tell the world that we are going to bed. Everyone has one in their pocket, wherever and everywhere they are. And even when they are on the go - on streets, cars and buses, on trains and planes, we stare at it literally everywhere.
Brands are in the business of connecting with consumers. If there is one medium that's perfectly suited for connecting with people, there is nothing better than mobile. It's intimate, immediate and inimitable.
Yet, in the marketing and advertising world, no one is getting it.
Coming out of the last few months of this award season, it is painfully obvious that very few, if any, brands or agencies are getting mobile right.
iPhone was the revolutionary new product that would change everything - and it did. Android is slowly but surely taking over and is becoming 'the Windows' of this decade. New tablets are being released every week. It was in 2008 that mobile access to the Internet exceeded desktop computer-based access. And in this day and age, that's a long time ago.
Through decades and even centuries of the history of media, whenever there was advancement in technological evolution, there was a leap in creative expression in our communications industry. Whether it was the printing press during the 1460's, proliferation of televisions in the 1960's or popularization of the World Wide Web in the 1990's, our industry has been able to capitalize (and monetize) these surfaces and screens as media to push messages and 'build brands'.
With mobile, we are in midst of another technological evolution in history. Great innovations are happening all over.
However, they are coming from startups, not brands and marketers.
The irony is that the big part of marketers' job is to communicate and connect with consumers. Mobile, the most pervasive medium of our time, is the perfect vehicle. And what's even more ironic is that marketers do have the budget to do it. For instance, Instagram, the hot darling of the mobile world, was started with less than a million dollars (subsequently and very quickly money did flow in for them) and it was four people.
Imagine if, for instance, a company like Kodak had the foresight to create a similar tool. Or if they hired a couple of young, bright, entrepreneurial developers and UX designers and let them invent a tool.
As an imaging company, that would have been such a brilliant marketing move for Kodak (or any brand in the similar space). Not only could Kodak have provided a new avenue to engage consumers, it would have raised awareness about its brand AND improve its image. Isn't that what 'marketing' is supposed to do?
So why is no one in marketing and advertising getting mobile right?
In many advertising campaigns, mobile is often treated as one of the check boxes, if at all - and so were websites or even digital at large for a long time. In the agency-client dynamic, the work gets shown to clients in meetings and presentations - often as words, pictures, and as slides. Or even as films. That's where mobile suffers - in client presentations and in award show judging.
Mobile is best when used. It's great at enhancing the moment on the go. When human psyche is fused with human behavior in context, it can be magical. But it's never shown or presented in that context.
We can all claim that we build brands by telling stories. But increasingly, instead of telling 'a story' to consumers, we need to provide 'a place' where consumers can form and tell their own stories. That's exactly what Instagram is doing. And as what we do shifts from telling stories to enabling stories, how we sell and present an idea also needs to adapt.
Often, what we are selling to our clients may be closer to software than to stories. But clients are not yet used to buying software ideas.
So, when selling a software idea to our marketing client, what we at AKQA do is this: Put the user experience into a story.
First we sketch out - mostly by hand - a few screens, no more than five. Just like an idea of an advertising campaign, an idea for software needs to be simple in order for the final product to be elegant. There is usually one screen that captures the essence of the "idea" of the software.
We then design it and prototype it - not pixel perfect but realistic enough so that you can 'feel' what the user journey could be. And this journey is told as a story. Storytelling is a fantastic technique to illustrate a point - or communicate an idea.
But the more usable the prototype is, the more believable it is. So the 'seeing is believing' rule no longer applies. The new rule is 'using is believing'.
I wonder how many years it'll take for an integrated campaign that is led by mobile to be recognized at award shows like Cannes. And as long as we as an industry are stuck in the 20th-century definition of brand-building through stories, the industry will continue to miss this opportunity in the most pervasive medium of all time.
Register for our newsletter /
COMMENTS /
Jeffrey
SO TRUE : Clients love to see it included in the mix during presentation. Makes everyone feel like they're riding the crest of a new generation. But it ends up sitting in the lonely "File of My Possible Brilliance".
With the religious manner people are hunched over their little communication handset a definite wake up call is in order.
Matt
Wasn't Nike+ a mobile campaign? Maybe not initially a mobile campaign that lived on your phone, but it was mobile nonetheless. And it was awarded every major award out there.
Doug Sherrard
Enable stories. I like that. Another great article mate. Also, refreshing to see someone listen to their audience too, re. your tweet responses to 'culture of code' article. Keep it up!!!
Gerrie Smits
Some good points made.
Indeed, why design a crappy ad to put on/round/through a crappy iPhone app, if you can spend that money to create an app that is useful, fun,...
However, I do wonder: if Kodak would have invented Instragram, would it have been that popular? Part of the success of Instagram I think is that it is exactly unbranded/independent.
Instagram enables people to tell stories. If the app were connected to a brand, wouldn't they feel like stories with ads in them.
For example: The Lynx Stream wasn't a bad idea/product, but it would surprise me if it was a real success (in software terms).
Andrew Allsop
Hello,
I agree with Gerrie. These sort of communities work because people pick them up at grass roots level and nurture a culture around the product. It's like when you're a kid and someone gives you an empty box, it can be a space ship, a house, a car...anything. But you sit in a playhouse, and the only thing you can play is house.
Maybe brands should instead focus not on telling or enabling stories, but by producing ideas that not only enable a better quality of living but also facilitates sales of their product/service. For example, an app that connects to your grocery retailer that then gives your recipes based on what you've bought. I don't know about anyone else but making meals out of my random student purchases was the bane of my life whilst at University.
Andrew Allsop
Sorry let me just summarise that comment, i struggle to articulate myself sometimes.
Why does mobile marketing have to tell or enable a story? Why not create things that improve someone's quality of life, therefore giving them the ability to create their own pure, unadulterated stories because your brands given them the free time to.
If anyone's read The Rational Optimist by Matt Ridley, you'll get me!
Angel
As an ex-pat of many large agencies, I agree with a lot of your points. However, I think your real point is that one of the challenges agencies face in mobile is that they are still tied to the campaign approach. In other words, tell a story for 3-6 months and when it gets old, tell a new story.
When it comes to mobile, agencies need to balance promotion and functionality.
Joel Kaplan
Re: Gerrie
"If the app were connected to a brand, wouldn't they feel like stories with ads in them?"
I think this sort of situation is easier to avoid if you consider the job of a marketing partner as one who advances a company’s story telling ability and not as a producer of marketing materials.
Basically, don’t make the app feel/look/act like an ad.
Part of what stops brands from adopting mobile ideas is that the best ones don't feel like recognizable ads. They feel like new products or extended functionality but not something that is traditionally included in a clients' ad budget. One notable and revolutionary example was Nike + (per Matt’s comment).
This is the second article that Rei has posted in the past few months that has hammered home a simple thought - Story + Functionality = Idea.
It's a modern model designed to work with a modern consumer's changing media habits. And if we want to be effective in that modern media, we are going to have to keep it in mind.
Morris Leoni
Very interesting article.
Doing mobile isn't so easy (so far)... I mean, yes, Instagram could be Kodak as well as Foursquare could be a Tom Tom mobile extension to explore a new market in a GPS devices' saturated world. I think it's hard for a brand to be "wide open", to be ready to put resources into a digital/mobile R&D team trying to produce such mobiles apps. These apps are great and made by people as passionate about their business as Henry Ford was about his business. Could a brand be so passionate outside its core business ? Canon, Nikon or Kodak could really put resources into these new directions being as focused and passionate as they are on their everyday core business ? It's hard and it comes with an extra price tag (or you have to cut elsewhere). Even if technically doable today, brands are merely starting into it. Lately, Toyota with its "Toytoyota" made a good move into this new mobile field, and I think they have done it well ! One last word : maybe it's hard to sell "software" to a client right now, but if in 2016 there will be 2.1 billions smartphones out there, that gives us "only" 5 years to be successful.