When you work as a telecom and media industry consultant for a while, you learn how hard it is to strategise, research, brainstorm, or just try to magic the next this-will-make-me-my-family-and-oh-yeah-my-company-a-million-bucks application for the mobile phone. No matter what you do, the pesky, top-performing application remains the humble, old-fashioned, but incredibly efficient and relatively cheap (depends somewhat on location) SMS. With the arrival of the iPhone, and more importantly, the iTunes App store, I think things are changing…really fast. And I have no doubt that Android and Windows Mobile and company will catch up with time as well. But…these days I dream in bits and bites of iPhone applications and am buoyed up by the popularity but also the usefulness of some of the applications out there. For instance, I’ve recently liked having 9 Toolbox – a useful set of utilities like tip calculators and public holiday listings by country. Another good one out there for even the casual photo snapper is Photogene – a great mini photo editor that does a LOT within a tiny space. Beyond mere usefullness is inspiration and Adidas’ new Urban Art app showcasing the street art in Berlin complete with GPS walking guides to which you can even add your photos showcases the originality and creativity of some of the apps. Finally, let’s not forget the addictive fun of simple games like Flood-It! (Yeah, I admit it – I am a little nerdy.)
My iPhone app dreams have been interrupted recently, though. At first it was mostly nuisance: “oh, someone else yapping about the wonders of Twitter. Ignore.” And then it became some sort of vague interest: “Really, you find it useful? hmmm, for information that I can’t get via Google Reader or otherwise?” And then progressed to alarming as I wondered if I was totally missing the boat: “Do I have to tweet too?” And really since then (sometime last summer), I have traveled up and down this rollercoaster trying to double guess if this Twitter brew-ha-ha is all just hype and marketing (sigh. yes, I am a marketer) and talk talk talk.
But.
Lately, I must admit, I am a little bit in love. Not with Twitter itself. But with what some companies and private individuals are doing with Twitter. Here are five of my favorite ideas of late and I think there is real brilliance to be further defined within the possibilities of this 140-character texting movement. (If you know me, you will understand why 4 out of 5 of them are food related):
BakerTweet: You are a baker? Ah ha. And your bread/cakes/cupscakes/pastries/addictive carbohydrates just came out of the oven? Ummmm, yes, I can smell them. You have some customers who would really prefer to get your goods as fresh and warm as possible? Well, easy. Tweet. Alert these people that it is time to stop by and get their hot cross buns.
Tastelive: Need some port to drink along with those biscuits you just bought? Not sure if you want the tawny? With tastelive, wine enthusiasts around the world get a chance to listen in on the rantings and ravings of the top wine personalities. Just follow binendswine and you can join wine tasting events as they take place – comment or ask questions of experts live.
Energize: (this is the non-food example) Here’s a clever way to search for new agency blood. Utrecht-based agency, Energize, is looking to hire an account manager and a strategic planner. They want to make sure that their people have some social media cred and experience and have therefore designed an application form that looks exactly like a page on Twitter, including an empty text field. Candidates enter a short message—describing why Energize should take a second glance at them for the position, plus their email address and Twitter username. Uploading a CV is optional.
Kogibbq: This one was launched last fall. Kogi Korean BBQ fuses the flavors of Korean barbeque with the ease-of-use (read: portability) of Mexican tacos and burritos and creates a whole new type of food addiction in the process. The food is sold primarily through two trucks that cruise around the Los Angeles area. You need a fix? Customers have to follow Kogi on Twitter to find out where the trucks are at any given moment. Apparently, more than 20,000 already do.
Maureen Evans: Perhaps my favorite of the bunch, but the least "useful." Maureen describes her services thus: “Tiny recipes condensed by @Maureen, Serves 3-4. Delicious ideas from all over the world.” And I am really in awe. In 140 characters, Maureen tweets entire recipes for fairly complicated fare.
Check out her recipe for biscotti: "mix 1/3c sug/3T oil/egg/t anise flavr; +c flour/t bkgpwdr. Roll log to fit bkgpan; pat down. 30m@375/190C. Slice~14; brwn+6m/side."
She was recently reviewed by The New York Times, by writer Lawrence Downes, who also went to the trouble of testing out a good number of her recipes – without any help from anywhere else on the web.
Admittedly, this last listing is not about a new way to engage with customers, nor about more superior customer service, or even representative of a new genre of eCommerce. It’s just a fun and different way to share ideas, expertise and probably to make some new and interesting friends.
Which is what social media is all about.
– Get rid of affiliates with low value traffic.”
