By Becky Reid, FIA Marketing Manager
In between decorating and getting central heating fitted at home (not a moment too soon either!) I have been looking at where we might take the FIA marketing-wise in 2012. And I have to say the future is mobile.
Now this won’t come as a surprise to any of you – as blog readers you are already au fait with all things digital! – but it does present me with an interesting challenge; one of educating those not so ‘hip’ and ‘with it’ that this is an area for expansion (meaning expenditure).
I am currently preparing a short presentation to the FIA Portables Servicing Committee, which will take them through the joys of mobile marketing and the opportunities it offers us.
Did you know that there are over 70 million people in the UK with mobile phones? That’s 1.6 phones per man, woman and child. Smart phone usage doubled in 2010 compared to 2009 and experts reckon that mobile internet usage will outstrip fixed internet usage (when you actually sit at a computer to surf the web).
Blimey.
Makes sense though. A typical day for me and my iPhone will feature news updates via BBC News and Sky News apps; keeping in touch with industry colleagues, friends and family via Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn; checking out the sports results on Sky Sports; seeing my latest Nectar offers with my Nectar app and checking out the weather forecast thanks to the Met Office’s app.
I’d just like to point out that I do work as well; it’s not all fun!
The one thing I have shied away from to date is doing my banking with my bank’s own app; I really want to as it’s just one step further on from online banking, which I do already, but I’ve already been a victim of online fraud and identity theft and need to be convinced how secure app banking is. I should explain… I have a history for losing phones or leaving them places and I don’t want to give someone such easy access to my meager funds!
The rise of the smart phone has also made it acceptable to sit on your own in a bar, pub, café or restaurant; you can be doing emails, reading an ibook or doing Sudoku rather than looking like the geek that’s been stood up on a date.
Sadly, smart phones have also meant the demise of the pub quiz, with everyone sat there on their phones BBMing their mates for the answer rather than relying on the traditional method. Not that I would know; I don’t do pub quizzes. But I do do pubs!
Even my mother has recently converted to a smart phone. Now I get text messages from her asking for help with downloading the latest version of iTunes and transfer her purchases from her phone to her computer (that’ll be the iCloud mother).
I believe one of the scariest things about constantly changing technology is the terminology. I find it makes people uncomfortable when you talk about tweeting, ‘in the cloud’, QR tags and the like. The one thing I always say is don’t be scared, just ask. It how everyone else found out, including me, and that’s what social and digital media is all about, sharing knowledge and having open conversations.
So, go on, embrace mobile advances and get tweeting, posting, uploading, downloading and sharing!
I must go…Once I’ve finished the presentation I need to check out my recipe finder app, work out what’s for dinner, ring my mother and talk her through installing iTunes (yes I do still use my phone in the traditional way too!) and then settle down to play a game or two of iSudoku.
PS – stats given her kindly provided to me by our web agency Pixl8
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