Those of us born before 1985 have seen the rapid escalation of technology advancement. The smartphone, that you take for granted in your purse or pocket, provides more access to data to you now than CEOs and the President of the United States had in 1985. Electricity reached 90% of US households in 45 years … but it only took 20 years for cell phones to reach the same level of adoption. Other notable milestones reaching 90% adoption: Telephone–65 years; Refrigerator–27; Color TV–25.
Our thirst for technology advancement is clearly the fastest in history. If you want to shake your head a bit … look at these graphs: Consumption Spreads Faster and .
So whats next? What may happen in 2016?
1. Content will consume business strategy.
From the consumer viewing perspective, the battle of the content creators and “hoarders” is being engaged on the technology battlefield by Amazon, Apple, Disney, Google, NetFlix and the various other cable and television/movie studios. Cisco predicts that by 2017, almost 70% of all consumer Internet traffic be video. Consumers will always desire the content of movies, documentaries, series and other programming. Twenty years ago, the movie studios and three major television networks controlled the creation and the distribution of video content. That has changed dramatically. Maybe too quickly!
But not only for consumers. Businesses are integration of video into their promotional strategy. The results from a Video Content Marketing Survey show that “96% of B2B organizations are engaged in video content marketing.” However, with that high adoption rate, 41% of those surveyed will be increasing their video marketing in 2015. So even more coming! Video content integration will increase into websites and email marketing as well as optimizing the content for SEO. The impact? The report states that 73% believe that videos have realized positive results.
2. The VDoC will continue to drive content distribution.
OK, the new word, Viewing Device of Choice. It was the radio, movie screen, television and video tapes … Magazines, catalogs and newspapers. now it is the device du jour. We have taken our computers off of our desks and into our back pocket and purse. Businesses are optimizing their content delivery in a mobile-friendly (mobile-ready, mobile optimized) environment. The challenge will be to implement solid SEO techniques in order to remain current to the ever-changing needs of the fickle technology-savvy and information-crazed consumer.
So what will change? No question, we will be watching more video and textual content on our portable tablets and smartphones. Two examples: hotels and airlines have already adapted to this phenomenon by “giving away the store.”
Hotels are realizing evaporated revenues associated with pay-per-view content in their rooms. Travelers are VDoC’ing in their hotels … leveraging content stored on the device or from partners (Amazon Prime, Hulu, NetFlix, etc.). Many chains, such as Marriott, are giving away wireless access to their rewards members. While they are losing revenue, they are capitalizing on marketing to network-hungry consumers by offering this complimentary service.
The airlines will be removing the expensive video devices in seats and overheads to be replaced by the consumers VDoC mentality. While I am not in their board rooms, the airlines must be thinking of the weight, cost and maintenance (headaches if they don’t work too!) of these devices. Consumers will bring their devices on the plane anyway … so just provide the content which will leave “bread crumbs” for their customers. On a recent United flight I occupied, they distributed free movies to passengers to view on their tablets, laptops or phones. More value for the fare!
In the 1960s, the big conversation (I was too young to remember it) was that televisions would replace movie theaters. That clearly did not happen. While VDoCs will scatter the habits of consumers, I don’t believe that someone will view the Super Bowl on their smartphone (unless they are at work).
Got you thinking? Ok, more thoughts and predictions coming soon …