What can Microsoft do when Google Android and Apple iPhone own the mobile market?

Below is a small snapshot of the mobile market setup -

(RIM has been left out in this context)

	Android	iPhone	Windows 8
Processor IP	ARM	ARM	ARM, Intel
Processor Design	Qualcomm, Nvidia	Apple	Qualcom
Processor Manufacturer	TSMC or Global Foundries	Samsung	TSMC
ODM	HTC, Motorola	FoxConn	Compal
Marketing and Distribution	HTC, Motorola	Apple	Nokia
OS	Google	Apple	Microsoft
Market Share	44%	27%	6%

Here is a plausible strategy that Microsoft can follow or may be Microsoft already has a similar one but it is just slow to implement.

Product Strategy:

1) Have a common or similar interface in PCs and mobile platform. Seamless integration between PCs and mobile.

2) Embrace cloud with mobile.

Take a lesson from Dropbox and Evernote. Why is it a success? Sleek design is one big part. But the core is seemless integration of PC to cloud. They did not try to change the user behavior.

Dropbox - Cloud storage - seamless integration between local storage and cloud.

Evernote - Cloud application - seamless integration between desktop application and cloud.

Make skydrive like Dropbpx and Microsoft office applications similar to Evernote. Then integrate them both and include them in mobile. 

Business Strategy:

1) Leverage your partners

Microsoft had always been good at this and it should again do so. It is not possible to create a closed ecosystem like Apple. So partnerships are important.

Who had a failed start in mobile?

Dell and HP

They are the biggest windows partners and have a lot of corporate customers. Dell and HP will lose its relevance in market place slowly if they do not embrace a solid mobile strategy. HP botched its Palm project. Dell tested waters with few android devices that did not gain traction. So there is a strategic win-win for them in shaking hands with Microsoft.

So leverage these players to create a new and bigger eco-system along with Nokia.

2) Think about Corporate IT needs and cater to them

iPhone has been gaining corporate ground but still has a long way to go as it does not have good corporate productivity utilities. Corporates cannot rely on apps as there are too many players and corporates need a few solid players who can give them the needed services and support.

Due to less control on Apps, Android has become similar to wild wild west in the mobile market which is a no go for Corporate IT.

Who is known for corporate productivity utilities? Microsoft!. Having a simlar interface, compatibility between devices and a handle on cloud would make Corporate IT's life less cumbersome.

Marketing Strategy:
1) Buy once use everywhere - Buy a product in mobile or any device and have access to it in all the windows 8 devices. 

2) Change the name - Do not use windows. Windows is already a baggage.  iPhone is a brand, Android is a brand but Windows 8 is not a brand. Reinvent the brand.

The mobile OS should not have windows influence. It should be the other way round and the name Windows 8 does not convey that. The conception of windows mobile had this flaw and did not understand that mobile is not an extension of PC. 

3) Make it easier for the developers to port apps between devices - not only from iphone and android to windows 8 but also between tablet, windows phone and PC. Offer a software tool kit for porting.

What is SCRUM? What is Video Marketing?

The below video explains SCRUM methodology effectively in few minutes. This is good video to learn about SCRUM concepts. This is a video created by Axosoft, a company that develops software for implementing SCRUM.


        

Now you have learnt about SCRUM you would have noticed the marketing message from Axosoft. So the other important thing to learn from this video is the effect use of video marketing. Creating a video on a general concept and at the saying "by the way we have a product that does what we are talking about in this video",  is the best video marketing tactic. It sells the concept, educates the viewer and at the end "boom", sells the product. Another important take away from web traffic aspect in lead generation is to think -

"How many people will search for SCRUM Vs How many people will search for how your product works?" Of course people searching for a general concept is more than people searching for a particular product by multiple folds. So what happens when you have a great video that educates people about a general concept in your website? You company website gets associated very well with the general concept and will not get better SEO results it will also increase mindshare among the customers.

Ning - Can it become a billion dollar business?

Ning was the first company to realize that there will be room for Niche social networks. It was founded in 2005 not long after facebook was launched. They want to be the network of all the Niche social networks.They were free for a while. As they were burning a lot of money, they thought they would charge for the service - a subscription based business model in 2010. The traffic went down immediately but seems to have become stable. Ning changed the CEO during the near bankruptcy crisis and the new CEO claimed they are profitable after changing to only paid model for about two months in 2010. About 120 million of VC money went into the company and it was acquired by Glam media in sep 2011 for 150 million. After 6 years of operation, you get a return of $30 million. That is not a good return on investment by any VC standards but still it was not a bust.

Can Ning go big? It seems to be a difficult task but few things can be done.

1) Ning has to showcase important usecases -
        1) Family networks
        2) Student networks
        3) Corporate networks.
3) Have two different market strategies - one for B2C and another for B2B.
4) Create templates for different networks -
      a) Family networks - photo slide shows, updates, videos,
      b) Student networks - Files hosting, calendar, - in effect it should be able to replace a LMS. This should be ready made LMS
      c) Corporate networks - Videos, product downloads, file downloads, blogs, faqs
5) The key is to make people think about social networks in a similar way to creating a website.
Big Corporates need to see value in niche social networks to foster their customers - Few B2B companies can have their customer only social networks. A new model that can replace forums and user groups.

Will Glam media take Ning to the next level?

Shelfari and Amazon's retail store

Shelfari was a neat project that I had always checked out once in a while. Until Amazon acquired Shelfari, it was difficult to see a sustainable business model behind it. It used to be a social network just for book lovers where you have a virtual shelf showcasing your books where related discussions were fostered.

Now about 3 years after Amazon's acquisition of Shelfari, what has happened?
It has transformed to a Niche Social network+Wikipedia+Comprehensive social integration
It has also integrated the Amazon's preview feature for the books and most importantly Kindle Store.

Meanwhile the latest development -
With the recent news of Amazon trying out retail book store -The retail stores are going to be mini book stores. Mini?! What would that imply?

As the ebooks are still scratching the surface and will gnaw the physical books market faster than we expect, my best hunch would be that the retail store will be more like a kindle service center with sales men nudging the customers to buy the ebooks when they will find out that the physical books are not available and with a reason.

I wonder how Amazon's Shelfari play will unwind with this recent development. Will Shelfari be just a marketing tool for fostering the customer community and of course send all the traffic to Amazon? or Will Amazon slice all the book business and bring it under Shelfari?
Book Business = Shelfari+Kindle+retail store.
Given Amazon's strong brand the second case would probably not happen. Also Amazon cloud is not fitting well in the equation and Amazon would have to spend a lot to do this. What would be the advantage with the fictional new structure? Amazon is no more a single businesses - It is in multiple businesses and this would give a better direction as we move forward.. I think?!

If only Shelfari had convinced all the publishers to host their books on its site and offered ebook tools for authoring books - It would have been a serious competitor for Amazon.If only...

On side note, you can also see how Niche social networks will take off with Shelfari as an example.
Talking about Shelfari I wonder how Ning is performing.Well that will be for the next post.

Technology Trends

Current Visible Trends

• Move from websites to web apps.
• Influence of mobile design in web design. - The idea of web apps in itself is derived from mobile apps, thanks to Apple which popularized the word app.
• Information overdose – Need an easy way to get the most out of the web in a short span of time.
• Mobile and web will be more integrated.
• Complex scentiment analysis and Real time data analysis will be popular, Big data Analysis.
• WebOS can gain more traction with all the data in cloud and with virtualization. 
• Online videos are increasing at a phenomenal rate – need faster network infrastructure.
• The technology innovation in web will bring behavioral changes in people. As technology makes it easy to share and create content, it will make people more expressive and open.
• HD webTv streaming – straight to tv from the studios – disruptive to cable operators.
• Increased number of disruptions to the traditional business models.
• Exponential growth in connected devices - cars, kitchen appliances.
• Desktop applications will lose market to web applications.

Past Tipping Points

• First Tipping point - 1996 - online communication - Yahoo, hotmail era
• Second Tipping point - 2000 – People took to web search as web data exploded. - Google era
• Second Tipping point - 2004 -  People took to online social. - Facebook and Youtube era
• Third Tipping point -2007 - Real time web + mobile web  - Twitter and Iphone era
• Fourth tipping point - 2010-2011 - Interactive Communication with devices - Voice and gestures - Siri+ Google voice search+Kinect era 
• Fifth Tipping point - Machine to machine communications?

A new paradigm is born every 3-4 years!!

The broader Vision

Apple Vision 1- Connect people to computers.

Microsoft Vision 1- Connect people to computers better than Apple.

Google Vision - Bring relevant internet to people.

Apple Vision 2 - Humanize electronics (make it sexy) and connect people to electronics.

Facebook - Become the internet. Mark Zuckerberg is thinking "How to become the world?"
                                                   - 1 done 6 to go - so simple.. yes I am talking about the population in billion.

Microsoft Vision 2 - Uhh.. Steve Balmer says "I am figuring it out myself"

Amazon - Bring all the products in the world to people.

Who has the biggest vision? You know it. Now you know why Facebook's valuation is sky high!!