Change Your Internet M.O. & Discover Your Mobile Mojo

03.17.11

Andrew Wetzler, President

If ever there was a time to step outside of your online comfort zone, it is now. The goal in doing so would be to expand your horizons in terms of how you access data and interact with the internet, email, Social Media, etc. 

One example of how you could turn your web habits on their ear (and I believe benefit as a result) is to change the home page from which you access the internet.

I have long been a proponent of creating a personalized iGoogle page from which to ground your internet experience and draw into one place all of the information that is most important to managing your life, such as links to the places you interact with each day (like email, certain websites, blogs, Twitter, Facebook, etc. ).

If you already have an iGoogle page, I can't make a compelling case for you to switch, other than to suggest that it might open your mind to new streams of content and marketing ideas by creating a start page with some other property (i.e. Yahoo, MSN, AOL, etc.).

Another beneficial step would be to make a decisive and potentially bold move toward using and relying on a mobile tool or tools. For starters, if you are not using a modern smartphone, then you are seriously behind the curve. Information is being crafted for mobile phones and tablets and it's past time to start understanding how they work; including the steps companies are taking to communicate with their prospects and customers via these portable and rapidly evolving web entry / communication points.

If you read any of the electronics / mobile trade journals, or if you have been observing first-hand what's going with individual behavior, you know that tablets are having a gigantic impact on how people compute and connect with the internet.

In a certain sense, they are making the desktop computer obsolete; with the exception of typing-oriented tasks. With so much of our world having point-and-click characteristics, we are less reliant on the keyboard than ever before. If you are not in possession of a tablet device, then you are missing out on an incredibly fast-growing and exciting new phase of mobile computing.

It feels weird to assert that there is an old school vs. new school dimension to the internet, but it's true. Today's internet is not your father's internet. Some marketers are blazing the mobile trail, some are inching forward, but many are still planted on the sidelines of the field where the web is transcending. No matter where you are mobile involvement-wise, no doubt an explanation exists to rationalize why you are there, but it's time to leap forward.

That said, before it's practical to think about moving your company into the new dimensions of internet, it's essential to become functional as an individual and view these new opportunities from a consumer's perspective. I think you will be amazed by what's going on with companies who are blazing the trail (both B-B & B-C). Try a new way to access your personalized web information. Get a late-model phone along with a 3G-enabled tablet. There is no way this investment won't lead to fresh ideas and innovations that will benefit your business objectives while being highly enjoyable at the same time.

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