Seamless Tech

Technology-enhanced marketing will increasingly provide seamless, simple experiences.

background

Last year, we made it abundantly clear that we’re Living in the OOC, where the online and offline worlds have converged for good. That’s not to say the transition has always been a smooth one. In fact, between check-ins, social media faux pas, and the general awkwardness of many brands in the digital age, much of the “magic” of this convergence has been overshadowed by its intrusions on life at large. Good thing that’s about to change, as smarter integrations focus on delivering simpler interactions for consumers. In a nod to Mindfulness over Matter, marketers and tech providers are realizing their common interest in moving the heavy-lifting technology behind the scenes and letting users live in the moment without interrupting that moment.

market manifestations

• NFC and RFID are BFDs: Since these tiny, unobtrusive technologies can transmit information with a simple tap or wave, they’re increasingly being embedded in everything from bracelets to flyers to (almost certainly) your next smartphone, dramatically simplifying the process of consumers sharing preferences, shoppers paying for purchases, and businesspeople swapping contacts. Or, in the case of Halls’ warming cough drops, helping people unthaw while they wait for buses in the harsh Chicago winter. A select number of bus stops will automatically dispense samples of the warming lozenges when consumers tap the ads with NFC-enabled phones.
• Seamless Shopping: Online retailers pose many threats to the brick and mortar experience, but perhaps the most insidious is shoppers’ recalibrated expectation of a completely seamless shopping experience. When an e-commerce site can mine a shopper’s preferences to deliver exactly what she wants and enable her to complete her purchase the moment she’s ready to check out, the traditional shopping experience seems painfully cumbersome in comparison. Thankfully, savvy retailers are pursuing partnerships that attempt to replicate this experience. When Unilever partnered with Jewel-Osco for a multi-brand Groupon, we felt the most important implication was that the deal was loaded to the shopper’s loyalty card and automatically redeemed at checkout.

implications

Look, technology is definitely a good thing. It’s just often applied in bad ways. Disruptive, irritating, or isolating experiences are the fault of their creators, not something inherently wrong with mobile technologies or social networking or Al Gore. Expect to see more companies following American Express’ lead, as their creation of a digital wallet API enables brands and developers to build simple, personalized shopping applications. Seamless Tech can also guide marketers through the increasingly fragmented environment of devices, in which marketers must simultaneously communicate with their consumers on an ever-growing number of screens. Rather than sinking your entire marketing budget into a bells and whistles iPhone app, many brands might be better off producing a streamlined, flexible application (tied together by the Cloud) that lives seamlessly across any device. As long as marketers focus on enabling and empowering their consumers rather than interrupting them, our technology-filled existence should be a harmonious one.