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As comment to the current update of the “Communication Global Scenario“, I wish to point out how content is over and over the real evolution point of mobile, but there’s no evident and current news that show the real engagement of big players into this market.

Let’s see the latest and less considered news:

• Fox Mobile Distribution Strikes Deal to Integrate Mobile Content on AOL’s Winamp (04/13/09)
• Nokia’s Latest Buy: Mobile Geotargeted Ad Firm (09/13/09)
• MySpace Breaks Into Mobile Ad Market (12/06/08)

Those three news show:

• content players (like Fox) are starting to test their assets on mobile-like platforms, but still without much commitment (Fox and AOL are part of News Corp group);
• mobile hardware payers (like Nokia) are evolving into service companies, which is not a trend but the mere possible way for them to keep their market share;
• distribution payers (like MySpace) are going mobile only because they lost the online advertising train.

My conclusion is that we won’t see a “mobile take-off” unless:

• the public revert from web to mobile at a more speed pace than expected (but that’s not the case in the main trending market – the US – due to too high consumer prices);
• the telecommunication crisis ends before expected (but it has to solve energy and business model’s problems), which could support reversion from land to mobile connection.

As these two conditions are far to become real, even the big players on the market are continuing to test, without any real shake to the current scenario.

I think that the current crisis should stop the “forcing to consume” attitude which naturally create more waste than richness. We have the opportunity to “falsely” embrace environmental issues while still forcing our public to buy.

Earlier this year the European Court of Justice ruled that member states cannot ban BOGOF promotions. That was said to Belgium, but later in the UK the Department of Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs began to put pressure on stores to target food waste: they ask supermarket heads to offer half-price discounts on perishable foods instead of BOGOF deals.

Now, in appearance there’s no difference between “Buy One Get One Free” and “Buy One Pay Half”. The money transit between shops and customers is the same.

On the other hand, the two options are very different.
Besides the fact that the customer perception of the first one is highly more positive, that one put the client into a buying loop that tends to provoke a double-buy (or the buy of larger-packages) for almost everything possible. Which means, obviously, more turnover for the shop.
So, it’s not so easy to force distribution channels avoid such promotions: you’re simply telling them to cut revenue.

But people are smarter, and even more now they have less value in their pockets.
So, why not:

• make the BOGOF mechanism work with multiple accounts (one consumer pays, another consumer gets the second item)?
• limit these type of promotions to “organic”, “natural”, “environmental friendly” products?
• enlarge the BOGOF to set of products (you buy a toothpaste and get either a tuna can or a pack of cereals or …)?

Marketing has to evolve, give solutions to social problems and embrace the new trends.

Smarter people need smarter shops, who need smarter companies.
I’m not talking about environment, that’s only an excuse.
I’m only trying to suggest an even better way to do business selling a lot of stuff to people.

“Embrace constraints”, “practice restraint”, “adopt the beginner’s mind”, “check your ego at the door”, “focus on the experience of the design”, “become a master storyteller”, “think communication not decoration”, “obsess about ideas not tools”, “clarify your intention”, “sharpen your vision & curiosity and learn from the lessons around you” and, finally, “learn all the rules and know when and why to break them”: those should all be part of our mindset when working in the actual business world.

Reading the “10 Tips on how to think like a designer” reminded me the times when I contributed to the design of many products and to their winning Design Awards all around Europe.
My approach was always on the maximum respect to design experience (it’s a mindset, developed through application on diversified markets and products) and my expertise was mainly in my ability to storytelling and communication.

But the start was always in

• clarifying the overall intention, which was mainly the service we wished to supply to people, being it a brand new one or a evolved one from a traditional approach;
• be very serious on finding ideas beneath tools, becoming a creator and not a technician;
• and curiously searching the market for any inspiration, which could be trans-functional or trans-national, always looking at things with the simple sight of a child, leaving aside the formal aspects and concentrating on substance.

Note: taking into account that I’m more a marketer than a designer, my most important function in the designing group was to keep it strictly connected with the market’s reality, avoiding that creativity could start prevailing by itself, ending the process in a concept product / service with very much immediate ROI.

But the most difficult part of the job was to “embrace constraints”, “practice restraint”.
Being the first phase a mixture between research and brainstorming, the difficulty were in keeping the creation of the idea within limits of the ambient where it was conceived. Creativity is richness, finding an idea is always powerful, but those two media frequently are “against” reality, which needs them but within the limits of economics.
Once a very good friend of mine told me that “an idea is not such if it’s not transformed into something real”.
A clear imagine of what the market asks for, of what we’re able to do, of the time involved into the process, of the involved resources is the basis of any designing process and the greatest enemy to creativity, at least of free creativity. But we live in a well constituted world, where rules are set and cannot be changed either without a great investment (in money or time) or with a very good idea.
So, reality is sometimes a limit but sometimes it’s a boundary that creativity is able to surpass.

When the latest case occurs, then “breaking the rules” is really fun.