Brands Create Customers

Sometimes the very form of a brand can become its limiting factor. The world leaps ahead on other innovations, and the old form factor/brand begins to languish. It can’t sync with the new.

The digital tablet may revive traditional media brands

If being out of sync was part of old media’s problem vs. Internet upstarts, new digital tablet technologies may breathe new life into old publications. Conceivably, new digital tablets could lead to new and better forms of storytelling, and new ways for traditional media brands to connect with customers.

A Time Inc. digital magazine concept

Take a look at this Time Inc. magazine concept on a digital tablet:

Of course, not many of us look forward to swiping pages of Sports Illustrated on the flipped around screen of a laptop tablet, as shown here. We want the convenience, immediacy and intimacy of a smaller digital tablet we can easily read on the couch or the train, freely flowing text, pictures and context with our fingertips.

That same tablet might contain all of our media subscriptions, our personal library, and maybe even our textbooks for a new form factor of college.

For more on what Time Inc. is contemplating with this new format see TechCrunch. And Wonderfactory.

The iPhone is such a powerful platform that it’s creating new markets every day. Is the iPhone a platform for interactive storytelling for children? Absolutely. Just check out this video of the “Phone Book” from Mobile Art Lab in Japan. (Mobile Art Lab site is in Japanese.)

Simple and amazing.

Found at Everyday UX.

Hat tip: @fusion_com_au

Apple’s relentless pace of innovation has already disrupted the music and mobile phone industries. Given the scope of Apple’s technology development, are universities next in line to be disrupted by Apple’s far-reaching digital platforms?

NOTE: See our updates here and here. The latter discusses the iPad.

A speculative disruption scenario

In this post I’ll sketch a purely speculative disruption scenario suggested by Apple’s current and projected technology innovations. It appears that Apple may soon have a seamless system of hardware, software, services and online infrastructure to become a pivotal player in higher education. As such, Apple itself may become a brand of education.

That said, I have no evidence that Apple might even desire such a role. My hypothesis is simply that such a role might be available to it.

Apple’s potentially disruptive resources

In the field of higher education, Apple’s potentially disruptive resources would include the following:

1. A method of organizing and managing huge amounts of online content and curricula
2. A convenient means of delivering educational content and curricula to students
3. Portable digital devices that students can use for digital textbooks, lectures and course materials (if some speculations are true)
4. A transaction system for collecting tuition and fees
5. An administrative system for maintaining student records.

Specific Apple resources would include Apple’s online iTunes University, Apple’s (rumored) forthcoming “iTablet” (for multimedia lectures and textbooks), its online iTunes store for transactions, and its platform of digital services for record keeping.

Apple as disruptor in music, mobile and perhaps publishing

We all know how Apple’s platform innovations disrupted the music industry with iTunes, the iTunes Store and the iPod. Apple subsequently changed the game in mobile communications with the disruptive platform of iPhone and App Store. Publishing may be next on the list if Apple’s rumored “iTablet” turns out to be a superlative e-reader, perhaps optimized for textbooks, and structured within a disruptive platform. Imagine Apple as the world’s default digital publisher, connecting readers with content producers. You may be buying your books, magazines, newspapers, music, movies and videos through iTunes, all downloaded in a few seconds to a spiffy Apple portable device with Apple’s famed ease of use.

For this to happen Apple would need a gigantic new data center—which it just happens to be building. It might suggest a mobile future for iTunes U.

Universities: tradition bound

Let’s now consider universities, those valued institutions whose basic structure and functions have been relatively unchanged for centuries. Are there equal or better ways of imparting high-level learning that don’t require the traditional four-year, classroom-based system of lecture-driven instruction? Is there an alternate means where instruction can be raised to the highest levels of interactive, multimedia learning, perhaps customized to student learning styles, and where costs can be contained, instead of spiraling upwards? And might there be a common digital platform where a university’s teaching and knowledge could be scaled worldwide, opening up massive new markets?

Apple’s foot in the collegiate door

Apple already has a foot in the collegiate door with its iTunes U on the  iTunes Store. (Yes, they’ve put a university in their store.) The iTunes U features steadily growing numbers of  (free) podcasts of complete courses from leading universities, plus many specialty lectures . Currently these are targeted to the iPod and the iPhone.

I’m a real fan of iTunes U. It has gems like this.  In its present form, though, iTunes U wouldn’t seem to have much disruptive potential. It’s mostly audio podcasts, and a lesser number of video podcasts. It’s wonderful that Apple makes it available. It’s a credit to participating universities as a means of expanding their educational outreach, as CNN notes.

Looking downstream, however, the emergence of new (and integrated) Apple technologies might position iTunes U as a potential disruptive force in higher learning.

A disruptive iTunes U scenario

Could Apple transform iTunes U into a global digital university, setting the world’s highest standards for interactive digital learning? Given Apple’s current and forthcoming technologies it may be possible to reposition higher learning from institutions of place (ye olde universities)  to an integrated system (and network) of instruction. This could be a system of online education orchestrated and operated by a central source, so that the learning modules could be of consistently high quality and be available anywhere, anytime, on convenient portable devices.

Apple’s potential partners in a distributed model of learning

How would this new digital model of learning be organized? It would need a core technology partner, and the closest company to fits that bill is probably Apple. It would need university partners, perhaps a gold list of the top 25 universities from around the world. Together they would offer premium (paid) curricula and courses downloadable via iTunes U.

Course materials (lectures, textbooks, exams, study guides, reference materials, etc.) would be optimized for the (rumored) Apple iTablet/e-reader.  Assuming that the Apple e-reader is an interactive device capable of web graphics, text, animations, movies, links, etc., these new courses would stand to be far more compelling than their classroom ancestors. They would also be much more engaging than the current podcast model.

An iTunes U disruption package

Here, then, is a hypothetical iTunes U disruption package, conceivably purchased from the iTunes U store for use on Apple’s “iTablet” (as speculated).

1. Digital textbooks (designed as multimedia/interactive books)
2. Digital lectures(designed as multimedia/interactive presentations)
3. Digital course materials (movies, music, art, etc.) outboard of online textbooks or lectures
4. Online student discussions, group exercises, team collaboration and uploads
5. Sign-ups, downloaded materials, fees and tuition paid via the iTunes U store.

As a student, you’d visit iTunes U, chose your course or courses, pay the fees, and download everything to your portable device. No lines. No waiting. No “semesters.” Order a logo sweatshirt, and you’re good to go. This may cost less, deliver more learning, and be far more convenient than attending a traditional university.

(more…)

When a brand becomes a platform its virtues radiate in a hundred directions. They spark more innovations, often in distant quarters, then fold back to raise the platform even higher.

It’s interesting amazing to watch the iPhone make mobile the complex processes that once required a computer and an office.

Here’s a demo of Autodesk’s SketchBook Mobile. It will set you back a hefty $2.99 at the App Store.

Jason Kottke has a nice overview of the disruptive potential of smartphones, using the iPhone as an example. He compares the current state of smartphone development to the early stages of the Internet. If correct, that comparison would leave a lot of headroom for smartphone disruption. Even if you believe that smartphones occupy a totally different market space, you may still be in the crosshairs.

Somewhere, a few coders may be planning to replace your brand with an app.

Apple’s iPhone has raised the bar for mobile brands in many ways, but perhaps Apple’s biggest iPhone brand advance is its ecosystem of developers to keep new mobile apps coming at a furious rate. To compete with the iPhone you now have to have your own app store and a powerful developer ecosystem crafting waves of irresistible apps. That’s a fairly high hurdle. Palm, Nokia, Research in Motion (BlackBerry) and Google (Android) are all chasing Apple in the brand ecosystem race.

Brands are moving from the showcase to the commons

I would argue that what is happening in mobile brands today presages what will happen to brands in general as mobile apps become the currency of culture. Going forward, the true measure of a brand will be how it transitions from the showcase to the commons, as brands use mobile platforms to enrich and extend social networks. As I’ve noted previously, brands will be recast as applications, as unique ways for customers to get things done. Brand creativity, imagination, moral sense and powers of expression will be embedded in the apps, not imprisoned in a package or an ad. The more these apps surge forth from the ecosystem, the more universal the brand.

Your brand ecosystem is a big part of your identity

In the mobile universe, your brand ecosystem now makes up a large part of your identity. Customers know you, experience you, and view you through your ecosystem. It tells the world how alive you are, and where you’re going. You can’t really be a “smartphone” without one.

Palm: a slow launch for the brand ecosystem

Palm still faces major brand ecosystem challenges for its new Palm Pre smartphone. It is paying the price in reduced sales. Eric Savitz at Barron’s reports on market research that says Pre sales will likely fall below estimates, raising questions about Palm’s ability to compete with Apple and RIM (BlackBerry). A key factor is Palm’s slow development of competitive apps for the Pre, and the slow roll-out of  the Palm Pre Application Catalog. These are critical ecosystem issues.

The Palm Pre software development kit (SDK) was released to developers a month after the Pre was launched.

Your brand ecosystem keeps your brand fresh

As the flood of iPhone apps demonstrates, your brand ecosystem helps you innovate, too, keeping your brand fresh. There’s something new every day.

For Palm, this is another critical issue, as noted by the Globe and Mail:

“[Lack of apps] is going to be a huge Achilles heal for Palm,” said Carmi Levy senior vice-president, strategic consulting with AR Communications. “What it’s done is compromised the company’s ability to capitalize on the bump that you usually get when you launch a new device. So there’s huge amount of publicity surrounding the launch and then a couple months later things settle down because you’re not getting headlines like you used to get. It’s during that critical phase that application availability drives attention.”

Apple has changed the brand game in mobile

Apple, of course, has changed the brand game in mobile. Customers now expect handsets to be slick mini-computers, with the ease of use and applications of advanced computer technology. Handsets are now exemplars of innovation, not ham-fisted compromises. That places the mobile game clearly on Apple’s turf. It makes the brand ecosystem element all the more critical for Palm and other mobile players. To out-brand Apple you have to out-app Apple—somehow.

Image: Apple iPhone

First gradually, and now suddenly, brands are migrating to the social sphere as methods of creating value. In this process they increasingly share concepts and processes with other innovation and design disciplines that are breaking new ground.

UX design, service design and design thinking

Sylvain Cottong has put together a nice overview of UX design, service design and design thinking and how they inter-relate. His presentation on SlideShare contains many classic diagrams from these fields, and some I hadn’t seen before. The presentation makes a good reference source for brand builders. At some point the best of these and other disciplines will be wrapped in a (meta) brand methodology, based (naturally) on the art of creating customers.

The ColaLife Aid Pod sure seems like a great example of “design thinking.” It’s a set of lightweight, form-fit containers designed to carry medicine inside Coca-Cola shipping cases, piggyback style, as the cases are transported from distributors to villages in Third World countries.

See the video.

The ColaLife idea

Here’s the skinny from ColaLife:

ColaLife is a campaign to get Coca-Cola to open up its distribution channels in developing countries to save lives, especially children’s lives, by carrying much needed ’social products’ such as oral rehydration salts and high-dose vitamin A tablets. For the latest on the campaign, please visit the blog. ColaLife is an independent and purely voluntary movement backed by thousands of supporters on its Facebook Group. ColaLife is not an organisation.

Brands are collaborations in context

With this very clever (and designerly) idea, ColaLife is extending the Coca-Cola brand. Brands are collaborations in context between companies and their communities. In this case, the ColaLife folks envision a context where the Coca-Cola transportation network can also function as a brand of health. Getting needed medicines to people is a major distribution problem in many Third World counties. Being able to piggyback medicine distribution on an available (and reliable) transportation network is a plus—and potentially a life-saver.

Opportunities as a “brand of distribution”

In many respects, the Coca-Cola brand is a brand of distribution. You can “like” Coke because you know you’ll always be able to find it. ColaLife presents Coca-Cola with an opportunity to leverage this key element of its brand.

Photo credit: Simon Berry