Animated magazine cover: reality mimics Harry Potter

July 30, 2008 by Dale Larson · View Comments
Filed under: Uncategorized 

A real magazine on newsstands available to Muggles this October will have an animated cover, just like The Daily Prophet newspaper read by Harry Potter.

Since this isn’t fiction, no surprise that it’s sponsored by an advertiser.  Ford will be the first company in history to have an animated print magazine ad.

What comes next?
I know I’d rather read anything good (but longer than a text message) on paper rather than skimming it on screen.  Especially if I can flip through it like a real magazine, not load each page like on a Kindle.
How long until we have a fully digital magazine allowing me to download a new issue on a regular basis then flip through pages and browse content and advertising targeted specifically to me?
Would this be the best of both worlds, allowing publishers a new outlet for distributing and selling customized content while giving advertisers the longer attention span of a magazine reader combined with the targeting of interactive advertising?
Information Week reports:

Esquire First Publication To Use Electronic Ink

Esquire plans to publish the magazine’s October issue using so-called electronic ink. The issue will feature a cover across which various words and images will scroll “news-ticker style” — thanks to technology developed by Cambridge, Mass.-based E Ink

E Ink uses segmented display cells to show simple images and alphanumeric text on a paper-like material. The system requires a small battery. In the case of Esquire’s October issue, the battery should last for about 90 days

“We’ve spent 16 months making this happen,” Esquire editor David Granger said in a statement. Granger said the issue’s content will eye how digital technology is affecting the world. “The entire issue is devoted to exploring the ideas, people and issues that will be the foundation of the 21st century,” he said.

Hearst’s effort is being co-sponsored by Ford. The automaker is running a double-page spread on the back of Esquire’s October cover that also will use electronic ink and will promote Ford’s new Flex crossover vehicle.

The technology “offered us the chance to show the vehicle in a way we never could have imagined,” said Jim Farley, Ford’s group VP of marketing and communications, in a statement.

Magazines have been steadily losing advertising dollars to the Internet as marketers begin to favor the Web’s interactivity and personalization potential. Electronic ink, if it catches on, could help the print industry reverse the trend — or at least hold its ground — in the contest for ad revenue.

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They Murdered the Experience: iPhone purchase and activation

July 12, 2008 by Dale Larson · View Comments
Filed under: iPhone, user experience 

One of the first things that gave me joy about iPhone 1.0 was the purchase, activation and setup experience.

If you’ve ever bought a cell phone, you’ve probably experienced pain going through all the many confusing options (in store or over the phone) for plans, dealing with upselling for warranties and accessories, answering all the questions and waiting for computer problems, credit checks, etc. Then onto quirks activating and setting up. Nothing about the process seems considerate of the customer, their time and frustration. Before iPhone 1.0, this was true across all the carriers and handsets out there.

iPhone 1.0 and AT&T changed all that, simplifying plans and choices, allowing you to purchase a phone with a credit card in seconds (like buying groceries), and providing for activation at your home computer with just a few simple questions.

I’d often evangelized this part of the experience as setting iPhone apart, as a brilliant move by Apple, and as something that would hopefully have an impact on the industry as a whole.

Unfortunately, it seems that in solving a business problem, AT&T and Apple have dropped that focus on the customer and their experience and taken us back to the days before iPhone 1.0. I can only hope that they will consider this a mistake, learn from it, and find a way to put the experience first again while addressing the business problems. They still have it in them to change the industry.

I’d love to hear from Apple or AT&T how they went about deciding this way to do things, retreating so far from the brave stand they took with 1.0.

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Experience: the essential competitive advantage

July 10, 2008 by Dale Larson · View Comments
Filed under: iPhone, strategy, user experience 

I camped on the street last night in front of 1 Stockton, the San Francisco Apple Store.  I’ll be here until 8am tomorrow.

Reporters ask “why?”
It’s a great question.  And it occurs to me that every business should be answering this question, too.
What would make anyone want to camp in line for a new product release?
What would make someone do that in my industry or for one of my products?
What do people in line say?
What do those who pass by say?
How do they feel after the line is done and they’re buying and using the product and service?
(I’ve had some great conversations with the homeless about what a one-man tent costs, or where they sleep and how they live.  What’s it like to talk to people you don’t think of as part of your market, or you wouldn’t normally have a conversation with?)
Of course, the answers must extend beyond marketing, to every aspect of the product, how it is sold, delivered and serviced.
I may be preaching to the choir, but only dinosaurs will keep competing primarily on price, features, or ad dollars. Others have gone on at length about some of the reasons (Seth Godin, for example).
Watching an Apple Store for 24 hours, and talking to people about it is a great example of how all the little details are accounted for, from the security guard who says goodnight to the friendly staff who all greet you with a smile, to the window cleaner who spends 90 minutes here each morning at 6am and the free internet I’m using to type this on a store computer while charging my old iPhone.
I’m not a fan of Apple in particular.  I’m a fan of anyone who understands the power of good design (understood in the broad sense) and delivers a fantastic end-to-end experience.
If you aren’t asking these questions for your business, it’s just a matter of time until someone comes along and eats your lunch by delivering a dramatically improved experience. And they’ll do it without using any special magic, just by paying attention and asking different questions.
If your organization operates in silos with no way to account for the experience a user has throughout the process, expect the same.  Saying “we’re customer focused” doesn’t make it so.  What do your customers say?
The answers you come up with today may be less important than continuing to ask the questions, to be curious, and to be out there talking to people and watching them.
So come join me in line, start asking the questions, looking, and listening, and lets talk about some of the answers.
(I’ve written several posts about the iPhone and User Experience that you might find interesting, perha

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