OTT vs SMS: Online Services Are Disrupting Mobile Phone Carriers' Messaging Binge

The initials don't matter but the monetary impact does. 

Messaging drives the mobile business model - and it is hugely profitable. Revenues of approximately $140 billion with profits to match.

For phone carriers this is the key to current survival and future opportunity. They are rolling in revenue from SMS messaging which has softened the impact of declining land line sales and actual phone conversations.

But there is now a disruptive innovation on the market and it could be a killer. The new messaging services are called OTT, which stands for over-the-top. And are they ever.

The OTTs provide instant messaging over the net that does not require wireless cell networks. Some provide the service for free and charge advertisers to send messages. Some prohibit adverting messages but offer phone carriers promotional opportunities. Some carriers are fighting but some think the best approach is to acquire the new services. Whatever the final outcome, the emergence of the OTTs reminds us that no one in any business dependent on technology and communications can afford to become complacent. JL

Business Insider reports:

A new batch of companies are providing over-the-top (OTT) messaging services — services that send instant messages over the Internet and don't depend on wireless cell networks.

The Post- Normal Age of Work

What's normal these days?

Maybe that's exactly the point. Nothing much is. Foosball, trading desks, skunk works, alliances, hierarchies, open plan, executive floors. We've gone from one size fits all to mix and match.

So post-normal could, at first blush, seem even more chaotic, even anarchic. But, as the following article explains, it is more a reflection of the reality we have created - or accepted - than some bold new vision of the future designed to take us where man has never ventured before. In fact, we're already there, we just aren't always sure what to do with what we've got.

The basic structure has become more decentralized. Contractors often outnumber employees. We manage to the project not the five year plan. Relationships are looser, if no less financially significant, but the formal bindings have usually stripped away. This means a work environment that is, by turns, more distant, but of necessity more collaborative and cooperative. We work together because we have to, but also because we want to. And if we dont, either side can move on, whether the other likes it or not.

This requires a more subtle approach to interaction if value is to be obtained. The lack of formal and familiar organizational landmarks is what makes it post-normal. We have to make them up as we go along, remembering, we hope, to keep the ones that work. Rather than 'knowing our place,' we have to accept responsibility for finding, building and nurturing it, at whatever level. This is challenging because few of us have been trained to do so, but also liberating because it gives us the freedom to experiment and figure out what's best. It wont always work - and it will always be messy - but it is the reality and if we want to prevail, we have to make it real for those around us and for ourselves. JL

Stowe Boyd reports in GigaOm:

It’s a now-prevalent notion that companies can advance by simply adding a social layer on top of existing business processes, integrating social tools with existing functional tools such as ERP, CRM, and HR solutions. The idea goes that this will make companies more social and therefore more productive. That idea isn't going to work.

Wanted: More Corporate Boards of Directors With Digital Savvy

Now, now, it isn't going to be that hard. 

Given the importance, one might even suggest, the essential, nature of technology to business survival, let alone success these days, adding directors to corporate boards who have substantial experience with the digital economy would seem as important as having lawyers, accountants, fellow CEOs and crisis managers.

But despite that seemingly obvious need and advantage, such directors are underrepresented on many Global 500 corporate boards. The reasons for this are cultural, social and experiential.

Corporate boards tend to be stocked with 'PLUs' - people like us. In other words, other corporate guys (and a few, um, 'gals') who came up through finance and marketing. Many have MBAs or engineering degrees. They also tend to be people who have already established a record of achievement over many years and, increasingly, many international assignments. They play golf, they went to many of same schools - or other schools pretty much just like them - and they share a certain outlook about business, politics, the right place to vacation and the advantages of bordeaux versus cabernet sauvignon. This is not to say that they are dumb, or superficial. That may occasionally be true, but the odds are against it: there is too much money at stake.

There may be, however, a certain insularity in the selection process. People want to serve with those who make them comfortable and CEOs want supporters, not critics, even if they are from outside the company and do not officially report to him or her.

By their very nature, tech executives, though no slouches when it comes to business and finance (or even golf and cabernet), do tend to be younger thanks to the age of their industry, have somewhat different educational and/or professional backgrounds and may not share the same world outlook. All of which should be an advantage to any pragmatic, ambitious corporation looking to capture the future. As the following article explains, that does appear to be dawning, however slowly. Overcoming social barriers if often harder than breaching professional ones. But necessity and financial opportunity - or threat - do tend to concentrate the mind, enabling the heart, in this case, to follow. JL

Joann Lublin reports in the Wall Street Journal:

Nearly every facet of corporate life has gone digital. But many public-company boards remain stuck in analog mode.

The Blame Game: Endorsements and Their Often Errant Effect

The very edge that gives some endorsers their value is what invariably creates the embarrassment for corporate sponsors.

Endorsements from rappers like L'il Wayne are not solicited because of their adherence of social norms and proprieties. So it should come as no surprise to the corporations that importune them when behavior goes awry, threatening the loyalty of one demographic segment with the style beloved of another.

Rap and hip-hop come in for more than their fair share of the blame with all of the attendant racial and class overtones. But these issues have been cropping up for centuries (Papal alliances with murderous despots etc) and with greater frequency in the modern advertising era which began in the 1920s. The question is not whether companies are surprised, but why they have not done a better job of preparing for the almost inevitable disappointments or embarrassments.

Edginess sells, but too much of it can offend. The challenge is when mainstream brands attempt to capture some of the dangerous allure that consumers find exciting. It is in that cross-over where the translation sometimes fails. Advertisers seek images consistent with what they perceive their core customer appeal to be. But they are always attempting to push the boundary a bit further so as not to appear to staid, boring or predictable. Hence the appeal of glamor, elegance and danger. So whether it is a rapper offending moral sensibilities or a movie star betraying too great a fondness for stimulants, the risk is omnipresent. Can't have the appeal without the jeopardy, whose impact is exacerbated by the social media megaphone.

Rather than hoping that nothing it will happen, it may well be more efficient and productive to assume it will, and figure out how to turn it into a lesson further confirming the company's prescience and appeal. Smart sells. JL

Jon Caramanica reports in the New York Times:

Companies already spend millions on endorsements and millions on social causes. In difficult situations, it would be more progressive to use that financial muscle to align the interests of the company, the artist and the public to raise awareness of the issues brought up.

Google Moves on Money, Music and Merchandise

Google came out firing yesterday and the intended targets were three of its biggest rivals, Apple, Amazon and the financial services industry.

With Apple in mind (and Spotify, as well), Google launched a monthly music service that for $9.99 offers users the ability to listen to unlimited songs.

For Amazon, it proffered its InstantBuy API (application programming interface) that streamlines buying stuff with Android phones.

But perhaps most significantly, Google Wallet will now enable the sending of money via email, enormously simplifying tech-enabled finance, simultaneously reducing concerns about safety while providing it with the scale required to make it the major business that bankers, retailers and techies have hoped it would become.

The three announcements are significant because in one breathlessly fell swoop, Google has used its existing technologies and customer base to challenge the core franchises of its three most prominent, successful competitors . The strategic audacity is compelling. Google employs arguably underutilized or sub-optimized assets to attack its rivals, at little additional cost to itself. And it does so by focusing its attacks along some of the most significant axes for scaling tech monetization: convenience, finance and ecommerce.

There will, of course, be competitive responses to these initiatives and first mover advantage is not necessarily sustainable. But by redeploying assets it already owns in order to reduce its rivals precedence in key sectors, Google has demonstrated its intellectual and operational ascendancy. JL

Chris Velazco reports in TechCrunch:

Google Wallet support has been baked into Gmail, so users will soon be able to send each other money by simply shooting each other emails.

The Dog Ate My Earnings: Are Walmart's Multiple Excuses A Sign of Deeper Problems?

'The dog ate my homework,' has been a traditional laugh-line used to describe errant students attempting to explain why they didn't complete an assignment.

Walmart, lately, has been sounding a lot like that.

The big news yesterday was of the company's refusal to join other global apparel companies and retailers in signing an accord designed to improve Bangladeshi factories ' safety and working conditions in the wake of the building collapse that killed an estimated 1,100+ garment workers. For Walmart, however, refusing to participate is based on one of a series of excuses, invariably blamed on someone else, for its disappointing performance.

In addition to the global factory safety pact rejection (for fear of litigation, as if Walmart is any stranger to that), the company announced sales and earnings for the first quarter of 2013. Earnings were in line with projections, which is to say, somewhat discouraging as analysts usually expect big corporations to find a way of outperforming preliminary estimates. Sales, however, were down significantly. Instead of vowing to rethink its merchandising strategy, Walmart chose instead to blame the US government. It cited mailing delays for tax refund checks and a payroll tax hike as the proximate causes for its operational shortcomings.

When combined with the rejection of the Bangladesh factory agreement which would require major customers to help pay for safety improvements, it appears that Walmart may be desperate to save money wherever and however it can. Blaming government check mailing policies or a de minimus payroll tax imposed against the backdrop of an economy improving so fast that economists fear deficits are disappearing too quickly seems like the sort of pathetic finger-pointing one expects of deficient 11 year olds, not the world's largest retailer. This excuse-mongering behavior raises questions about what other operational inadequacies Walmart may be masking. JL

Brad Plumer reports in the Washington Post:

Supporters of the (Bangladesh) accord say that the U.S. companies are simply trying to dodge an extra cost.

Return to Sender: Reports of Email's Demise Are Wishful - and Wildly Inaccurate

Reports of email's demise continue to surface. They also continue to be inaccurate, tend to be based on spurious data - when they are based on data at all - and are largely beside the point.

The latest figures advise that email usage is growing approximately 6 percent a year. That suggests that email will double at least once and possibly twice in the lifetimes of anyone reading this post. The problem is that much of that growth will not be from old friends reaching out to see how you are doing, but from bots spamming you with offers you probably arent interested in seeing let alone exploring.

But the big trend for which you, dear reader, are personally responsible, is that the future of email is mobile. 79 percent of mobile phone owners report using their devices more often to read email than to actually make a phone call.

The complaints about email tend to focus on its volume, relentlessness and wastefulness. Business marketers report sending 19 percent more email each year, which accounts for some of the overall increase and most of the frustration with it. The tech community has heard the complaints and, as is its wont, perceives an opportunity. New methods for identifying, analyzing, organizing and interacting are either available or in the works. But complaining about email is like whining about traffic, weather and other generations' music tastes: nothing you say is going to change it much so better to figure out how to optimize your relationship with it than to wish it away. JL

Dileep Thazhmon reports in TheNextWeb:

You get 100’s (or 1000’s) of emails competing for your attention every day. Why bother? Why care? Why not just throw in the towel? Well, the reason is simple — because email has been around forever and it’s not going anywhere anytime soon.