Personal Technologies Are Game Changers for Consumers

People are changing their Web habits as they become more comfortable with personal handheld media devices. Systems such as iPhones, iPads and Blackberry and Android phones are becoming the preferred interfaces with the Web instead of desktop or laptop computers. This trend is changing the way that people manage their lives, and marketers are moving to take advantage of it. In the MILCOM 2010 Wednesday keynote panel, Steve Yankovich, vice president, Mobile & PBS Group, eBay, related that his company is seeing rapid growth in its mobile business and is bridging the gap between online and mobile shopping. The company does not offer its entire menu in the mobile realm, but instead it tailors services to the mobile user who is away from his or her computer. "A huge paradigm shift is happening as people engage the small screen more than they do their computer," Yankovich declared. "It has transformed eBay." A key to exploiting this trend is to determine who and where the user is and to ascertain what that person is going to do. Determining intention is a valuable step in marketing to mobile devices, he noted. Yankovich offered that cameras on mobile devices are changing the way we live, and marketers are noticing that. Some day, a person will see a consumer item that they want worn or carried by another person on the street-a watch, some clothing or an accessory, for example. The first person will take a picture of the item with their mobile device; software will analyze the pixels and identify the item; and the handheld then will tell its user where it can purchase the item, either at the best price or at the nearest location.