You have heard it, you’ve read about it, people who appear to know stuff have told you: the digital revolution is unwired and if you don’t feed it what it needs to exist it will move on without you. When is this going to happen? It’s already, almost, so last year.
We cannot imagine the resistance Alexander Bell experienced. I remember hearing old people talking about it back int he 60′s saying they thought the phone would be a huge invasion and some called it “the devil’s box”. Why do we always credit “the devil” with innovation? But I digress. Let’s look at communications changes over the last few thousand years:
When I was in communcations classes some 30 years ago we were told 90% of the advancements in communications had been made since 1900. The number today must be closer to 99% of the advancements since 1969.
Many humans are slow to embrace change. Those who are generally miss the opportunity to leverage the excitement of new chances. Now we all know not everyone can do everything. You can’t be a specialist at real estate and a social media guru and a web programmer and a mobile technology expert … the list goes on. You can, however, use the technology as it is made available to you as an “early adopter”.
The important reason to be an early adopter is because if you are a late adopter by the time you start using the old technology another technology has come into play and the old technology is dead. Why is this important? Be where your buyers are coming instead of where they have already been.
We know, now, after me being laughed and scoffed at by Mrs. Garner some 15 years ago, over 80% of all home searches are started on the internet. I bet if she were still in the business she’d have a website just like every other agent. But I wonder if she would scoff at me when I called to tell her she needs to optimze her website for mobile?
What does this mean, “optimize for mobile”?
Simply put a website created for display on a larger screen laptop or desk top computer is not going to present well on a smaller screen mobile device. The browsers, for the most part, are completely different, smaller in byte size and present the web pages in a different manner than when used on a computer. Even though mobile is new it is re-inventing a few wheels to make use of existing data in the new technology.
The subject is vast and a complete dissemination of the topic is far beyond the scope of a simple blogpost like this one. Do some research. Check your stats (you do track them, right?) and see how much of your web traffic comes from mobile. On one of my sites I’m at 13%. Thirteen percent. Would you close your doors to 13 out of 100 people who tried to come and buy from you?
Then there’s video. Don’t scoff – mobile and video go together like movies and popcorn …
See you at REtechSouth. Speaking of video, come dressed for your debut. I’ll be doing free green screen sessions at the event! My session is on how to actually cut through the smoke and generate some leads online. Not theory, my actual tools that I use and have used to generate millions in gross income.
Image credits:
(Phoenician alphabet) (Parchment) (Chinese horesmen) (Gutenberg press) (Marconi radio)
Infographic:
You are free to use the infographic in any way you wish so long as you either link the image back to http://icobb.com or place a credit in the article thus: <a href=”http://icobb.com” title=”Social Optimization” target=”_blank”><img src=”whereveryoustoredtheimage” alt=”Infographic by @thekencook”></a>
