2011 Techology Recap

Amidst the holiday hustle and New Year’s resolutions is the opportunity to stop for a moment and reflect on the whirlwind that was 2011. We didn’t see the unveiling of the iPhone 5, as many predicted we would, and AT&T never did acquire T-Mobile, but nevertheless it was a year of growth and breakthroughs in many ways. Here’s a recap of 2011 in technology.

Android:

Android is dominating the global smartphone market. According to Gartner's numbers for Q3 2011, more than half of all smartphones sold worldwide during that period were Android phones (52.5 percent). The next closest competitor is Nokia's Symbian at around 16.9 percent, followed by iOS at 15 percent. That represents a 100 percent increase from Q3 2010. There is no question, Android is here to stay, and a scary force to be reckoned with.

Voice Search:

With the advent of Siri, Apple put a major focus on voice-based search this year. While some of the fanfare has worn off, voice search is especially useful in the car or while multi-tasking. Going into 2012, as users increasingly use voice as an input, the notion of brand names and their voice detectability is becoming even more relevant. Does your brand translate? Does your competitor's?

Mobile Web:

Many brands and retailers, who did not jump aboard the mobile movement in 2010, learned from their mistakes and took mobile more seriously in 2011. As we move closer to the time when more people access the web on a wireless device than a PC, brands and others will realize that they need a mobile web offering that delivers. Consumers will demand it.

QR Codes:

QR codes and other 2D mobile bar codes are an emerging technology that quickly caught on with marketers in Europe and the United States in 2011 because of their ability to drive consumers to specific content. However, if the code doesn’t do what it should, and takes users to a dead url for example, you can hurt your brand and cripple your QR Code campaign.

Other mistakes marketers commonly make in their QR code campaigns include un-scannable codes, not including a call-to-action, codes with no instructions and lengthy URLs.

Less Use of Flash

It is not the fact that Flash is not a great technology (when used appropriately it is), but in the past year or so it has been overused and misused so much that it has developed a bad reputation. Certainly, the ongoing shenanigans between Adobe (creator of Flash) and Apple are not helping the situation. Today, websites need to have a clean, uncluttered design, fast loading and above all must be Search Engine friendly. This is a problem for Flash and now with the coming of the new web coding languages of HTML5 and CSS3, together with the explosive growth of web surfing on mobile devices it could be the beginning of the end of Flash in web design.

Simpler and Cleaner Design

Simple. Minimal. Uncluttered. There’s nothing quite as “attention grabbing” as an honest, straightforward message on a quiet backdrop. Quiet can be interpreted several different ways. Forget black and white or shades of gray, although these are still very popular in certain industries. Think of green, yellow, red or even blue as your primary color. However, limit your palette to two or three colors. Work within the shades of each color for variety and depth. It can be truly remarkable what a few colors can do for effective messaging.

Social Media

2011 will likely be remembered as a year of incremental upgrades in various social media platforms rather than any major breakthroughs. Facebook introduced a flurry of changes to their news feed and Twitter became widely accepted as a mainstream social media channel, however the biggest news in social media marketing in 2011 was the introduction of Google+, Google's would-be competitor to Facebook. Google launched the social network in late June with a great deal of fanfare. In typical fashion, the launch started out as an invitation-only network and then admitted the general public in September. Marketers, however, didn't get to sign up for brand pages until late October, which may have been a tactical error on Google's part, hindering the network's growth and angering brands

As we head into 2012 all of us here at New Wave will continue to stay on top of the latest industry trends and developments for our customers. We proudly offer Web Design and Development services, as well as Mobile App Development, E-Commerce and Content Management Solutions, Search Engine Optimization, Social Media Management and more! Don’t know where to start? Call us today to see how our technology solutions can enhance your business’ marketing strategy.