Archive for May, 2011

Key Facts & Conclusions

1. It takes 100 years to have 1 billion fixed lines & only 20 years to reach 5 billion mobile subscriptions
2. More consumers will access the Internet by mobile devices than by desktop or laptop by 2014
3. 2015 forecast of annual global mobile data traffic (75 exabytes) is equal to 19.000 million DVDs
4. Mobile-only Internet population will grow 56-fold up to 788 million by the end of 2015
5. In 2015 mobile devices will exceed the home PC base installed
6. 500 million mobile using mobile health Apps in 2015
7. In 2015 revenue mobile Apps will be an amount near to 40.000 million dollar
8. M2M revenues will grow more than 3,5-fold from 2010 to 2015
9. The TV experience will be more personal and social but less familiar
10. Traffic generated by 20 homes will be greater than the total traffic of Internet in 1995
11. New services in the cloud: “ Your Desktop Wherever You Want”
12. Social Networks revenues will grow more than 4-fold from 2010 to 2015
13. By 2015, it is expected that 500 million people worldwide use their mobiles as metro and bus tickets
14. MMO (Massive Multiplayer Online) is expected to reach 20.000 million dollar by 2015
15. It is expected that in 2015 it will exist 2,5 Internet connected devices per inhabitants worldwide

Source: http://digitallife.neolabels.com/

Video: http://vimeo.com/23903009

Social networks can be a valuable tool when it comes to getting your name out there, but while many businesses have a Facebook page it’s surprising how often little to no effort is put into using them effectively. No mater how diligently you answer comments on your wall, there will come a time when your user base will grow bored. Here are a few sure fire ways to keep them interested and coming back.

Incentive Programs

A good starting place for making sure your user base sticks around is to give them a reason to. It’s pretty commonplace to see sweepstakes and giveaways as a way to encourage more people to comment, like, and generally keep interest high. What is less common and far more effective, however, is to make a game out of it. As an example, if you implemented a system where points are given for various actions—ten points for liking a page, maybe twenty for referring another user to like the page, and five points for every comment posted—you’re immediately giving your users something to work towards and a sense of progression not unlike those found in video games.

Best Using the Point System

Once you have a system like this put in place, it’s important that when an eventual winner, or winners of this game are chosen, no one feels cheated or like their time was wasted. The best way to do this is to foster a sense of community, and make your users feel like they are working together rather than against one another. A good example of a way to implement this is to keep a grand point total as well as an individual point total, and give incentives to the entire community at various points. When the grand total reaches one hundred thousand points lets say, everyone gets a coupon code for five percent off at your or maybe a partner retailer. This increases sales, makes everyone feel like they have won, and keeps interest in your page extremely high.

Source:

• jeffbullas.com by Heather Green
• Image by Master Isolated Images

“The battle’s been raging for years to try and put together a ‘social network for gamers’.  The idea is that gamers everywhere need a place where they can hook up with one another, share their scores across all their platforms, challenge one another and find new games.  I’ve seen it tried in some form by EA Rupture, Zynga, OfferPal (now TapJoy), Facebook and even Apple.  Among the various efforts, though Raptr has stood out as a solid option, combining a simple interface with a plethora of options.  Today, Raptr’s upgrading.

Raptr announced today that they are launching a social news platform, which is essentially a news feed.  This will be broadcast to its 8m+ user base today, and the goal is to get gamers interacting with one another more, and likely discovering new games and opportunities based on the feed.  They’re not saying much about the algorithm that chooses what gamer stories you see, but they’ve indicated it will be based on what you play, what platforms you use and what your friends do.  Raptr’s CEO, Dennis Fong, explains:

“At Raptr we’re reinventing the way people stay connected and informed about the games they care about. We’re excited by the launch of the new community-driven website because it builds upon the success of our existing service and provides a new way to discover and share content.”

Check out Raptr and let us know what you think.  The list of features available at the site are given below as well, in case you weren’t sure what else you can get out of the service.

• Personalized news feed
• Community-curated content
• Expanded topics to include all things related to gaming
• Suggestion engine to help you discover new games
• Automatic gameplay and achievements tracker on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3
• Centralized buddy list and friend tracker
• In-game chat and web browsing for PC games”

Source:

• socialtimes.com by Neil Vidyarthi

“Without question, the social gaming market is the newly hot space in the game industry.  Some of the leading developers have emerged as companies only in the last few years and in that time have managed to gather tens of millions of both dollars and users from these games.   With these outstanding numbers and increasing sociality of games not only on the web, but on mobile and console platforms as well, it seems like a very attractive market to enter.  However, for all its potential, it’s a place that many independent developers and traditional game publishers are having difficulty being successful in.  The reason for this is because these games are overwhelmingly financed by microtransactions of virtual goods, and knowing how to inspire users to pay you for virtual goods is something that’s not easy to master.

This article will attempt to shed light on these economics within the social games market, what kind of opportunity exists for new entrants, and provide strategies that independent developers with limited resources can use to make a successful entry into the market.  This article is one of a two part series that will focus on strategies independent developers can use to be successful.  The next will focus on strategies for publishers to enter the space.”

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Really interesting article on gamification of start ups:

Beyond Badges: 3 Smart Ways to Gamify Your Startup

About the author:

Rajat Paharia is the founder and chief product officer atBunchball. You can follow him on Twitter @Bunchball and read his blog

According to the article the main questions for gamification are:

1. What Is Your Core Experience?
2. Know Your Business!
3. Know Your User