launch
drag2share: Google+ Is Regaining Momentum, Proving Its Many Skeptics Wrong
source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/businessinsider/~3/bnPk-fbSEK4/google-is-regaining-momentum-2013-8
Why Google+ Isn’t Going Anywhere Anytime Soon (L2 Think Tank)
Google+, which gained momentum after a successful launch in 2011 but then suffered from a slowdown in growth, is now surging in popularity, defying the predictions of many pundits who said it would fade away. L2 Think Tank Founder Scott Galloway says that’s because Google has effectively integrated Google+ with its most popular products, such as Search and Gmail, which places the social network in front of Google users throughout the day.
We noted in our recent analysis that Google+ has surpassed Twitter in monthly unique visitors on PCs.
Pandora Shows That A Media Business Can Grow Around Mobile Ads
Source: https://intelligence.businessinsider.com/welcome
Pandora reported total mobile revenue growth of 92% year-over-year, according to the company’s earnings released last week.
That puts Pandora’s mobile revenue at $116 million, almost 72% of total revenue, up significantly from a 65% share last quarter.
More than ever, Pandora is a mobile-first company, and its efforts to build a media business around mobile advertising make it a bellwether for the industry.
In the recent past, Pandora seemed to be struggling to monetize mobile effectively.
The company even saw its RPM rate, the amount of revenue it could command for a thousand advertisements, decline in recent quarters.
But this past quarter it accomplished a 180-degree performance turnaround.
Pandora’s RPM rate jumped 52% compared to the same quarter last year, and 39% compared to the prior quarter.
Pandora executives have attributed the impressive mobile numbers to app improvements and bulked-up efforts to sell locally targeted ads.
Pandora has improved its ad revenue picture enough that it now feels confident lifting its 40-hour-per-month listening cap for free mobile users, despite the increased content licensing costs that will bring.
The end of the 40-hour cap could also be seen as a preemptive defensive tactic against the expected September launch of Apple’s iTunes radio streaming service.
‘Netflix Effect’ Hits Nordic Countries
source: http://www.emarketer.com/Article/Netflix-Effect-Hits-Nordic-Countries/1010160
Internet users in the Nordic countries—Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden—are quickly developing a taste for online movie subscriptions and purchases. Across these four nations, visits to websites offering films and other video content for sale leapt 190% between June 2012 and June 2013, according to comScore Media Metrix.
In mid-2013, Denmark boasted the largest number of web users in the region going to retail movie sites—some 700,000, according to comScore, and nearly double the number a year earlier. But the smallest markets, Finland and Norway, demonstrated the most remarkable growth during the year, with traffic to such sites up 271% and 981%, respectively.
The arrival of Netflix seems to have given the market a major push. Its launch in October 2012 offered an estimated 10 million broadband homes in the region direct access to movies and TV shows from US, European and national broadcasters and film studios. Subscribers can also watch Netflix content on a range of other web-enabled devices, such as smart TVs, Blu-ray players, tablets and smartphones. By June 2013, Netflix reached 1.5 million internet users in the Nordics, comScore reported.
The “Netflix effect” is evident in Sweden, for example. Mediavision noted that 500,000 Swedish households had a subscription to a web TV or streaming service in March 2013, three times more than before Netflix entered the market. According to Mediavision, this rapid growth was “primarily driven by Netflix.” The “MMS Trend & Te! ma” report prepared by Mediamätning i Skandinavien estimated that 645,000 people in Sweden ages 9 to 99 had access to Netflix content in Q1 2013—making it the leading VOD service in the country.
drag2share: Moto X, And Why Google Bought Motorola Mobility
source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/businessinsider/~3/YbP9Q6sqLis/moto-x-and-google-2013-8
Moto X, And Why Google Bought Motorola Mobility (Wired)
Motorola’s new flagship handset, Moto X, debuted on August 1st. Wired surveys Google’s two-year journey from the acquisition of Motorola Mobility to the launch of this smartphone. The Moto X is the pioneering device that Google hopes will enhance its hardware portfolio
Google Chromecast review: can you make your dumb TV a smart one for just $35?
Source: http://www.engadget.com/2013/07/29/google-chromecast-review/
More Info
Despite the best efforts of Panasonic, Samsung, Sony, LG and others, most of the televisions in people’s homes these days are not of the smart variety. However, there are hundreds of millions of regular televisions packing HDMI ports, and Google’s new Chromecast device offers a way to put some brains into those dumb TVs by giving them access to web-based content. Having a Chromecast dongle connected to your TV means you can stream videos straight from a Google Play, Netflix or YouTube app, or mirror the content in any open tab in Google’s Chrome browser using a tab casting feature.
Sure, we’ve seen devices with almost identical functionality, like Plair, but Chromecast is backed by Google, whose relationships with content providers and developers mean that the Google Cast technology powering it will soon be popping up in even more apps. Not to mention, there’s the price. At $35, it’s almost a third of the cost of Plair and also Roku 3 and Apple TV, the current most popular devices that bring internet video to your TV. Even for such a paltry outlay, is it a worthy addition to your living room? And is it really “the easiest way to enjoy online video and music on your TV” as Google’s marketing would have us believe? Read on to find out.
Filed under: Home Entertainment, HD, Mobile, Google
drag2share: Zynga’s Struggles Persist As It Fails To Gain Any Mobile Traction
source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/businessinsider/~3/dbKaJ-WIsLg/zyngas-struggles-persist-2013-7
Zynga Q2 Earnings Results Show Continued Struggles (TechCrunch)
Zynga reported its second quarter results. The social gaming company posted a revenue decline of 31% year-over-year as well as a net loss of about $16 million. Its inability to convert its portfolio of games to the mobile platform has been the biggest issue for the company over the past year. Now, it faces greater competition in the mobile arena from King (Candy Crush Saga) and Kabam. The major launch of Draw Something 2 failed to bring in an audience. The game never reached a top 100 ranking across app store charts. Read >
drag2share: Apple’s Passbook Ecosystem – How It May Still Shake Up Mobile Payments
When Passbook launched, excitement was high — among marketers and retailers in particular.
“Forget The E-Wallet, It’s Apple’s Passbook That Will Transform Retail,” declared an op-ed in Ad Age in October 2012, just two weeks after the iOS 6 launch. The op-ed was written by Krishna Subramanian, CEO of ad company Velti.
“With Passbook,” wrote Subramanian, “the integration of promotions, redemption, and ongoing loyalty will be closer — and more location-specific — than ever.
Subramanian pointed out that Passbook also solved a real problem: that coupons don’t work very well.
Google+ Surpasses Twitter On PCs, But Can It Catch LinkedIn?
Source: https://intelligence.businessinsider.com/welcome
LinkedIn is consolidating its position as the second-largest social media platform among U.S. PC users.
The latest data, from comScore for June 2013, puts the site’s unique monthly visitors at 50.6 million.
In the 12 months to June 2013, this audience grew 28%.
Google+ grew 26.1% in the same period, surpassing Twitter as the third-largest social media platform.
All these numbers are impressive considering that they are desktop-only. It may be that some or all of these networks would be growing even faster once mobile users are accounted for.
But, will Google+ catch LinkedIn on the desktop? Based on its current trajectory, it appears not.
Google+ experienced rapid adoption and growth early in its existence, but it slowed down dramatically in the middle of 2012.
Google+ saw 173% PC-based growth from its July 2011 launch through December 2011, and 61% growth in the first six months of 2012. But then it had only 6% growth in the last six months of 2012, and 7% growth from January 2013 through June 2013
Unless Google+ growth speeds up again, it’s not going to get within reach of LinkedIn.
Download the chart and data in Excel.
Joshua Kushner Has Quietly Amassed 30 Employees And $40 Million To Shake Up Health Care With A Startup, Oscar
Source: http://www.businessinsider.com/joshua-kushner-launches-health-insurance-startup-oscar-2013-7
You won’t find Joshua Kushner tweeting his whereabouts, tagged in Instagram photos or blogging about tech.
Although the 28-year-old dates a Victoria’s Secret model, the entrepreneur and venture capitalist keeps to himself. He rarely gives interviews and his firm’s website, Thrive Capital, doesn’t even list the companies he’s invested in, despite an impressive portfolio which includes Instagram, NastyGal, Fab and GroupMe.
That may be why Kushner has been able to keep his plans to disrupt the health care industry quiet for nearly two years. But under everyone’s nose he’s poached engineers from Google, plucked co-founders from Tumblr and Microsoft, and raised $40 million.
The company Kushner is launching with Microsoft’s former director of health care, Kevin Nazemi and former head of engineering and operations at Tumblr, Mario Schlosser, is called Oscar. It will be a full-blown insurance company that rivals longstanding entities such as Aetna and UnitedHealth. But Oscar will be transparent, making bills and charges easy for customers to consume via technology.
Oscar is set to launch in January 2014. Kushner’s team was just granted a New York health insurance license this month. Oscar will begin enrolling New Yorkers this fall who are seeking insurance under Obama’s Affordable Care Act.
Raising $40 million before launch isn’t always smart. It didn’t work out for Sean Parker, who raised $34 million for a social video company Airtime, or Bill Nguyen who raised $41 million fo! r Color which flopped. But we’re told all $40 million of this fundraise, which comes from Khosla Ventures, Thrive Capital and Founders Fund, is necessary. Reinventing the health care industry isn’t easy, and most of the money Kusher has raised isn’t operational. When you have an insurance company, there are reserve requirements. Much of the $40 million will be stashed away in case of emergency, thanks to industry regulations.
Oscar is Kushner’s third venture. His first, Vostu, was a gaming company that rivaled Zynga in Brazil but has since gone through a series of layoffs. Thrive Capital, the investment firm Kushner started three years ago, has raised more than $150 million to invest in startups.
drag2share: Brand Videos Hit Their Viral Peak On Day Two After Launch
Television is no longer the only game in town for distributing and watching video. The Internet and the social web have provided content creators and advertisers with a cost-effective way to distribute video.
“Social” video is video that is influenced — in any part of the pipeline, from production to distribution — by social media. For audiences, discovery is no longer about flipping through channels or a TV guide, it’s about listening to friends’ recommendations and glancing at social media feeds.
In a recent report from BI Intelligence, we look at the general state of social video, examine social video audiences and their demographics, analyze how marketers and advertisers are getting into the mix, compare the major social video platforms, and detail how social is influencing video as a content medium.
Access The Full Report And Data By Signing Up For A Free Trial Today >>
The first few days following launch are key to a video’s viral success. Unruly Media studied the top 200 viral ! brand vi deos launched 2012, and shared some of their results exclusively with BI Intelligence.
Take a look at these charts:
Here is a look at the same chart, but over a longer period of time:
According to Unruly’s data, 10% of shares occurred on day two (the viral peak), and 25% of shares occurred within the first three days. However, marketers shouldn’t forget that brand videos also have a shelf-life and somewhat of a long-tail: 50% of shares came after the first three weeks. Shares are defined as Facebook shares, Facebook likes, Facebook comments, Twitter mentions, retweets, and blog post mentions .
A separate Unruly study of 1,000 brand videos analyzed how the different days of the week stacked up for video shares, whether they saw more or fewer shares than the daily average. The resu! lt was c lear: video shares increase late in the work week — Fridays saw 16% more shares than the daily average — and then drop precipitously over the weekend.
Digital Consigliere
Dr. Augustine Fou is Digital Consigliere to marketing executives, advising them on digital strategy and Unified Marketing(tm). Dr Fou has over 17 years of in-the-trenches, hands-on experience, which enables him to provide objective, in-depth assessments of their current marketing programs and recommendations for improving business impact and ROI using digital insights.
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