Laughing City

Which phone system do you prefer?
Windows
11%
 11%  [ 2 ]
iPhone
58%
 58%  [ 10 ]
Blackberry
0%
 0%  [ 0 ]
Android
29%
 29%  [ 5 ]
Total Votes : 17

Author Message
Kirk
Sea Post King


wilsmith wrote:
You can sell market reports and demographic correlations. Companies are extremely interested in peoples habits' and prefernces and tailoring their efforts to advertise, market, and develop goods and services to maximize impact based on said data. Market Research is a pretty significant industry. It's made Maritz a boat load of money (worked for them myself years back, later my Ex did the same). They were contracted by Billion, and Trillion dollar companies to do market research via cold calls when I worked for them, and still were when she took a job their. If google can aggregate that kind of date by means of their OS collecting data points with every click, that's a veritable gold mine in the corporate world. It's just the nature of the beast.

Right, but Google is a billion dollar company (there aren’t any trillion dollar companies, though Apple is likely to be the first, and would already be if it weren’t so absurdly undervalued). Selling demographic data alone isn’t going to move the needle at a company of Google’s size. Moreover, the most valuable data is the most specific: John Doe has been dating Jane for two years. That information is worth a lot of money to a jewelry store, but Google itself wants to sell the ads. Selling actual identifiable customer profiles both gives away a competitive advantage and privacy rights PR nightmare. I think Google’s sole ambition for Android was to directly advertise to users. Unfortunately for Google, Android users have proven to be of surprisingly low value to advertisers, while Android costs have increased precipitously.
Joined: 05 Jul 2003 | Posts: 374 | Location: Seattle, Washington
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail Visit poster's website AIM Address
wilsmith
Vintage Newbie


I shouldn't have said Trillions, it's just some of the Chemical Firms we did market research for seem that big as far as their global impact of how they do business and the environmental impact of what they do.

What I'm saying is that Google is in a position to move away from web advertising as a sole source or revenue if they mobilize the non-secure data the generate from android usage, like web traffic, site usage, purchasing preferences. That sort of data is specific enough. If they can associate that data with location information along with specific personal demographics from google accounts used on android, like gender, age, and region, the could "corner the market" in market research, if not directly to the companies using the data, to the market research companies that are currently providing the date.

Market Research is a Billion dollar industry. Tapping into the revenue stream is a no brainer, regardless of the size of Google currently, diversifying and monetizing it's assets is a must to stay competitive in the event of dramatic changes in the marketplace.

_________________
yup, that's my name.

FOR YOUR RATING PLEASURE:
4 LIKE Buttons, 1 NEUTRAL, 1 VEXED, 5 DISLIKE buttons. LC > FB

Love Very Happy Smile Cool Neutral Confused Sad Embarassed Rolling Eyes Mad Evil or Very Mad
Wink = personal fave Mr. Green = Eisley fans should dig it
Joined: 09 Apr 2008 | Posts: 9637 | Location: Greater St. Louis Area
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
Kirk
Sea Post King


wilsmith wrote:
Market Research is a Billion dollar industry. Tapping into the revenue stream is a no brainer, regardless of the size of Google currently, diversifying and monetizing it's assets is a must to stay competitive in the event of dramatic changes in the marketplace.

There’s a lot of stuff on that page, but from what I can tell the industry you’re talking about has annual revenues (for the “full service” portion) of $9.2 billion. Google, by itself, makes more than that from displaying ads every quarter. I agree with you that Google desperately needs to diversify, but I don’t think selling demographic data is enough. I liken this to the analysts who are obsessed with Apple making its own TV, even though the entire global TV industry is only $100 billion/year with extremely slow growth. Maybe it’s still a good idea for Apple to go there, but it’s, at best, a third-tier source of revenue.

So here’s my radical scenario for Google: They shut down Android as an open source project and try to turn Motorola into the Android brand, as a way to steal market share from Samsung. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t. I think it would be fun to watch regardless. What makes it more interesting is that Samsung has been at work all along on an Android alternative, Tizen. So which brand are customers actually choosing, when they buy a Galaxy, Samsung or Android? If I had to place bets, I’d say customers will “choose” Samsung (simply because Samsung spends a fortune bribing cell phone store employees to push Galaxy phones).

On a related topic, here is a fascinating article about Samsung’s sales costs compared to Apple’s sales costs. Anybody interested in the mobile phone industry should then take a day to read every single article on that site. It’s the FiveThirtyEight of phones.
Joined: 05 Jul 2003 | Posts: 374 | Location: Seattle, Washington
View user's profile Send private message Send e-mail Visit poster's website AIM Address
wilsmith
Vintage Newbie


Kirk wrote:


So here’s my radical scenario for Google: They shut down Android as an open source project and try to turn Motorola into the Android brand, as a way to steal market share from Samsung. Maybe it works, maybe it doesn’t. I think it would be fun to watch regardless.


That's what I thought they'd do, especially with the Samsung Patent case looming when the purchase was made.

The new RAZR got solid reviews when it launched, but I think people are just "over" motorola as a band, no matter who owns it. They are just another disposable phone maker in the pile now to the average joe. It seems like google has been very hands off since acquiring them as well, because they marketing campaigns haven't really changed a bit, other than a reduced scope since the buyout.


Kirk wrote:
What makes it more interesting is that Samsung has been at work all along on an Android alternative, Tizen. So which brand are customers actually choosing, when they buy a Galaxy, Samsung or Android? If I had to place bets, I’d say customers will “choose” Samsung (simply because Samsung spends a fortune bribing cell phone store employees to push Galaxy phones).


Samsung as a brand has managed to build a decent reputation, but it's fair to say the familiarity non-iphone users have developed with android in whatever flavor and capacity helps. They have to tread carefully to because the last thing the need is Google to be suing them too. If they build a proprietary OS that is intuitive, and stable, that's definitely a feather in their cap. If it works well for the tablet as well, they are basically a small step from taking a leap into the larger mobile device game, given Desktops and even notebooks are well on their way to becoming specialized purchases, whereas mobile computing via touch is taking over. On that we definitely agree.

Also, it's pretty messed up that supposedly the economy is the pits but we're talking about Billion dollar industries like they're yesterdays lunch to Apple and Google. Confused

_________________
yup, that's my name.

FOR YOUR RATING PLEASURE:
4 LIKE Buttons, 1 NEUTRAL, 1 VEXED, 5 DISLIKE buttons. LC > FB

Love Very Happy Smile Cool Neutral Confused Sad Embarassed Rolling Eyes Mad Evil or Very Mad
Wink = personal fave Mr. Green = Eisley fans should dig it
Joined: 09 Apr 2008 | Posts: 9637 | Location: Greater St. Louis Area
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
wilsmith
Vintage Newbie


Just got an email ad to sign up for rePublic's $19 unlimited data/wifi/phone that makes all calls over wifi. Only phone offered is a Motorola, I assume Android obviously. Their gambit should be interesting since they've already turned a profit with a limited run with the service in beta. They're on Sprint's data network. The Phone is $250 so there's offsetting that cost, and the restriction of a limited phone, but with tethering, in theory, you can do all your smartphone stuff on any other phone you may have that's wifi enabled. Could this be Google's X-box?

http://news.cnet.com/8301-1035_3-57551998-94/ultra-cheap-$19-republic- wireless-service-opens-back-up/

~~~~~~~~~yahoo chimes in on Microsoft~~~~~~~~~~~

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/steve-ballmer-s-nightmare-is-coming-true -181558610.html

_________________
yup, that's my name.

FOR YOUR RATING PLEASURE:
4 LIKE Buttons, 1 NEUTRAL, 1 VEXED, 5 DISLIKE buttons. LC > FB

Love Very Happy Smile Cool Neutral Confused Sad Embarassed Rolling Eyes Mad Evil or Very Mad
Wink = personal fave Mr. Green = Eisley fans should dig it
Joined: 09 Apr 2008 | Posts: 9637 | Location: Greater St. Louis Area
View user's profile Send private message Visit poster's website
Post new topic   Reply to topic

Display posts from previous:   



You cannot post new topics in this forum
You cannot reply to topics in this forum
You cannot edit your posts in this forum
You cannot delete your posts in this forum
You cannot vote in polls in this forum
All times are GMT - 12 Hours
Jump to:  
Powered by phpBB, coffee, and Eisley fans worldwide.
phpBB is © 2001, 2005 phpBB Group