10 anticipated technologies for business

8/3/2019 10 Anticipated Technologies for Business

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10 Anticipated Technologies for Business

1. Facial recognition

Giving away free product is a great way to build your brand, right?

Unilever, the company that makes things like Lipton soup and Suave shampoo also makes ice cream andfigured it would use some of it to get customers to smileliterally. It worked with the high-tech marketingcompany SapientNitro in London to make a vending machine called Share Happy that uses facialrecognition to give people ice cream bars for smiling.

They even designed the box so people can upload their smiling mugs to Facebook, pushing the brandeven farther out into the consumer space. When the machine debuted in Lisbon last year, it vended52,000 ice cream bars in two days with no media support or advertising. Thats about 600 percent morethan a regular ice cream machine.

The award-winning box is now on world tour doling out brand recognition as it goes.

Facial Recognition is being used not only on experiential campaigns but even on digital signage,says Rob Gonda, global head of emerging technology and innovation for SapientNitro. For instance, a lotof our installationsdetect things like gender, age bracket and start serving more targeted advertising ondigital signage and digital displays.

Whats different today compared to a few years ago, Gonda says, is brands have to be situationally

aware and contextually relevant.

We have evolved from broadcasting messages to [delivering] more digitally precise messages. Butactually understanding the context of the situation or the conversationincreases the likelihood of betterengagement [between] brands [and] people, he says.

Gonda says SapientNitro is currently working on interactive displays for retail spaces that use a mashupof rear-projected video, touch, gesture recognition and facial recognition.


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And SapientNitro is far from the only company doing it.

According to The Los Angeles Times, The Venetian Resort in Las Vegas is using facial recognition totailor restaurant and entertainment ads for passersby and big brands likeAdidas are installing and testingdigital walls with facial recognition in a handful of stores to display age-appropriate shoes to customers.

2. Hyper targeting

While targeted advertising has been around for a while, today the big thing is to make ads super specific.

When people spend time onlinesurfing, shopping or commenting on social networksthey leave adigital footprint that huge data mining systems can track. That means advertisers can profile nearlyeverybody today in terms of preferences, habits and demographics.

Cambridge, Massachusetts-based ChoiceStream has an ad platform called CRUNCH that uses predictiveintelligencethe same technology retailers like Zappos use to suggest shoes to customers. It selectsconsumers to target based on hyper-segments a high performing cross-section of audiences with twoor more attributes applied, meaning ads are delivered to people who are most likely to respond to them.

To illustrate, ChoiceStream COO Eric Bosco says one of the companys clients is an antivirus softwareprovider and to hyper-target ads for this particular customer, CRUNCH not only looks for people shoppingfor software but also for those who order pizza online and get online legal self help. The results from thatnarrowly focused segment end up being five times better than when the company only uses one attribute.

That type of activity is a proxy for how active these users are on the Internet. Theyre probably

consuming a lot more online content, and that exposure has the side effect of exposing them to moreviruses and risks, and so theyre much more likely to need software to clean their machines, he says.

The companys advertising is so highly targeted; in fact, that it has actually has a hard time gettingbusiness from advertisers who market things everyone needs.

We were recently in Minneapolis talking with an ad agency there and their main issue with CRUNCH isthat they place ads for butter. Everybody needs butter, so how do you target butter? We excel whenthings are a little more focused than that, Bosco says.


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3. Eavesdropping apps

While theyre still mostly in concept stage, Gartners Andrew Frank says companies are starting to playaround with advertising through new apps that can tell what show youre watching on TV or listening to onthe radio.

He says Yahoo bought a company called IntoNow, which has a fingerprinting technology that can listen toand identify whats on TV, and let people check in to a show or ad. Pepsi Max ran a promotion where ifyou tag their ad when it runs using this app you can get a coupon for some free Pepsi Max, he says.

The media synchronization that can recognize the audio track of a TV show can also be used on radio soif youve got a mobile phone and theres a radio ad for example, you might be able to use that to distributea coupon directly from the audio, sort of like an audio QR code directly from the ad to the mobile phonethrough the microphone, he says.


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4. Augmented Reality

Dekko wants to merge reality and augmented reality.

Swiss watchmaker Tissot, used Augmented Reality (AR) outside ofHarrods in London to let people tryon its watchesvirtually. They handed out black and white paper wristbands and when someone stoodin front of the companys large LCD screen, a webcam behind it sent the coordinates of the paper watchinto anAR system which then displayed video of the person on the screen wearing a 3D virtual version ofthe watch. The person could even play around with the watchs touch screenfeatures.

Tissot now uses the high-tech display at events in the States, as well, such as atthe MotoGP motorcycling championship at the Laguna Seca raceway in California, where the company isthe official timekeeper.

But the space where youll be seeing more AR is mobile.

According to this infographic created by the U.K.-based AR developer Hidden Creative, AR is now beingused for a wide range of marketing activitiesin everything from riveting displays at conferences and forsales pitches to loyalty programs at the Point of Sale. Hidden says 35 AR apps are launched everymonth.

And some of them look pretty amazing.

Junaio has iOS andAndroid platforms that brands can use to customize AR for their customers needs.

Valpak, for example, has a channel on the Junaio app that launches the smartphones camera and GPSto overlay a set of 3D icons in real time showing the available Valpak coupons in the vicinity as the userscans the surroundings, with a radius varying from five feet to 20 miles away.


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5. Mobile: Codes and spot targeting

Quick Response (QR) codes are the little black-and-white pixilated squares commonly found in print ads,on products, displayed on TV, and even stitched into fabric. If you have a phone with a camera and theright kind of reader app, you can scan a QR code to display text, contact information, or open a Webpage.

People are also scanning UPC bar codesespecially the ones found on products youd find at a groceryor drug storefor product pricing and information.

According to David Javitch, VP of marketing forNew York City-based Scanbuy, the company has seen an800 percent increase since a year ago in the number of barcode or quick response (QR) code scans itprocesses and is now doing more than one per second.

While Scanbuy currently has 8 million people using its ScanLife app on their phones and has worked withbig companies such as The Home Depot and Taco Bell on huge code campaigns, the company is rollingout a platform that will allow regular people and small businesses to create their own QR codes starting at$25 a month.

While pricier than QR codes, StarStar Numbers might be a titch faster from a consumer perspective sinceit only involves one step. Theyre branded vanity mobile numbers that let consumers call a brands name.For instance, if youve got a craving for Samoas or Thin Mints, you can call (not text) **GSCOOKIES andyoull instantly receive a text message with a link to a Girl Scout Cookie Locator app.

In addition to smart phones giving consumers near-instant access to marketing or product information

and digital content, they also are empowering businesses to do local spot targeting that only serves adsto people near a certain geographic location. For instance, a movie theatre could broadcast show times toonly those smart phone users within a mile radius who happen to be doing things like playingAngry Birds,listening to Slacker Radio, or other similar activities.

Millennial Media, a Baltimore-based mobile ad platform, delivers such ads to consumers who arebrowsing the mobile Web or using apps. The company says advertisers can use a variety of formats suchas banner ads, rich media ads or interstitials


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6. Video

Gartners Andrew Frank says the video space is seeing some interesting innovation, particularly in thearea of what he calls dynamic creative that lets a company or advertiser change video content in realtime.

For example, you might re-edit a movie trailer on the fly depending on whether the viewer is male orfemale or in the North or in the South, he says, holding up Tumri and Teracent as examples of adplatforms that can do it.

Cloud-based Flite is another ad platform that allows for real-time editing of ads. It can incorporate real-time content streams such as videos, polls, and other interactive elements into an ad, and even pull insocial media content from Facebook, Twitterand YouTubeall of which can be switched up at any time.

For instance, a restaurant having a slow couple of hours could update its display ad with a flash deal thatincludes a poll and its Twitter stream that mentions the promotion.

Flite's pricing is about $1 CPM (cost per thousand views) but it depends on what you set your ad up to do.Simpler ones are cheaper but ads with customization such as sweepstakes or video galleries are more.

But what if putting things like YouTube in your ads sounds like a great idea, but you dont have anycontent?

Near Networks just launched an online video channel platform for local businesses across the country.For $1,499 it will send a professional camera crew to your location and create a 90 to 120 second highdefinition micro-documentary for your business.

Once the video is done, Near Networks helps its clients create and manage a video channel on YouTubethat can be embedded on a Web site, blog or on social media outlets


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7. Incentives and virtual currrency

Gartners Andrew Frank says incentivized ads in games such as Farmville, Mafia Warsand Angry Birdstap into a huge audience of social gamers who play every day. Its the idea of giving people game creditsor virtual goods or other things that they can use in a game in exchange for watching ads or interactingwith them or otherwise engaging with the sponsors content, he says.

Virtual currency, is what Chicago-based Lab42 calls it.

The year-old start-up not only creates some of the great infographics showing up lately on media outletssuch as Mashable orHuffPost Tech, but it also offers an online market research tool that uses socialnetworks to do market research.

You can either create your own survey using the Lab42 dashboard or theyll do it for you. After selectingyour target market, they launch the survey across various social networks and social media partner sitesthat offer virtual currency in exchange for the respondents time and opinion. By reaching out to thedesired audience of their clients target market, the Lab42 research team is able to return results in just afew days, with packages that start at just $500.

Another example: Peer-to-peer promotion.

Calyp is a network that rewards consumers with cash, gifts and discounts for promoting products they likewith their friends and networks.

Using either the Calyp mobile app orCalyp.com, an endorser can broadcast a Calyp linkthrough a text

message, blog post or social status updatethat features her favorite line of clothing, for example, andlet people know theres a big sale going on. When her friends or followers click on the link, she gets thecredit.

Getting your business into the Calyp network will run anywhere from $950 to $25,000 a month, so its notcheap. Blue Calypso, the company behind Calyp, says the investment pays off.

Blue Calypso says it has launched more than 400 campaigns, reaching more than 1.15 million mobile andsocial media consumers with a 325 percent click-through rate and 21 percent intent to purchase.


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Were not a good fit for a new business, says Sabrina Dee, Blue Calypsos CMO. Its about using yourloyal customers that love you and can speak with an education about your brand because they use yourbrandsharing with people that are like-minded about why they would also like it.

8. Social Analytics

Today there are great analytics tools that help brands engage with customers and potential customers onsocial networks. Heres a slide show of the best social CRM programsthat features several good ones.

I believe that one of the most important trends in the market is the increasing participation ofconsumers/customers on social networks, and the 'big data' problem - and opportunity - it is creating formarketers who can effective analyze and act on that data, says Chris Selland, CMO for social marketingplatform Terametric and expert on the Focus network.

Traditionally, marketers have focused on analyzing data that is theirs - visitors to our Web site, callers toour call center. But social data lives on social networks - outside the walls of the organizationIt does notbelong to the company, but the ability to analyze and act effectively on it is key, he says.


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9. Web

Is your Web site doing the best job it can for you?

Plenty of great tools now exist for getting measurable data about the effectiveness of yoursite design andhow well youre marketing to yourtraffic.

EyeTrackShop is different. Its a Sweden-based digital marketing research firm with offices in NewYork and Los Angeles that conducts eye-tracking studies to gauge the effectiveness of not only Web sitepages but also online ads, banner ads, print ads and packing designs to see if your audience will noticewhat you want them to. Some of their clients include P&G, Google, SnapFish and Clorox.

You simply send your sample design to EyeTrackShop, along with the demographic you want to test.

From there, EyeTrackShop enlists its U.S. database of 6 million users who use their own Web cams tosend video to EyeTrackShop, which then uses retina scanners to gauge gaze duration and location.

EyeTrackShop says it returns results in 48 hours, charges $2,500 for one stimuli test and $1,800 for twotests.

Another useful tool you might check out is Gigya, which you can use on your Web site to allow users tologin using their preferred social identity.

While you can use something like Facebook for Websites to let people log on using Facebook, if you wantto save the development time, Gigya offers what it calls a "Super API" which lets users to log in to yoursite with over 25 different identity providers such as Facebook, Google, Twitter,AOL, Yahoo and more.The company says youd be surprised how many people choose to log in with non-Facebook identities.

Gigya also offers a suite of social plugins that can to your site features such as comments, sharing,ratings and reviews, games and chat.

When users log in to your site using their social identities, they grant access to data inside their socialapps which Gigya can then collect and store on your behalf. For marketing purposes, this can allow youto not only serve them specific content, but targeted ads as well.


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10. Deals

Daily Deal sites are everywhere and whether using them is good for business is a topic Inc. has writtenabout elsewhere.

Signpost, however, does it differently than most. Instead of taking a share of each dealmoney thatshould be going into your pocketit lets you set up as many deals as you want on its platform and onlycharges you $99 a month (with the first month free).

Its self-service platform gives merchants complete control over the discount amount, wheneach deal is announced, the timeframe in which the deals can be redeemed, and the limit of how manydeals can be sold.

Signpost markets the deals businesses create through its Web site, daily newsletter and social mediafollowing.

10 anticipated technologies for business

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