Thanks in large part to the popularity of the open-source model, companies of all shapes and sizes have access to technologies that would have cost six and seven figures to develop in-house a half a decade ago.
From high-performance data stores to countless software libraries, there are plenty of open-source technologies that make building a sophisticated web-based service far less costly and time-consuming than it would have been.
Following are my personal thoughts on what will be interesting and important in the world of digital marketing and ecommerce for 2013. As is traditional for my trends, there are around seventeen of them.
I haven’t spent too much time on giving extensive justification for any of these; they are based largely on the many conversations I have with industry influencers and practitioners.
Many are really just notes, or bullet points, but I’ve tried to give links to further information if you want to delve deeper. They are in no particular order though I’ve started with the more ‘strategic’ stuff.
As ever, I’d be very interested to hear your thoughts, or feel free to post a link to your own trends or predictions.
It’s not exactly new, but you probably encountered far more sites with infinite scrolling functionality in 2012 than you did in 2011, and there’s a good chance you’ll come across even more in 2013.
With popular services like Twitter and Pinterest bringing infinite scrolling into the mainstream, it’s no surprise that more and more designers and publishers are considering doing away with old school pagination.
But is infinite scrolling a good trend or will it soon become a design worst practice?
For many companies, a native mobile app is one of the most important parts of a mobile strategy.
Unfortunately, although the costs of building native mobile apps are in many cases decreasing, building a successful mobile app is increasingly difficult.
Behind Lenin’s Tomb in Moscow there is a small door embedded in the Kremlin Wall where Soviet rulers used to duck through on their way to presiding over the annual May Day Parade.
The door is small and, according to a Russian soldier I met there a decade ago, it was deliberately so because of Stalin’s diminutive stature.
After all, if he was about to acknowledge the size of his huge army, the last thing he needed was to be reminded of was his lack of height.
Rather like Stalin’s door, the, er, window of opportunity for Russian entrepreneurs has been similarly narrow. Inventors and creators were employed by the State and any resulting IP or patents would be owned by the State.
My favourite definition of governance comes from the Institute on Governance: governance is “the process whereby societies or organisations make important decisions, determine whom they involve and how they render account”.
Organisations that don’t address governance end up spending a lot of time on it. They discuss it over and over again for each decision as they argue about due process and decision rights and accountabilities. They end up with little energy for the decision itself. So they make bad decisions.
Yesterday I attended Econsultancy’s Digital Cream event, which we host annually, and which brings together around 300 client-side e-commerce brains together for a day of intense knowledge sharing.
The event format is based on roundtables, which are a core part of our staple diet. We’ve been running roundtables since I joined Econsultancy back in 2003, and they inform much of the best practice insight that underpins our research. They are incredibly helpful.
Digital Cream is essentially roundtables on steroids… there are more than 20 of them, in one day. I have a few takeaways from the event that I’d like to share. By all means add yours in the comments section underneath this post, or let us know if you blog about the event, as Simon Lilly and Nick Allen have done. Our thanks to all who participated.
Before we begin I should probably mention a couple of similar events, which are are free to attend for client-side folks. Firstly, there is Peer Summit 2011, which takes place in New York in early June. Secondly, there is Digital Cream Dubai, which is our first big event in the Middle East and takes place on 12 April. Do sign up if you’re local.
Ah, December. For many media folks it is a month of fat lunches and the parties. It used to be like that for me too, until we launched our Innovation Awards a couple of years ago.
Since then December has turned into a month of hardcore reading. Our in-house judging panel (me, CEO Ashley Friedlein and Research Director Linus Gregoriadis) spent the majority of the month poring over the 350+ entries, checking out sites and apps, and generally trying to make sense of things.
Last year was a great year for innovation, based on what we read. There are some amazing things going on in our industry.
Following are my personal views on what will be interesting and important in the world of digital marketing and e-commerce for 2011.
I haven’t given extensive justification for any of these. It’s just what I feel to be likely from my many conversations with industry influencers.
I’d be very interested to hear your thoughts, or feel free to post a link to your own predictions.