The tech world is ablaze with excitement as September 2023 heralds the arrival of Apple’s latest masterpiece – the iPhone 15. Apple, known for pushing the boundaries of innovation, continues to set new standards in the smartphone industry with each new release. The iPhone 15 is no exception, poised to dazzle consumers with a slew of cutting-edge features that promise to redefine our mobile experience. In this article, we’ll delve into the details and explore what makes this release a true game-changer.
Apple has always been synonymous with sleek and elegant designs, and the latest iPhone lives up to that reputation. Its bezel-free, edge-to-edge display not only maximizes screen real estate but also captivates with its refined form factor and premium materials. Holding this iPhone is like holding a piece of the future in your hand.
Under the hood, the iPhone 15 is fueled by the most advanced chipset ever seen in a smartphone. Its lightning-fast processing speeds and unparalleled graphics capabilities ensure that it effortlessly handles any task you throw at it. Whether you’re a multitasking pro or a mobile gamer, this iPhone is your trusty companion.
Apple’s commitment to smartphone photography shines brighter than ever in this release. The device boasts a state-of-the-art camera system featuring a triple-lens setup with unmatched low-light capabilities and cutting-edge image processing algorithms. No matter the lighting conditions, expect stunning photos and videos with unparalleled detail.
Privacy and security are paramount, and Apple goes the extra mile in the September 2023 iPhone. The device incorporates advanced facial recognition technology, ensuring that your phone is truly yours alone. Furthermore, Apple maintains its unwavering commitment to data encryption and secure payment options, granting you peace of mind in a digital age.
Prepare to be transported to new realms of multimedia bliss. The edge-to-edge display enchants with vibrant colors and razor-sharp visuals, breathing life into every photo, video, and game. The device’s enhanced stereo speakers complement the visuals with immersive audio, making every moment a sensory delight.
Apple’s ecosystem continues to be a testament to seamless integration between devices. The iPhone seamlessly connects and syncs with your other Apple devices, elevating your digital life. The latest iOS iteration introduces a myriad of features and improvements, ensuring a user-friendly and intuitive experience.
As we eagerly anticipate the arrival of the iPhone 15, it’s evident that Apple is once again poised to redefine smartphone innovation. From its groundbreaking design to its formidable performance and cutting-edge features, this release is set to rewrite the rules. Whether you’re a tech enthusiast, a professional, or simply someone who appreciates the beauty of cutting-edge technology, the September 2023 iPhone promises to leave an indelible mark. Prepare to embark on a new era of mobile excellence.
Ready to experience the future of mobile technology? Contact Colure Media today to explore how we can elevate your brand with the latest in digital advertising, app development, and social media marketing strategies.
In the ever-evolving world of blockchain technology and digital art, a new concept has emerged that is revolutionizing the way we perceive non-fungible tokens (NFTs). Dynamic NFTs, the latest innovation in this space, are breathing new life into the digital art market and pushing the boundaries of what can be achieved with these unique digital assets. In this article, we will explore the concept of Dynamic NFTs, their potential applications, and how they are transforming the notion of digital ownership.
Understanding Dynamic NFTs:
At its core, a Dynamic NFT is an NFT that possesses the ability to change or evolve over time. Unlike traditional static NFTs that represent a fixed digital asset, Dynamic NFTs introduce an element of programmability, allowing for dynamic characteristics and interactions. These characteristics can range from animations, audio, or even real-time data updates, making the NFT a living, breathing entity in the digital realm.
Breaking the Boundaries of Digital Art:
Dynamic NFTs are redefining the boundaries of digital art, enabling artists to create immersive and interactive experiences for collectors. With the ability to incorporate animations, music, or other multimedia elements, artists can now craft NFTs that evolve and adapt to the viewer’s actions or external stimuli. This interactivity adds a new layer of engagement and emotional connection to the artwork, enhancing the overall value and appeal of the NFT.
Applications and Use Cases:
The potential applications of Dynamic NFTs extend far beyond the realm of art. These programmable assets can have various practical use cases, such as:
Gaming: Dynamic NFTs can be integrated into video games, allowing players to own unique in-game items that can evolve or gain new abilities over time. This creates a dynamic and personalized gaming experience, enhancing player engagement and fostering a sense of ownership.
Collectibles: Dynamic NFTs can be used to create digital collectibles that change or grow based on specific conditions. Imagine owning a collectible card that gains new abilities or attributes based on your achievements or milestones within a game or community.
Virtual Real Estate: Dynamic NFTs can be utilized in virtual worlds to represent real estate or properties. These assets can evolve or change based on the actions of the owner or the community, creating a dynamic and ever-changing digital landscape.
Digital Identities: Dynamic NFTs can serve as digital identities, allowing individuals to showcase their achievements, skills, or personal growth over time. These programmable identities can update automatically as the individual reaches new milestones or accomplishments.
The Future of Digital Ownership:
Dynamic NFTs represent an exciting frontier in the world of blockchain technology and digital ownership. With their ability to evolve, adapt, and interact with the viewer or the environment, these programmable assets are reshaping the way we perceive and engage with digital art and other digital assets. As the technology continues to advance, we can expect to see even more innovative use cases and exciting opportunities emerge in the world of Dynamic NFTs.
Conclusion:
Dynamic NFTs are unlocking a new era of digital ownership, where digital assets can evolve, adapt, and interact with their owners. This innovative concept is revolutionizing various industries, from art and gaming to virtual real estate and personal identities. As we witness the rise of Dynamic NFTs, it’s clear that we are only scratching the surface of their potential. The future holds endless possibilities for these programmable assets, reshaping the way we perceive, value, and interact with digital assets in the digital age.
In today’s fast-paced digital world, staying ahead of the competition is crucial for businesses looking to succeed online. One of the most effective ways to achieve this is through search engine optimization (SEO) powered by artificial intelligence (AI). AI-driven SEO tactics offer a powerful tool that can significantly enhance website visibility and outperform competitors.
By utilizing machine learning algorithms, AI-driven SEO tactics collect and analyze data to boost a website’s search performance. These tactics enable businesses to optimize their websites for search engines and create compelling content that resonates with their target audience.
Let’s take a closer look at some smart AI-driven SEO strategies that businesses can employ to outsmart the competition:
Keyword Research: AI-driven tools can analyze competitors’ websites and identify commonly searched keywords. This valuable information allows businesses to optimize their website content using relevant, high-traffic keywords.
Natural Language Processing (NLP): NLP-based AI technology aids businesses in improving their website’s semantic search. By understanding the context and meaning behind words, NLP helps create content around topics and themes that customers are actively searching for.
Content Optimization: AI-driven tools can analyze a website’s content and provide actionable insights, such as identifying missing keywords or evaluating competitors’ successful content strategies.
Voice Search Optimization: With the growing popularity of voice assistants, AI technology can optimize websites for voice search by understanding natural language and common phrases.
The Power of AI-Driven SEO Strategies
Implementing AI-driven SEO tactics empowers businesses with a significant competitive edge in the digital marketplace. By leveraging data analytics, businesses can identify search trends and consumer behaviors to optimize their websites effectively and achieve higher search engine rankings.
Furthermore, AI-driven SEO enhances the user experience. By analyzing user behavior and search history, AI tools can suggest personalized content, improving engagement and creating a seamless customer journey.
In addition to these benefits, AI-driven SEO tactics offer a cost-effective solution for businesses. Instead of relying solely on costly pay-per-click advertising, implementing AI-driven SEO strategies can lead to long-term benefits through organic search results that drive continuous traffic to the website.
If you’re ready to seize the advantages of AI-driven SEO and propel your business forward in the dynamic realm of digital marketing, reach out to our NYC-based digital marketing agency. At the forefront of cutting-edge strategies, from SEO to influencer marketing, we are dedicated to optimizing your online presence. Contact us now to embark on a journey of sustained growth and elevated online visibility.
The business landscape is continually evolving, demanding companies to be innovative and customer-centric to maintain a competitive edge. One of the most potent strategies for achieving this is through hyper-personalization, an art that AI has mastered to perfection.
Hyper-personalization involves leveraging customer data to create highly tailored experiences. By mining and analyzing data from various sources, businesses can deliver personalized content, products, and services that resonate with individual customers. AI plays a crucial role in this process, enabling companies to harness vast amounts of customer data effectively.
Understanding Hyper-Personalization
Thanks to advancements in big data and machine learning, companies can now gather and process copious amounts of data, providing valuable insights into their customers’ preferences. When coupled with AI capabilities, businesses can craft hyper-personalized experiences that feel tailor-made for each individual.
The Benefits of Hyper-Personalization
Hyper-personalization goes beyond improving customer experience; it fosters loyalty and trust. By creating an emotional connection through personalized interactions, customers are more likely to remain loyal to the brand. Furthermore, targeted marketing campaigns built on AI predictions can enhance brand awareness through positive word-of-mouth.
The Power of Hyper-Personalization
The potential of hyper-personalization is immense, but it requires businesses to invest in data analytics and AI-powered tools to reap the benefits fully. As AI continues to evolve, its capabilities in delivering hyper-personalization will only grow. Therefore, it is crucial for companies to stay ahead of the curve by embracing AI’s potential and integrating it into their strategies.
Incorporating AI-powered hyper-personalization can revolutionize the way businesses interact with customers and create long-lasting connections. By utilizing customer data effectively, companies can deliver experiences that stand out in today’s competitive market. Embracing AI-driven hyper-personalization is not just an option; it’s a necessity for businesses looking to thrive in the dynamic world of tomorrow.
If you’re ready to take your marketing strategies to the next level, contact Colure Media, a leading NYC branding and digital advertising agency. Whether you need assistance with social media marketing, influencer marketing, or building your next mobile app project, our expert marketing consulting services are here to elevate your brand in the bustling landscape of New York.
By now, the ability of the fast-paced evolution of modern technology to disrupt should come as a surprise to nobody. In 2021, a group of Reddit users employed the Robinhood app to change the way we think about the stock market, likely forever. In that time, the ability of a single mobile app and of other areas of tech like artificial intelligence to upend entire industries has proven itself time and again.
AI in particular has become an increasingly common part of the public conversation thanks to the debut of solutions like ChatGPT. At a basic level, the premise of ChatGPT is simple – it leverages natural language processing, coupled with state-of-the-art AI technology, to let users have human-like conversations with what is essentially a chatbot.
In the short period of time since it launched, however, ChatGPT itself has been filled with surprises. Organizations are using it for coding help – and indeed, there have been entire mobile apps created using AI. Business leaders use it to support their decision-making. It’s been leveraged for customer support, language translation – you name it and ChatGPT can probably do it.
Which is a major part of the reason why artificial intelligence has been so disruptive in such a short amount of time. One industry that is asking a bevy of existential questions is digital marketing. In a world where AI can be used to effectively manage most touch points on the buyer’s journey, what role do actual humans play in the lives of customers everywhere? The answers to questions like that one bring with them a number of fascinating implications that people should be aware of moving forward.
AI and Digital Marketing: Where Does One End and the Other Begin?
To take an optimistic approach to the topic, AI does bring with it a number of benefits in the short-term for human digital marketers. It allows them to automate a lot of the time-consuming and menial tasks that make up their day, letting them focus on matters that truly need their attention. It helps them understand their target audiences better than ever through things like data analytics, all in a fraction of the time it used to take.
But keep in mind that AI is also being used for content generation. Right now, people are using these tools to write everything from blog posts to entire novels and just about everything in between. If a business owner can use it to generate exactly he type of digital marketing copy that they need at a much smaller cost than it would take to hire a team of people to do the same, one can’t help but wonder – what do you need that team of people for after a certain point?
Right now, the digital marketers themselves are still in control of the marketing experience. But how far off is a day when that is no longer the case? Artificial intelligence is supposed to get better at whatever task it is programmed to do over time. When it becomes better at connecting with audiences than human marketers are, it will reach that point objectively. Then what?
All this is somewhat ironic within the context of an industry like digital marketing – something that was founded based on the principles of disruption to begin with.
For decades, marketing was a fairly straightforward affair, driven by ad agencies filled with copywriters who spent time crafting a message that would be effective with the largest possible audience in an instant.
Then came the Internet and the increased level of personalization that came with it. This disruption was massive – marketing success was no longer about the broadest message, but instead focused on getting the right hyper personalized message in front of the right person at exactly the right time. Seemingly overnight, the focus of an entire industry changed for all-time.
Now, it seems poised to happen again. It is being shepherded by an extension of the very technology that supplanted teams of ad men on Madison Avenue all those years ago.
The Future of Digital Marketing is as Disruptive as Ever
Perhaps the most important question is this: is the level of disruption on digital marketing brought on by artificial intelligence even a problem at all? Likely not from the perspective of the end users, who still get the personalized experiences they crave. Probably not from the point of view of the businesses who need marketing collateral to sell their products, either.
So what does digital marketing – and its ability to employ countless people – even look like a year from now, let alone in five or ten? Nobody can say right now, but it’s something that many industry professionals will be thinking carefully about for the foreseeable future.
By now, most people are familiar with the sheer level of disruption that AI-driven tools like ChatGPT are leaving in their wake. That one in particular is already being used take (and pass) business school exams for people. A mobile app like the Robinhood app was used by Reddit to upend the stock market. It’s changed the way people think about searching online. It’s had a major impact on eCommerce. The list goes on and on.
But when it comes to art, the impact has largely been limited to being a novelty… until now. People have used ChatGPT to write wonderfully bizarre essays or to create rudimentary pictures based on rough descriptions. But could that same tool soon be used to instantly create another season of your favorite television show, or to write massive series of novels so that you never run out of something to read?
If the answers to those questions are “yes”… is that a problem? That’s where things get tricky.
The Impact of AI on Art is Already Here
Perhaps the biggest example of this idea playing out in the news right now takes the form of the Hollywood Writer’s Strike. For those unfamiliar, all writers who are a part of the Writer’s Guild of America (or WGA for short) began a strike in May 2023 with a list of demands that studios like Disney and Warner Brothers initially refused to accommodate. One of them had to do with protections against the impact that artificial intelligence might have on the entire industry.
One of the WGA’s demands was that studios “regulate the use of artificial intelligence on all covered projects.” More specifically, they want guarantees that AI will not be used to write or rewrite literary material, that anything generated by AI cannot be used as source material, and that anything covered under the Guild (which is just about everything produced by the major Hollywood studios) can’t be used to train an artificial intelligence algorithm.
To put it another way, writers want guarantees that they’ll lose out on future jobs in the future because AI will simply be used to fill that void. If they turn in a first draft of a script, they want to make sure that they won’t be immediately fired so that an AI can then rewrite it for free. Anything that has previously been written (like a script for cinematic classics like “The Godfather” or “Gone With the Wind”) should also not be used as training material to allow an AI algorithm to do all of the above.
In essence, what they’re trying to protect is not necessarily their ability to be artists – as any of us can do that at any point. It’s their ability to make a living from it. If a studio has a choice between paying someone to write a script and using an AI tool like ChatGPT to create that same script for “free” (after the initial investment of course), and the results are similar if not identical, it’s clear that they will select the second option almost every time.
Equally complicating things is the subjective nature of art. Person A could watch a movie that they loved while Person B could watch the same movie and think it was terrible. So who is to say a script written by an AI tool like ChatGPT isn’t just as good as one written by a human?
The same is true of the quality of a painting written by AI, or a song that has been generated in largely the same way.
So even though, as it stands, AI cannot replicate the quality of human-derived art with 100% success (just look at the hands in any AI-generated drawing of a human for proof of that), there will come a day when that is no longer the case. Given how hard the Hollywood writers are currently fighting, that day may come a lot sooner than most people realize.
What happens then? If “art” lacks that human element – that connection that we make with the thoughts, ideas, and feelings of another human being – does it continue to be art? If “yes,” does that matter? Is this future inevitable? These are the types of questions that people who care about art and its impact on our society are already having.
As the philosopher Alfred Korzybski once said “a difference which makes no difference is no difference.” When it comes to art as a concept, that is a level of disruption that we all may have to come to terms with sooner rather than later.
If you had to sum up the recurring theme of the last several years in virtually all areas of our lives, “disruption” would be the word you would undoubtedly use.
We have witnessed some significant and thrilling instances of disruption, such as how a community of Reddit users utilized the Robinhood app to revolutionize our perception of stocks. However, the impact of mobile apps on financial markets is merely the tip of the iceberg when it comes to the various forms of disruption that we have encountered.
Another form of disruption that is prominent in ways both large and small takes the form of AI, or artificial intelligence. In just a few short years it’s changed the makeup of the modern office significantly – something that is true in a number of ways that are worth exploring.
The Role of AI in the Ever-Changing World of Work
For decades, managers have existing in an office environment primarily for the purposes of “people management.” They help make sure that team members and other employees are staying on-task, are moving in the right direction, are keeping up with all necessary deliverables, etc.
With AI tools that are already available, all of this can now be automated. An estimation between 40% and 50% of human resources functions are now using many AI-augmented applications to perform these tasks with greater ease and accuracy than ever before. Somehow, this has simultaneously managed to make the human resources department more valuable than ever thanks to the timely and accurate insight that it can generate, while also completely shifting the definition of what employees working within this department are expected to do.
As the world rapidly adopts AI technology, even Zoom has hopped on the bandwagon. In a recent announcement, the video conferencing platform revealed its collaboration with OpenAI, the creators of ChatGPT, to introduce AI-powered features, primarily targeting sales teams, marking a major shift for the company.
The feature, dubbed Zoom IQ for Sales, uses artificial intelligence to digest the massive volumes of data that organizations are already creating to generate an accurate and real-time engagement score for all customers in a system. It is intended to give insight into how “attentive” a customer is based on the amount of time that passes between when they make contact, how long they speak during calls, the number of times they speak when talking to an employee, and more. It also generates a sentiment score that essentially measures how positive or negative their attitude is when they participate in meetings.
In an instance, tasks that formerly took up a significant amount of a sales representative’s day in the office are now handled quickly, easily, and accurately by an AI tool. This in turn frees up as much of their valuable time as possible to focus on matters that truly need their attention.
But how soon will it be before these same AI tools are essentially running our Zoom meetings for us? Suddenly what was once a pivotal collaborative tool during the pandemic becomes yet another opportunity for automation. If that isn’t a perfect example of disruption – and the rapid pace it often arrives with – nothing is.
In the end, it’s truly incredible to think about that which has been made possible thanks to AI in an office environment over a (relatively) short period of time. From the role of automation in allowing employees to work smarter, not harder, to the recent emergence of tools like ChatGPT. When you consider all that artificial intelligence has been able to disrupt in just a few short years, it’s truly amazing to think about what the next few might have in store for us all.
Much has been written about artificial intelligence over the last several months – particularly when it comes to consumer search.
ChatGPT debuted mere months ago, and it’s already being heralded as the natural evolution of the chatbot. Not only can it do everything from answer complicated questions to generate responses to prompts, but it can even help generate content like resumes, blog posts, and more. Things have gotten to the point where, according to one recent study, an estimated 70% of people who regularly use ChatGPT at work to make their lives easier haven’t actually told their bosses that they’re doing so.
But while this may be the flashiest example of just how disruptive AI can be, it’s far from the first – or even the most important. Medical professionals have been using artificial intelligence in the healthcare space for years, for example – all in ways that are changing how we think about the care provided to patients and the potentially lifesaving outcomes that we’re able to generate.
AI and Healthcare: The Perfect Pairing
One of the most immediate ways in which artificial intelligence is being used in healthcare has to do with patient triage, particularly as it relates to reviewing images, scans, and other critical documents.
In an effort to find out what disease or condition a patient is suffering from, a doctor will typically order a battery of different tests. Those tests produce scans and diagnostic images of organs like the heart or lungs that then need to be carefully reviewed. The issue is that not only does this typically take a great deal of time, but it is also susceptible to human error as well.
Artificial intelligence, however, can be trained on massive amounts of data to perform the same basic tasks in a fraction of the time. Not only can then quickly analyze images and other records at high speeds, but they can do so far more reliably than a human ever could. This can lead to a faster diagnosis on behalf of the patient, which can get them the care they need quicker and improve outcomes along the way. Not only that, but it frees up the invaluable time of the medical professional to focus more on those matters that could truly use their attention.
The same concept holds true to the way that artificial intelligence is being used to train doctors, nurses, and other clinicians as well. Again, once an AI system has been given the chance to ingest the right, quality dataset, it can review information and “make decisions” with an incredibly high degree of accuracy. When used as an assistive training tool, this can help to minimize the types of mistakes that new doctors are likely to make, can help usher in more accurate clinical judgments, and more. All of this results in better trained medical professionals getting out into the field far faster and with a more robust education than ever.
All of this helps bring about the most important benefit of all: higher quality and better healthcare for larger numbers of people, allowing for lifesaving treatment along the way.
Based on use cases like those outlined above, it’s easy to see why it has been estimated that artificial intelligence could save the healthcare industry approximately $360 billion per year. Once obstacles like slow adoption rates among doctors and patients are overcome, there truly is no limit to the potential that is on display in front of us.
In the end, it’s safe to say that technology is changing just about every facet of our lives. In a world where a collection of Reddit users can use a mobile app like the Robinhood app to disrupt the stock market, should anyone be surprised of what AI is capable of in contexts like healthcare? Perhaps it is best to think about it this way: what is impressive is not necessarily what AI can do today, but what it will potentially be able to accomplish tomorrow. That in and of itself is truly exciting to think about.
Conversational AI is an innovative form of artificial intelligence that recognizes and responds to natural human speech. This technology has revolutionized customer service and eCommerce, offering convenience and accessibility to businesses and customers alike. If you’re not already using conversational AI in your business, you’re missing out on the numerous benefits it offers.
One of the most significant advantages of conversational AI is better customer service. With natural language processing, chatbots and virtual assistants can understand human speech accurately, making customer interactions more efficient and personalized. Conversational AI automates simple tasks, freeing up agents to handle more complex issues and gather real-time customer data to improve product or service offerings. Furthermore, conversational AI eliminates language barriers by providing support in multiple languages without the need for bilingual agents.
Conversational AI also enables personalized customer interactions by linking to a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system. Customer data such as contact details, order history, and past interactions are used to create customer profiles, allowing businesses to personalize conversations and increase customer satisfaction and lifetime value.
In addition, conversational AI helps businesses to scale their support function, handling more customers without sacrificing quality. AI can automate simple customer interactions, freeing up agents to handle more complex queries. This makes it possible for smaller companies to offer the same level of customer service as larger enterprises at a fraction of the cost.
Conversational AI also lowers operational costs by offering 24/7 availability, which is costly to staff for most businesses. AI platforms get smarter over time, reducing the number of staff required to provide customer support and keeping operational costs low.
Lastly, conversational AI enables easy follow-ups with customers by automating the process. This allows businesses to build better relationships with customers, showing them that their experience matters and their business is valued.
In summary, conversational AI is scalable, affordable, and efficient, making it the perfect solution for businesses of all sizes. Whether you’re a small business or a large enterprise, conversational AI can help you improve customer satisfaction and loyalty, setting you up for long-term success.
One of the dirty little secrets in the worlds of business, technology, and just about every other industry that you can think of is that “disruption” is only a bad thing if you’re the one being disrupted.
One minute, Wall Street is cut off to everyone but the largest among us. The next, a group of savvy “nobodies” on Reddit used the Robinhood app (among others) to disrupt the entire system. With one beautifully simple move, they changed the game – likely forever. It’s time to start paying attention to others who are trying to do the same.
Case in point: ChatGPT and You.com. Both are leveraging artificial intelligence in entirely different ways, and both are poised to upend what we know about the Internet along the way.
Disruption Today Can Create a Better Tomorrow
The concept of a chatbot – that is to say, a digital service that can answer basic questions and respond conversationally the way a human might, is nothing new. They’ve been used in the customer service field for years. But ChatGPT, the AI-powered chatbot that only launched in November 2022, is something entirely different.
It all began innocently enough. It’s a deceptively simple tool that allows you to create original text by giving it a prompt, by asking it questions, and through other straightforward tasks. It’s easy to use, it functions essentially like a normal chatbot, and for a short time after it launched, it went largely unnoticed.
Why? Because people understand that for impressive as ChatGPT already is, the surface of its full potential hasn’t even been scratched yet. Such is the nature of artificial intelligence – it gets better, smarter, and more efficient the longer it is used.
The same is true of You.com – dubbed as the “AI search engine you control.” It’s a privacy-focused search engine that, on the surface, looks a lot like Google. But rather than displaying a list of links to any query as Google does, You.com uses artificial intelligence to accurately summarize web results using various categories.
Rather than simply showing you what it thinks you want to see, as is true with other engines, You.com gives you total control over the experience. You can sort through the results, emphasizing what you want and what you don’t, all via an innovative interface that promises to never sell your data and to always put the user first and foremost.
So what do these two disruptors have in common? One factor, obviously, is artificial intelligence. But the other is that they both take concepts that were once innovative that were allowed to grow stale. They examine what works, what doesn’t and, using the power of AI, innovative the experience all over again. They used the past as a rock solid foundation upon which the future can be built.
Think about it this way: how much has life changed since Google first debuted in the 1990s? It became so synonymous with Internet search that “to Google” became a verb. But when was the last time it was truly innovative? When was the last time it pushed the envelope?
That’s exactly what both ChatGPT and You.com are attempting to do in their respective areas and, by all accounts, it very much seems to be working.
According to one recent study, the average American has about 80 different apps downloaded on their phone at any given moment. That makes sense, given the fact that there are an estimated 5.7 million apps on both the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store combined.
Steve Jobs disrupted and revolutionized a lot of things when he first walked on stage and introduced the iPhone to the world in 2007 – and the hardware itself had little to do with it. Apps have changed the way brands communicate with consumers, how people communicate with each other, and how we live our lives.
That’s why paying attention to the top mobile app trends for 2023 and beyond is so crucial. They can help give you an incredible amount of insight into just how far we’ve come… and where this all might be headed before you know it.
Essential Mobile App Trends: Breaking Things Down
Maybe the biggest trend in mobile app development for 2023 is actually contrary to why this type of software became popular in the first place.
Back in the 1990s and early 2000s, desktop applications were the “Swiss Army Knives” of software. They did as many things as humanly possible, all from a single screen. Then, mobile apps debuted as a straightforward alternative. Instead of doing 100 different things moderately efficiently, they were instead dedicated to doing one thing incredibly well.
As they say, “everything old is new again” – and the era of the “Super App” may be upon us. Indeed, Super Apps are single applications that perform a variety of functions, all within the same piece of software. Sound familiar? It should.
Now, that doesn’t mean that you want your mobile app to become bloated. You never want to be looked at as a “Jack of All Trades, Master of None.” But if you can solve multiple problems for your users within a single piece of software, you should take the opportunity to do so as this is what people are looking for more and more.
2023 also looks to be the year when the marriage between mobile apps and voice technology is finally ready for prime time. People have had voice assistants like Siri on their phones for years, but recently more and more industries have started to take advantage of this to create better experiences on behalf of their users.
If you open your bank’s mobile app right now, you can send a payment to someone in a matter of minutes. Or, you could tell your voice assistant to send the payment in seconds and you don’t even have to pick up your phone to do it. You can have a voice assistant make a purchase on Amazon, send a message to your spouse, and more – all without physically interacting with your device. This, too, is a feature set that people are looking for more and more.
In the end, it’s important to acknowledge that the way we think about what a mobile app can be is constantly changing. Once upon a time, they were seen as little more than a minor convenience – a way to check your email or watch a video while on-the-go. Flash forward to today, and Reddit users literally employed the Robinhood app to disrupt just about everything we know about the stock market. That’s no longer a minor convenience – that’s a legitimate way of life.
Therefore, it’s always in your best interest to pay close attention to where things are and how far they’ve come. Once you understand why today’s trends have been able to make such an impact, you’re in a better position to anticipate where things might be going tomorrow, a year from now, and beyond. At that point, you’ll be able to get there before any of your competitors have a chance to do the same – which is a very exciting position to be in.
In today’s world, our most valuable asset is no longer a precious metal, a diamond – or any form of fiat currency. In fact, it’s not even a physical product that you can hold. But it’s certainly worth far more than any of the aforementioned items.
What are we talking about?
Data. No doubt, our most precious commodity at this point in time is data. But, no matter how precious this data is and how much it’s revered – or how far companies will go to obtain it – it’s not a tangible asset that an organization can measure with a clear value financially. So, where does this leave us? Certainly, companies who have LOADS of data could – on paper, be worth more than what they’re estimated – thousands of times over – if only a uniform method existed to measure the value of data.
Other digital items have certain frameworks for determining their value – even IP can receive a designated worth. Well, why can’t data? What’s the catch?
What’s the deal with data?
Data can do anything any other tangible asset can do – it has all the characteristics. We can move it, store it, and measure it. It’s bought and sold (in the form of different client lists and information – legal or otherwise). For the latter (otherwise), the price that some individuals are willing to pay would make you sick – all in the name of information. But what you can do with that information…is powerful.
Surrounded by data
Every day you wake up, you’re surrounded by data. All data about you is measured and stored – traded, bought, and sold – during every hour of every day. Data is captured on website forms, email lists, social media sites like Reddit and Facebook, platforms like Robinhood App – and any other mobile app, for that matter. All of this VALUABLE data IS constantly moving – it doesn’t disrupt, and we are rarely aware of it’s change of hands or existence at all.
But globally, companies everywhere sink billions into the handling of data because they know it’s a precious resource. The question begs – how can they be sure when their billions of investment dollars have returned to manifest as a positive return?
Defining data
At the core of the term, data is defined as strands of information converted to symbols, letters, numbers, or any other identifying symbol that can be transferred and altered by a computer. Literally, anything that’s identified using letters, numbers, and every symbol in between – is considered data.
In today’s world, hot ticket data includes things like what we buy online, the stuff we search for, how much time we spend on a website, and how we interact with applications and other platforms.
So, in the business world, how do we break down data into a measurable way to understand how much of a financial impact it has??
Measuring data
All data has a lifeline. It doesn’t necessarily ever die – but it does have a defining lifeline that measures its purpose or what it’s been used for. So from a business standpoint, all of this raw data must be converted into some type of valuable information in a context that has a purpose within any organization or business. Are you following?
When this transfer is made, this information is then used to make a certain decision regarding your organization – and the result is either a gain or loss – of revenue.
Understanding the way data works in a business setting – the only way you can truly measure it is to find out exactly HOW a company uses a particular form of data. Are they using data to lower the costs of certain operations? Are they using data to forecast things and increase revenue? Are they using data to find out what caters to their audience to generate income? Get it now?
But it’s not enough just to be aware of how they leverage data. Remember, everything comes with a price, and overhead must be covered. And yes, data has overhead. How, you ask?
Data must be captured, stored, prepared, converted, transferred, etc. All of these things cost money. So, the simple thing to do is to measure the total you’ve invested into acquiring and applying the data and subtract this from the monetary benefits you reaped from your hard work of preparing the data for its intended use.
Essentially, when you invest in data, you’re putting money back into your business. You’re betting on your organization. Did you know that way back in 1992, a rule was created to officially measure the way data and its price impacted your company?
Yep. It went like this: The cost was $1 to verify new data as it was captured, $10 if you don’t clean the data until it’s in your databases, and $100 if you use it without cleaning it up.
“What does that even mean?”
Basically, what was being stated in a round-about way, was that it’s cheaper to guarantee the input of top-tier data than to correct it once the data’s been quantified. This is critical when you compare a human looking for potential errors compared to a mobile app or advanced algorithm using the data, causing it to disrupt every output and workflow beyond the output of this dirty, disgusting data.
Unhealthy data is worthless
The value of data is relative to the company that needs it – and how accessible and “healthy” it is at the time of need. Prepared in the correct manner, data is invaluable to your company because it does things like optimize your collaborative efforts within your company and between departments – or any relationship for that matter. This can be with customers, partners, vendors – it doesn’t matter.
And, the most obvious, you can boost your efficiency and productivity by relying on automated tasks created by…DATA! In the end, the price of data…is…..relative. It’s almost like a ransom situation. Seriously.
According to one recent study, the vast majority of all people still find a brand for the first time in the exact same way: via a search engine. A massive 93% of all online experiences still begin that way, which is why concepts like search engine optimization are so important.
More than that, the same resource indicated that about 70% of the links that users click on when they make a search are organic. This means that while PPC (pay-per-click) advertising alongside the search results do make somewhat of an impact, they can’t match the power – or the reach – of ranking organically.
Google uses an algorithm – the mechanics of which are a closely guarded secret – to determine which pages rank highly for which terms. If you check enough of the algorithm’s proverbial boxes, your content is deemed both valuable and relevant and you rank highly as a result. If you don’t, you might appear near the bottom of the page or even on page two – which is a location that roughly 95% of all users will never reach.
So if you’re a business that wants to connect with as many new customers as possible, ranking as highly in Google as you can should always be a top priority. It’s also why it’s critical to pay attention to whenever Google updates their algorithm – as they’ve recently done once again.
The Situation With Google’s Algorithm
Again, the precise way that Google’s algorithm works tends to be kept from the public to keep people from gaming the system. It’s a little like how keyword implementation used to work in previous years.
Once people figured out that keywords mattered and that Google used them – and their volume – to determine how a page should rank, everyone began the practice of keyword stuffing. This means that the quality of the content itself didn’t matter – so long as you had the right keywords inserted into the page as many times as possible, you were virtually guaranteed to rank highly.
Once Google tried to put a stop to that practice, people got tricky. They would hide keywords on the page that were the same color as the background. Your average reader wouldn’t ever see this – but Google’s “spiders” would. Once discovered, Google updated their algorithm to put a stop to this as well, penalizing pages that practiced it in a way that saw their average traffic rates eviscerated.
Indeed, that’s why Google updates its search algorithm many times per year – in part to help provide more accurate results, and in part to try to catch people who are “cheating” their way to the top. Remember that Google makes the vast majority of its money via ad revenue, and that number is so high because it has a 90% marketshare on all searches around the world. If Google continually returns low quality or spammy links to searchers, those users will soon look for alternatives. That means ad revenue will drop.
Google doesn’t want that. Which means that you can’t want that, either.
The Recent Update: Breaking Things Down
In September, Google confirmed that it had rolled out an updated specifically related to product reviews. Essentially, Google is now “rewarding” high quality product reviews that “share in-depth research” about a brand’s products and services.
Those product reviews where someone is overwhelmingly positive or overwhelmingly negative? The ones where someone is either so happy you think they must be a bot, or so upset that they clearly aren’t recognizing that they didn’t know how to use the product and made a mistake and should be embarrassed? Those don’t matter as much anymore compared to the ones in the middle.
The product reviews that matter are the ones that include photos and videos. That provide detailed breakdowns about the benefits and disadvantages of a product. The ones that compare how something works with competing products. The kind that you’re most likely to see on a site like Reddit. The list goes on and on.
What you’re thinking is correct – your average customer or user of a mobile app like Robinhood app absolutely does not want to do any of this. They don’t have time. It’s just not a realistic idea. They have lives to lead, mortgages to pay. Kids to feed and play with. But Google, in its infinite wisdom, has decided that all of this is important. Which means that if you’re looking for an opportunity to supplant your larger competitors, you need to encourage your own customers to leave reviews that are as detailed as humanly possible.
Note that you’re also not allowed to offer them anything for free in exchange for them doing so. You need to hope that your average customer is someone with enough time on their hands to want to do this all on their own. Is this a tall order? Sure. But again – if you want to play the game, you have to play by Google’s rules. At least for the foreseeable future.
Currently, we exist in the age of the trend – a world where attention spans are measured in nano-seconds. We live in a true walking contradiction in every sense of the word, where time and technology seem to be moving faster than ever before.
There is no constant anymore, young grasshopper – there is only the trend. Honestly, we just exist in a world that’s more conducive to ideas, and innovation, with unlimited information at our fingertips. It’s a gift and a curse, but it does make for some amazing concepts – and some may actually stick. Maybe..
These are the top trends for EOY 2022..
1. Metaverse Real Estate
We’re in the age of the mobile app. First, we had Robinhood App…allowing all of us to trade, invest, and sell at the drop of a dime. Then, we ushered in the NFT.
And now, ladies and gentlemen, we have the Metaverse Real Estate. Reddit is rife with information and advice – and plenty of…blunt..opinions regarding this trend.
Just so you’re up to speed – an NFT (nonfungible token) is a digital item that’s bought and housed within a virtual world or landscape.
In the same manner, Metaverse real estate is acquired with crypto. After finalizing your purchase, you receive your deed or title – a piece of unique blockchain code.
These transactions go through real-life property managers or brokers – seriously. Pick your metaverse platform and stake your claim – but be warned: There are no regulations, and no special certification is required. So, pick and choose wisely who you work with.
2. EVs
Just a decade ago, EVs were still a prototype for most auto manufacturers. Now, they’re on the highways and streets of every state and city, continent and country – they’re everywhere. And apparently, they aren’t going anywhere anytime soon. With new legislation signed in California and other states following suit, many auto makers already have the wheels turning for plans to completely eliminate the manufacturing of fuel-powered vehicles.
3. Selfie vs. POV
The selfie existed just fine – ruling the world of narcissism with an iron fist. There was even a selfie song. Then the selfie’s arch enemy, the POV, had to disrupt everything. In the end, it looks like there’s room for both, as the selfie is a young person’s game, and the POV is for all of us old timers over the ripe old age of 21.
4. Permanent Remote Work
When Covid ushered in the single biggest change in our workforce in history, we’re not sure if anybody quite thought it was here to stay. But when many companies discovered the innovation it brought and other advantages – the remote worker became a permanent fixture. And it doesn’t look like it’s changing anytime soon.
5. The Focus On Employee Wellness In the Workplace
This is another silver lining regarding the pandemic. When half the world was laid off, those who had no choice but to adapt and press forward discovered how empowered they could be as freelancers. Soon, those who had known nothing else but the hourly grind were transformed overnight into entrepreneurs – and making a pretty penny doing it. This allowed a large portion of the global workforce to collectively tell their bosses to take this job and shove it – or treat us better. And guess what? The corporate world obliged. Companies everywhere are rolling out new packages and programs that place more emphasis on employee wellness and appreciation. High five.
6. Collaborative Technologies
With the explosion of remote workers came the sweeping deployment of collaborative technologies. Offices around the globe have left the cubicle and are currently Slacking, Microsoft Teaming, Google Workspacing, tweeting, ticking, and Zooming away. Who said the remote worker would kill the collaborative environment of most organizations? Another high five.
7. Lead Agencies, Agency Tools, SaaS, etc.
The fiery battle between marketers of cold, modern ad agencies, and other parties is extinguished. There is no separation of the old way and the new way – but instead a focus on the user. Just a year ago “content was king,” but now efforts are being placed on eliminating ad fatigue through unique creation, a clear message, and user intent. In other words, agencies must make good on their promises by reaching the target demographic like never before.
Pricing and proofing aren’t the only items on the table during the initial negotiations with an agency. It’s hands-on now. We’re in the age of workshops, meetings with real experts in the field, and seminars – any way that a client can digest real knowledge and understand how their target audience is captured. Nowadays, it’s not about the bells and whistles – it’s about the relationship and the trust factor. The good guys are winning.
8. SMS Marketing
Here’s the talk of personalization again. The balance of power has shifted to sending coupons, promotions, and messages that pull the hearts and strings of your customers. Even live conversations with “real people.” The intrusive “old way” has left the building and customers have the choice of opting out. We’re possibly in the most polite age of advertising and marketing that’s ever existed – and it’s working.
9. Influencer Marketing
Partnering with the top influencers in your industry can expand your options to a MASSIVE pool of potential buyers. Just how big is influencer marketing? Try to the tune of $13 BILLION just since 2021. That’s a hell of a “trend.” But a new trend has emerged within a trend – the micro-influencer. Instead of hundreds of thousands of followers companies are leaning to influencers with 1,000 to 10,000 followers – and gaining a more intimate experience…and no doubt reaping the benefits.
10. TikTok vs. YouTube Shorts
In the battle for capturing the minds of audiences with the shortest attention spans, the short-form video content battle is being waged between the behemoths of the industry – TikTok vs. YouTube Shorts. So far, TikTok seems to be winning. Now we also have IG Reels emerging as a third participant. Moving into 2023, it will be interesting to see which platform consumers, advertisers, and creators gravitate towards. This could get ugly.
Colure Media is a New York based advertising and marketing agency. We can help your corporation gain exposure and increase revenue. If you are interested in exploring various marketing possibilities for your corporation, Contact us now.
Okay, first of all, what even is CX? CX stands for customer experience. The experience of being a customer. And if you’re thinking that’s not revolutionary enough to disrupt something, you’re probably absolutely right. CX startups are companies like Zendesk; they’re companies that are designed to streamline the current customer experience. And they’re poised to disrupt because of AI. Let’s dig in.
Hand touching digital chat bot for provide access to information and data in online network, robot application and global connection, AI, Artificial intelligence, innovation and technology.
Disrupting the customer experience
So, go on Reddit and search for CX. It’s like user experience, user interfaces, and user design, but much more. It starts with a buyer’s journey and ends with you embedding yourself into every facet of their being. For example, the Robinhood App has poor CX. They barely respond to anyone.
The customer experience is a relationship that customers build with a business. And it’s becoming important because customers are seeking these experiences. Look at Apple. People want to call themselves Apple or iOS users. People want to connect with the brand that they’re using.
But more than that, there’s AI.
The AI chatbots are disrupting customer satisfaction
In the old days, we hated phone trees, right?
If you’re a younger millennial, you have no idea what that means. A phone tree is a directory; when you call in, you get directed to different areas of a company. There weren’t any voice prompts, and the phone trees could get five or six levels dense.
“Do you want accounting? Do you want receivables? Do you want Steve? Steve A or Steve S?”
The earliest chatbots operated like this, too, and they sure weren’t going to disrupt anything. If you called, say, Reddit, you’d get an automated voice telling you to press 1, 2, or 3. If you then went on a live chatbot (let’s assume Reddit ever wanted anyone to contact them, because you actually cannot contact Reddit at all), the chatbot would tell you much the same.
But now chatbots have differentiated themselves. You can talk to them in natural language, and they respond. This is something called Natural Language Processing.
What does it mean for you?
You could start a CX web3 machine-learning startup today, and realistically, most people wouldn’t even know what you do. But they would throw money at you.
Today, CX is mostly about using automation and artificial intelligence to smooth the customer experience, reducing friction across multiple channels. So the reality is that a CX startup is someone who is using high technology to make the customer experience better.
So you’ve got AI. And you’ve also got web3, because this is what people are expecting web3 to be. They go on their mobile app, they load up a page, and they see furniture in real life through augmented reality. They see furniture, scan it with a mobile app, and immediately buy it.
Let’s all move to a better customer experience
Part of it is that people do need a better CX. Amazon made itself an empire because of fast returns and good customer service. Guess what: That’s how Sears was an empire for over 100 years. A better customer experience is essential, and it’s a great industry to be in.
As the economy falters, customers are increasingly operating solely within realms they want to operate with. Newer customers have been more concerned with customer experience than product quality. That’s right. They’ll stick with a mediocre product because they… want a good experience.
How far could you get if you could help other companies build those experiences?
So, you want to disrupt the world with your mobile app. But like all things, disruption and entrepreneurship occur on the shoulders of giants. Steve Jobs didn’t come up with the iPhone on his own. He took things that were already popular and made them better.
Life isn’t always about innovation. Often, it’s about implementation. You identify best-in-class technologies and find opportunities to apply them. And you do that by knowing what’s going on. Let’s take a look at some essential resources for a disruptive founder today.
Mainstream Periodicals: Let’s Get It Out of the Way
Entrepreneur, Fast Company, Fortune, Forbes — you should read them all. But be aware that once something’s in a mainstream periodical, its time has expired. In the old days, investors used to say: “The best time to invest in a stock is before your Aunt Sally is talking about it.” The same applies.
Still, these mainstream periodicals are critically important because they provide insights into the general zeitgeist is thinking. Mainstream periodicals will tell you what people are already talking about. It’s your job to be ahead of the curve.
Innovation and Tech: Futurism, MIT Technology Review, and Wired
Frequently, new technology breaks quietly. There are one or two articles on an advanced, open-source machine learning platform… and then silence for literally years. Tech frequently develops unevenly. You bring radio to the internet before internet speeds have caught up to streaming. We’ve understood the principles of artificial intelligence and machine learning for decades, but it’s only recently that cloud technology has advanced to the point where it’s feasible.
So, new technology is an opportunity to grow. And it’s not always obvious what will or won’t be critical. Look for the trends under them; if you’re starting to see things pop up in multiple talk spaces, then it’s probably important.
Podcasts: Masters of Scale, The Week in Startups, Mixergy, and The Growth Show
You know what? There are thousands upon thousands of podcasts targeted toward entrepreneurs. But these are some best. Whether riding the bus to your Silicon Valley day job or going for a stroll in your suburb, listening to the opinions of experienced founders will help.
These podcasts give you a good mix of inspiring startup stories, current news, and actionable tips for growth. Don’t ignore the importance of inspiration. Podcasts are uniquely inspiring: they are designed to keep you going, thinking, and innovating.
Books: The Startup Owner’s Manual, Who, Zero to One, and Leading at the Speed of Growth
Read books, whether you’re listening to them in the car or reading them on your Kindle. In particular, Zero to One (by Peter Thiel) encapsulates the startup experience from someone who’s lived it. But don’t forget that there’s a lot of survivorship bias out there. Just as you should read information about those who succeeded, you should also read information about those who failed.
Some other critical books include Why Startups Fail, Build, and How to Ruin Your Life by 30. If you prepare for the worst you can move toward the best.
Entrepreneurship Means a Lifetime of Learning
Don’t stop there.
You want to create the next Reddit or Robinhood app. It starts with learning more — about everything. If you never stop learning and never stop thinking, you can keep innovating. Be open to new ideas and be willing to learn from anyone.
Can you disrupt an industry that’s just begun? Who is currently winning the battle for web3? It’s a complicated question — for end users, the hope is that no one wins. For companies, the hope is that it creates megaliths and monoliths.
Metaverse, Web3 and Blockchain Technology Concepts. Opened Hand Levitating Virtual Objects. Futuristic Tone
Facebook’s Got the Name
Sorry — Meta. Regarding being recognizable, Facebook has worked hard to make itself synonymous with web3. And the work has paid off; most people think of Meta when they think of the “Metaverse.”
The bad news for Meta is that everything published about web3 looks extraordinarily goofy. While people are thinking about the Metaverse when they think about Meta, they aren’t taking it seriously.
The Game Industry Has It Locked
From mobile app to VR space, the game industry is really making advances into web3. It’s understandable. The gaming industry has always been at the forefront of new technology. And society just got out of a few years of staying at home and playing with their computers, consoles, and phones.
If you want an example of what “the Metaverse” and web3 could do, you need only look at… Roblox and Fortnite. There are children already growing up in the Metaverse and living their lives in an overlaid, digital reality. People are holding concerts in Fortnite.
It’s Not Like Amazon Isn’t Trying
With Amazon’s AWS technology, it may be surprising that Amazon really isn’t breaking out into the web3 space. Why isn’t it selling digital terrain through its online platform?
Actually, Amazon is trying. Just this year, Amazon Studios released an MMO that they had touted to be groundbreaking. It ended up being quite poorly received and almost universally panned. It was just a regular MMO, but it shows that Amazon is trying to get into the digitally interactive space.
Of course, to really disrupt web3, you need to be able to get into the space and be accepted by people and Amazon doesn’t really have an understanding of people, nor does Zuckerberg.
What about the NFTs?
You know, a little while ago we could stay that bitcoin was definitely the winner of web3. But Bitcoin is going the way of the dodo. Even if it’s the de facto standard still for trading and bartering in crypto, it’s not going to be for long. Because it’s being surpassed by other contenders.
NFTs are going to stay but they are going to be very different.
Right now, there’s a battle for the soul of web3. It could be Facebook, Amazon, Google, or any other large company. But it could also become a decentralized service that everyone can take advantage of and enjoy.
There’s something to the dark net. It’s not just a place to buy drugs and hitmen. The dark net has remained entirely uncontrolled and collaborative for years. It’s a space where anyone can throw up a site and everyone has to essentially collaborate for people to get there. Read into the dark net and you’ll find that more things are being traded in the dark net than on the Robinhood app.
So if you want to find out more about the future of web3, why not make it? And if you want to know what people hate about web3, just ask Reddit.
If you went to college (or dropped out of college—hey, all the tech wunderkinder are doing it), you’re already rolling your eyes. Yeah, Pearson could disrupt the NFT space by selling textbooks as NFTs. Let’s set aside the anger and explore what it means for new startups.
Pearson? Textbooks? NFTs?
Maybe you somehow have the luck of never encountering a Pearson textbook. Pearson textbooks are hundreds of dollars and usually required by a class. Even better, Pearson has worked hard to ensure you can’t get their textbooks on the secondary market.
It began with edition inflation. Every year another edition… so you couldn’t just use an old book. Next, there were codes attached to each book for an “online lab,” even books that really didn’t need an online portion. These codes were one-time-use only, so again, you couldn’t sell the book.
Now NFTs are the latest in Pearson’s pursuit of profit.
Removing the secondary market
But actually, this isn’t about NFTs. Not really. It’s about removing the secondary market. Pearson has been clear that it hates that its books can be resold. A used textbook can be sold up to seven times, even with multiple editions and lab codes.
Removing the secondary market is happening everywhere. Earlier this month, HBO axed a tremendous portion of its library. People were mad, but they can’t do anything about it; they don’t actually own the library, they just own access to it.
Pearson’s NFTs also remove the secondary market but use an entirely different strategy. What you’re purchasing now is your access to this book. You can’t sell it because you only purchased your access. And if Pearson goes through with this, there will probably be limited access; the Terms of Service will likely state that the service could go down or disappear entirely without liability to the company.
NFTs, web3, and the world of artificial scarcity
We’ve talked about this before, but what web3 commerce does very frequently is create artificial scarcity. Planet #24928 of the Metaverse could have infinite lots, but if we produce only 100 lots, then we profit. This isn’t new. A painter could sell 4,000,000 prints, but they chose to sell 40 because that makes their work valuable and rare.
The extraordinary thing, of course, about this new economy is that anything can become rare art, including a Pearson textbook on Quantitative Analysis for management. Many of the most successful NFT products dabble with these elements of artificial scarcity. You might pay $5 for a hat for your Metaverse avatar now, but what if we told you it was the only one in the world?
More importantly, NFTs are moving firmly into mainstream space. CNN is selling NFTs of articles. While the world hasn’t quite gotten a handle, universally, on what an NFT is or what it means, they have continued to embrace it.
That’s some good news in the world of bad.
The funding window is closing—so go find your unicorn
If you haven’t loaded up Reddit in a minute, you might not realize that the unicorns are missing. In a reference only millennials will get, they’ve been driven back into the sea. Bottom line: You’re running out of time.
Investors are pulling back. Layoffs are rampant. Startups are having a hard time. The time to throw out a quick mobile app and make millions of dollars was slightly before the Robinhood app launched. Things are getting lean out there.
But that doesn’t mean there aren’t opportunities. You can see that mainstream adoption of NFT, blockchain, and cryptocurrency continues even after the disastrous series of crashes this year. Pearson’s consideration of NFTs means mainstream companies still welcome the idea, provided that NFTs and cryptocurrency can solve their extant pain points. What pain points could your blockchain solve?
Crypto mortgages are bringing in a new wave of onlookers, wondering if this is the next avenue to securing a home? Well it makes sense, but we’ll see if there’s a catch to it. Say you’ve got $300,000 in crypto currency, this can be leveraged against a mortgage company’s $300,000 cash for a home with no taxes paid because you never cashed out of crypto!
Why crypto mortgages do make sense
When you cash out of crypto you pay huge amounts of taxes, short-term investments get hit harder than long-term investments. The trick here is that the bank will hold your crypto equity as collateral, so it’s like you never cashed out and those taxes are out of the equation of your new home. This is especially helpful for those who are self-employed or a regular trader since qualifying isn’t easy traditionally.
The end all is crypto mortgages allow you to pay off your house without meandering through the traditional process, with large dollar signs sitting in your crypto wallets it makes perfect sense to skip all of that lousy traditional process!
Why crypto mortgages are insane
Okay really, what’s the risk?
Okay, so the thing is, like everything in the crypto world, crypto mortgages are an amazing idea that can go south for you very quickly.
Let’s say that your $300,000 in crypto tanks and now it’s worth $100,000. Your bank will perform a mortgage call and you’ll either need to put up more equity, refinance your home, or otherwise come up and with the cash.
And let’s be honest, crypto is very volatile. So, the odds are that this could happen.
It’s a gamble. If everything works perfectly, you disrupt the mortgage industry and get an amazing house without paying taxes. If everything goes poorly, you’ll be back on your Robinhood app trading penny stocks in no time at all.
As you should know, the crypto world is very volatile and can make your life either Heaven or Hell depending on the market. How you could end up losing out on big dollars is, say that $300,000 in your wallet tanks down to $100,000 your bank will either require you to refinance your home, put more equity, or otherwise come up with the cash. The odds of this happening are probable as the market fluctuates consistently, so the gamble is up to you. The pros are getting to disrupt the mortgage industry by securing an amazing home without paying taxes, versus the cons of a major setback in your crypto wallet and the bank leveraging you (they know you’re likely to pay considerable fee and high interest to avoid hefty taxes).
What crypto mortgages mean for tech disrupters
The larger picture is mortgage is a highly regulated and controlled industry. You’re not going to be getting FNMA mortgages, however the fact that you can get a subprime mortgage with crypto makes crypto continue to take over the conventional mainstream spheres.
So, what industry will be next? Travel and hospitality? Restaurants? Manufacturing? As cryptocurrency continues to tumbleweed in support and reach, it can also spread into any of these other sectors and more. Just as Blockchain technology is changing everything from the Metaverse to legal contracts, crypto can be slotted into any type of equity or asset-based transaction.
Years ago, crypto fans on Reddit rejoiced when they could suddenly order a pizza through BTC. Being able to buy cars, houses, or even just groceries with crypto doesn’t put crypto closer to adoption, it opens new opportunities more widespread than the eye can meet. It’s not just about building some crypto mobile app anymore. Now it’s about what traditional industry you want to disrupt.
Conversational Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a form of AI that can recognize and respond to natural human speech. The emergence of this technology has led to some impressive innovations in customer service, eCommerce, and beyond.
If you’re not already using conversational AI in your business, you may be wondering what all the fuss is about. As more people today get used to having their own virtual assistant at all times, any customer-centric business that doesn’t offer a similar level of convenience and accessibility is likely to get left behind.
Conversational AI can be used in many ways to improve customer service, increase sales, and streamline business processes. Here are five benefits of conversational AI that you should know about:
Better Customer Service
The impact of AI on customer experience is already being felt by businesses and consumers alike. Thanks to the development of natural language processing (NLP), conversational AI understands human speech. This technology is constantly improving, meaning that chatbots and virtual assistants are becoming more and more accurate at understanding the nuances of human conversation.
Boost your customer service with these nifty features:
Automation– Automating simple tasks that would otherwise require the attention of a human agent, including complaints. This frees up your agents to deal with more complex issues and provides a more efficient support system for your customers.
Gather and analyze real-time customer data– You can use conversational AI to collect data about your customers’ preferences and pain points. This valuable information can be used to improve your product or service offering.
No language barriers– Conversational AI brings the power of machine translation to the customer service arena. This means that businesses can offer support in multiple languages without the need to hire bilingual agents.
Linking your conversational AI platform to a Customer Relationship Management (CRM) system provides a wealth of customer data that can be used to personalize interactions.
The CRM system stores all relevant customer information in one place, including contact details, order history, and past interactions with your business. This information can be used to create a customer profile which is then used to personalize conversations and ensure they are relevant to the customer. This not only increases customer satisfaction but can also lead to a higher customer lifetime value.
Growing your business too fast should be a good problem. You don’t want to stop growing just because your company can’t physically or affordably support more customers. But when all your agents are busy with current customers, how do you take on more without sacrificing quality?
This is where conversational AI can help. Most customer queries can be answered without the need for a human agent. Leveraging conversational AI can help you to automate simple customer interactions, freeing up your human agents to focus on the more complex queries. This can help you to scale your support function and handle more customers without sacrificing quality.
Smaller companies may find it difficult to afford the customer service infrastructure to support a large customer base. However, conversational AI makes it possible for them to offer the same level of customer service at a fraction of the cost.
Lower Operational Costs
24/7 availability is a costly proposition for most businesses. Staffing your customer service department round the clock can be prohibitively expensive, but with conversational AI you can offer this level of support at a fraction of the cost.
Conversational AI platforms are powered by artificial intelligence and machine learning which means they get smarter over time. This means that the more queries they handle, the more accurate their responses become. This can help to reduce the number of staff required to provide customer support and keep your operational costs low.
Easy Follow-Ups with Customers
One of the challenges of customer service is that it can be difficult to follow up with customers after they have interacted with your company. Conversational AI can help to resolve this issue by automating the process of following up with customers. This can be done using several methods, such as sending an automated email or SMS message, or by including a follow-up question in your conversational AI platform.
The value of customer service lies in its ability to build relationships with customers. By following up with customers after they have interacted with your company, you can show them that you are interested in their experience and that you value their business.
Conversational AI offers several benefits that can help businesses to improve customer service and reduce operational costs. It is scalable, affordable, and efficient—making it the perfect solution for businesses of all sizes. Whether you’re a small business or a large enterprise, conversational AI can help you to improve customer satisfaction and loyalty, setting you up for long-term success!
A downturn doesn’t destroy startups. Rather, it separates the startups that are in recession-proof arenas from the startups that didn’t think about the economy at all. Silicon Valley is no longer a pinata full of cash; you can’t just take a whack and bleed green. You need to be thoughtful about your enterprises. Well-run companies will thrive. The others will perish.
Lean it up
Strip your tech, drop your weight. Startups that were getting fat need to lean it down; they need to pare down to the barebones now. Now is not the time for rapid expansion or hyper-scaling. It’s time for hunkering down and building real muscle. Start cutting areas that you can cut while still retaining your core technology, talent, and identity. You don’t want to be the people scrambling to pick up talent later, but you also don’t want a thousand excessive tools and utilities that you really don’t need during a time when you can’t build strong scale.
Build homes, not castles
Focus on the major pain points of companies and create technologies that they need. Okay, a decade ago, you could make millions solving some minor “problem” that a company had or giving them some luxuries that they didn’t want. But now you have to concentrate on the issues they have. And they’re going to have a lot of problems. Think about what’s going to happen to people when the economy crashes? How can you help them lean it up themselves?
Learn from success
Hey, Amazon’s doing great isn’t it? Walmart, Amazon, anyone who sells stuff online, really. But who isn’t doing great? Oh, Facebook, Twitter… social media. It turns out that during a recession, companies that don’t produce anything of value don’t do great. Take a look at the companies that are posting record profits during these recessions. It has to do with the technologies that are making it easier for people to survive during a recession, doesn’t it?
Make less go further
Don’t just lean. Think about what you can do to grow your client base from within. Think re-selling, re-targeting, re-marketing, rather than raw expansion. What other problems can you solve for your customers? How can you help them succeed? Their success is your success, after all. It’s easier to sell to people who already love you. And, as Amazon has discovered, clients are more likely to stay onboard if they rely on you for multiple things. How many people still have Amazon Prime because they don’t want to lose Prime Video or Prime Music?
Look to the debt/credit/finance industry
And finally, look, it’s a raw deal, but the reality is the industry that’s gonna be doing great is in debt, credit, and finance. At minimum, diversify your interests. Fintech booms when deals go bad, and there’s no way around that. Forge partnerships within industries that are going to last. The real estate bubble, for instance, might crash, sure; but it’s not going away.
Alright, so you’re on your way to building a mobile app to disrupt—which industry? Choose a lean one. A recession doesn’t have to stop your startup in its tracks, but you’re doing it wrong if it isn’t changing at least some of what you’re doing.
Can you believe it? It worked. But what does it mean for the media? What does it mean for “free speech” and the market of opinions? Elon Musk has finally bought Twitter — and tanked his own stock doing it. What does that mean for digital disruption?
A Hostile Takeover
Earlier in the month, Elon Musk started a hostile takeover of Twitter by purchasing an immense number of shares. Twitter reacted by enacting a poison pill measure; a poison pill is something a company does specifically to avoid a hostile takeover, making it effectively impossible for a company to be taken over through stock purchases alone.
But despite the board initially saying that Musk would have no control over the company, they quickly introduced him to the board. And when he offered $44 billion for Twitter itself, they rather quickly folded. Musk is known for his capricious but often visionary purchases; he did not build Tesla but rather purchased it.
Interestingly, until the very end, Reddit posts were saying Musk could never take over. But Redditors have a long history of skepticism, going back to the Robinhood App.
Why Does Musk Want Twitter?
Musk has a weird relationship with Twitter. He doesn’t like being censored. So much so that he’s been fined repeatedly by the SEC for saying things that manipulated Tesla’s stock prices. Musk says that he wants transparency on the platform but it’s also likely he wants the freedom to do what he wants.
Whether he’s the proper steward for a channel that has become a leading resource for news and even political change remains to be seen. Musk cut his teeth in digital disruption with PayPal and his forays into Tesla and SpaceX have both been markedly successful. But they are very different technologies.
The Consequences for Tesla
Tesla stock, meanwhile, has been absolutely slaughtered. In part, this is due to the perception that Musk is acting irrationally or emotionally, which he has historically been prone to do. If he’s purchasing Twitter as a means of radically decentralized discourse, that’s one thing. If he’s purchasing it because he wants people to stop saying mean things about him on the internet, that’s a vastly different situation. Regardless, Tesla stockholders got to see the stock plummet.
The Consequences for Twitter
While many users have abandoned Twitter, the reality is that people are mostly meh. As one user stated, “if you’re upset over a billionaire buying Twitter, wait until you find out who owns everything else.” So, a billionaire bought an online platform/mobile app. What else is new?
For many, the reality of the situation is that Twitter is just a social media venue that they can take or leave, and most appear to be waiting to see what happens.
Entrepreneurs, though, will face broader implications. One thing Musk does have a stance on is algorithm transparency.
Algorithm Transparency and Business
No one knows what special sauce Google uses to make sure that results surface. That’s the point. Billions are spent every year trying to figure it out in the form of search engine optimization.
Musk wants to make visible the mechanisms that promote posts on Twitter. And that could be both a problem and an opportunity. It will either radically change the way people are using Twitter or (more likely) destroy it as spam becomes even more aggressive and prevalent.
Companies that lean firmly on Twitter for their advertising campaigns are currently right to be wary.
Note that the Musk deal with Twitter could still fall through. It’s not finalized. He may discover that he didn’t want to buy Twitter after all. He may get butthurt that Bill Gates’ short position against Tesla paid off big. And Twitter itself may decide not to capitulate.
Still, this gives rise to many thoughts as to how the wealthy can control discourse, how vulnerable the entrepreneurial disruption community is to its tools, and how the internet is evolving today. The Twitter purchase will undoubtedly disrupt business on the platform and mobile app; the question is how much?
If you feel like social media and online marketing is shouting into the void, you’re really not alone. Many small, local businesses are told to invest in online advertising and mobile marketing only to discover that it’s really not effective for them.
Imagine if you advertised your company to every 10,000th person on earth. How many of those people would actually be able to use your products or services? Probably none of them. There are a lot of people on earth and there are a lot of people online.
Geotargeting and geofence marketing focus on hyper-local leads — so you can stop shouting and start earning.
Connect to the Customers Closest to You
It’s the customers that are closest to you that you want to connect with. It’s better to connect with 50 people in your neighborhood than 5,000 people across the world. And it’s cheaper, too. When you connect with customers close to you, you greatly enhance the viability and effectiveness of your advertising campaigns.
How Does Geotargeting/Geofencing Work?
Geotargeting/geo fencing works by identifying where customers are inside of a broader, third-party advertising network. For instance, Google Ads shows throughout the world but can show your ads only to those who are in your vicinity. Geotargeting is broad; it just means that you’re sending your ads to those who are in your country, state, city, or even zip code.
Geo-fencing is a little different. Geo-fencing specifically defines an area, such as an area that is located in a highly-trafficked region around your business. Once individuals are inside this area, they are targeted. Geo-fencing can be used to deliver ads through PoS systems within your neighborhood, for instance, or to send ads to phones and other devices detected in your region.
The Advantages of Geotargeting
Really, the advantages of geotargeting are clear. You can spend $100 to connect with 5,000 people in the world or $10 to connect with 50 people in your area. It’s cost-effective and far more useful.
But it also enhances public perception of your brand, as you’re no longer trying to reach out to individuals who wouldn’t be interested in your advertising to begin with. Geofence marketing creates more relevant, useful advertising, as well as more profitable strategies.
Implementing a Geotargeting Campaign Strategy
To implement a geotargeting campaign strategy, you (obviously) need to know where your customers are. There are third-party ad platforms like Google and Bing, but their usefulness will actually be vanishing shortly; action is being taken to reduce third-party tracking cookies.
There are two better options: social media marketing and third-party behavioral targeting databases. Social media marketing works because individuals already provide where they live to the social media platform. Even better, they provide information such as whether they’re married, whether they have children, and even where they work and where they went to school.
Third-party databases seek to identify consumers based on their behavior and contextual information without the help of cookies or files stored on the user’s device. These third-party geotargeted databases are likely to grow dramatically once cookies become ineffective for geofence marketing.
Summary
With the right geofence marketing, your company can focus all its efforts on advertising directly to the people who are closest to you. When they look at their phone or check their email in your location, they’ll get information that relates to your business. If they’re halfway across the world, they won’t.
But this type of advertising and mobile marketing really does require that you use the right technology. Social media marketing provides some of this targeting, but mobile marketing is about to get a lot more challenging.
Imagine that you wanted to purchase a car from your neighbor. You open an app and accept a contract. Instantaneously, money is sent to your neighbor and the car is transferred into your possession. Everyone can see that you own the vehicle. Your neighbor doesn’t have to do anything other than send the contract.
This is the future of the blockchain — the incredible benefits of smart contract technology. But it’s also, like most new technology, potentially dangerous and disruptive.
How is a Smart Contract Created?
Smart contracts are created on a blockchain. They are programmed to exchange a given blockchain’s token (such as wrapped Ethereum) under specific conditions. A smart contract can be sent to anyone, anywhere, if you know their address. This also means that smart contracts can technically be sent to those who have no idea that they’re about to receive them. Driven by blockchain, smart contracts have risen into power alongside crypto and NFTs. Binance, Polymatic, and Solana all support smart contracts.
What Are Smart Contracts Used For?
Smart contracts can send and receive money and record transactions on the blockchain. Essentially, though, that boils down to one thing: smart contracts, given a set of conditions, write to the blockchain. That means smart contracts can be used to validate real-life contracts, exchange goods and services, and complete very fast financial transactions.
What Are the Benefits and Limitations of Smart Contracts?
Like crypto, the major limitation of smart contracts is that they’re difficult for the average person to understand and they’re difficult to use. More than cryptocurrency, an individual needs detailed tech knowledge to launch a smart contract. But ideally, smart contracts will become more prevalent and easier to use as time passes.
Smart contracts record transactions. But they cannot influence anything outside of their individual blockchain. That means that additional work has to be done to do things like validate real estate transactions or validate car transactions — even if that work is merely acknowledging that the blockchain provides a real record of contracts.
What is the Relationship Between Contracts and the Blockchain?
Smart contracts are built on the blockchain. This provides for triggering events (such as opening a transaction) as well as for recording events (recording them directly on the blockchain). A smart contract is blockchain technology, but blockchain doesn’t necessarily imply smart contracts. NFTs could be called a type of smart contract, as they do convey ownership to an item in exchange for money.
What is the Legality of Smart Contracts?
A contract, legally, is something that two or more parties agree upon. Consequently, no new laws are necessary for a smart contract to be a type of contract; if it is validated that both parties agreed upon a transaction, then both parties agreed upon a transaction. A car can be sold through a smart contract right now, all that would be necessary (which admittedly is a hurdle) is for the law to understand what a smart contract is and how it operates.
That being said, smart contracts aren’t intended to be a legal venue, at least not yet. A lawyer should be involved if smart contracts are used for anything that is more valuable than a car or more obscure than an NFT.
Conclusion
Smart contracts are very disruptive. Presently, someone can borrow money, buy an NFT from themselves, and then send that money back within milliseconds. That may not seem helpful, but people have borrowed millions of dollars to buy their own NFT (in a fraction of a second) thereby boosting the value of their NFTs.
Start to dig deeper and you can see how smart contracts could be disruptive. Because they aren’t regulated (and can’t be regulated) they can give illusions of profitability where there isn’t one. People who work with smart contracts need to be tech-savvy and knowledgeable due to the potential complications and ramifications.
GPT3 is like Bitcoin that makes your Alexa and Siri look like Dogecoin! If you are reading this there is a likelihood GPT3 may disrupt your entire industry.
The originator is Manuel Araoz, but halfway through the piece he confesses that he did not write it. The article was fully written by GPT-3. He received access to OpenAI API, and was amazed at the raw power of GPT-3, after only giving it access to his homepage, a title, some tags, and a summary.
“OpenAI, a non-profit artificial intelligence research company backed by Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, … and others, released its third generation of language prediction model (GPT-3) into the open-source wild…”
So, GPT-3–Generative Pre-trained Transformer 3–generates text. It can create anything that has a language structure. You can ask it a question; prompt it to write an essay or summarize a long passage of text, translate languages, take memos. Since apps and web design are structured language, GPT-3 makes coding easier and faster.
Will GPT-3 as Marc Strassman, Founder & Executive Director at GPT-3 Society predicts, put a lot of writers out of business? That’s an open question for now, but there is no doubt that AI has the potential to add even more to information overload by producing more content than anyone can absorb. The good news for writers is that GPT-3 can generate lots of useful new ideas and back them up with facts and evidence.
What is actually occurring inside GPT-3’s programming may not be all that clear, but what it does best is harvesting text found on the internet and creating a vast “scrapbook” glued together and available on demand. The quality and durability of its end-products depend on the reader’s taste and preference.
Said one observer, “GPT-3 often performs like a clever student who hasn’t done their reading trying to bullshit their way through an exam. Some well-known facts, some half-truths, and some straight lies, strung together in what first looks like a smooth narrative.”
However, GPT-3 is a quantum step up from its previous GPT-2 version, released in 2020. GPT-2 spat out pretty convincing streams of text when prompted with an opening sentence. Compared with GPT-2’s vast 1.5 billion parameters, GPT-3 is over a hundred times more powerful with its 175 billion neural network ties at work in text generation and automated learning.
Michael Ryaboy, GPT-3 Prompt Engineer at Codebuddy in San Francisco adds a writer’s perspective to how GPT-3 will disrupt society:
“Most repetitive writing tasks such as copywriting will be in large part done by GPT-3…Similarly, a model like GPT-3 can greatly increase your writing productivity by writing for you if you are stuck… (For gaming programmers) Tools like GPT-3 will also be used to create immersive realities, as thousands of subplots for a video game can be created in minutes, and AI Dungeon already allows cohesive text-based explorations.”
Will AI-powered technology eventually become smarter than humans? Elon Musk fears that is so. He has warned that our existence as human beings could be at stake. Musk warns “that we’re headed toward a situation where AI is vastly smarter than humans.”
The operating term here is “technological singularity.” That is the hypothetical point in time when technological growth becomes so exponentially expansive that it becomes incontrollable and irreversible. The disruption and changes to human civilization, according to the hypothesis, can result in unforeseeable disruption and changes to human civilization.
Not everyone agrees with Elon Musk’s pessimism. AI pioneer Yoshua Bengio’s view is that we “are very far from super-intelligent AI systems and there may even be fundamental obstacles to get much beyond human intelligence.”
As Cofounder, Create Labs Ventures Abran Maldonado stated, “It will put the power of AI technology into the hands of more creative and mission driven communities outside of tech. This technology has lowered the barrier to entry and will allow new groups to enter the space and stay focused on the problems they are trying to solve.”
And according to the CEO of OpenAi, Sam Altman, all the hype about GPT-3 is “too much.”Yes, he agrees, “AI is going to change the world, but GPT-3 is just an early glimpse.” He identifies three main impediments to AI taking over everything:
1. AI is hugely expensive to use because of the vast amount of computing power needed to do its work. So, the cost of using it could be well beyond the budget of smaller organizations.
2. GPT-3 is a “closed” or “black-box” system. OpenAI has not revealed full details of its algorithms. So, if you rely on a technology to answer questions or create produces, you can’t be entirely sure how those answers or product solutions came about.
3. The output is far from perfect. GPT-3 can handle tasks like creating basic apps and short texts, but often tends to deteriorate and produce gibberish when tasked to produce something longer and complex.
How GPT-3 will disrupt everything else
Mobile App developers are already leveraging GPT-3 to do some amazing things with very little effort beyond plain language requests. Some examples:
Generating web and app design code based on text descriptions.
All that design code is already there. Developers can simply describe what they want, like “a layout that contains 3 buttons with a random color.” Watch this stunning display of GPT-3s plain language coding on this YouTube video.
Getting medical advice and answers.
One medical student in the UK used GPT-3 to answer medical and health care questions. His program gives correct answers to plain English questions as well as the underlying science and biology.
Converting legalese to plain language, and vice versa.
The law is one of the most text-driven professions. There are GPT-3 apps that can write pleas, motions, and other complicated legal documents and translate their text back to understandable English. For example, “my landlord neglected the property,” becomes “The Defendants allowed the real property to fall into disrepair…”
Finally, will GPT-3 send Siri and Alexa packing?
Probably not anytime soon, Michael Ryaboy believes that “Siri and Alexa do their job well. They are designed to allow you to do tasks through speech and not to maintain engaging conversation.” Until someone comes up with a better idea that Apple and Amazon are willing to throw out those top performers, they will probably be around for a while yet.
Let Colure help you design your mobile app and mobile app marketing
So, where do you fit into all that disruption? If you’re an innovative app developer or business owner and want to tackle some of our world’s most pressing challenges and harness AI to make everyone’s life better, contact us today. Colure’s Mobile App Development Team can get you going on your next projector to be interviewed and featured in our next series of “Project Venus.”
In 2010, a single Bitcoin was worth about 8 cents.
Today, it’s nearly $62,000. Yesterday the mobile app known for buying crypto called Coinbase went public reaching almost one hundred billion dollar in valuation.
Despite its detractors, Bitcoin keeps going up and up. An inherently deflationary currency — a currency that is finite — it is built to grow in value. The same can be said about a multitude of other cryptocurrencies such as Ethereum, Litecoin, and even Dogecoin.
Cryptocurrencies were once treated as a joke. But they’re being taken seriously now. The question remains: How seriously should they be taken?
The State of the Crypto Market as of 2021
Cryptocurrency has gone from being denied on major payment processors (Visa, MasterCard, American Express) to showing up in ATMs. The cryptomarkets now support most major cryptocurrencies, with fringe candidates (such as Dogecoin) being slowly introduced. Market caps are growing. The market cap of Bitcoin stands at $1 trillion.
More companies are supporting cryptocurrency. Recently, Elon Musk stated that people could purchase a Tesla car in Bitcoin. It’s understandable. Cryptocurrency isn’t just a currency, it’s an investment. Companies make more by accepting Bitcoin and then holding it. And that is the double-edged sword.
Right now, cryptocurrency is still a relatively new technology. Ask the average person how the blockchain works, they won’t know. They don’t understand how the treasury works, either, however; they just have faith that it does. Consequently, the barrier isn’t really “understanding” the new technology. Right now, the barrier is usability.
How does someone purchase a Bitcoin? How do they invest in Ethereum? How can they turn a Bitcoin into a cheeseburger — or Ethereum into the down payment of a house? It’s these questions that need to be answered by the crypto market moving forward.
How Crypto Currency is Already Disrupting the World
As with any currency, crypto has some good aspects and bad aspects.
First, let’s tackle the bad. Untraceable currency has led to the proliferation of scams (such as malware and ransomware attacks) and a huge underground drug purchasing community (the dark net). Because it’s both currency and investment, it’s volatile. Most people don’t want to wonder if a cheeseburger is worth $10 or $1600 every morning; Bitcoin’s swings are no longer that volatile, but they used to be. While $1 trillion is a large market cap, it’s nothing compared to say USD ($30 trillion). It’s easily influenced. A single tweet from Elon Musk can send it doubling its price.
But, there’s the good. Volatility means a lot of money can be made. And the untrace-ability of Bitcoin is it working as intended; the idea is that Bitcoin being untraceable essentially means that anyone can use it for anything, true economic freedom. Even those who are in areas where they have an autocratic or dangerous government can purchase things that are important but “contraband.” Ideally, globalizing currency will make it easier to trade and will make it less likely any one country, such as the US or China, can control trade.
Crypto currency has already significantly disrupted many markets. And it will continue to do so.
The More Things Change, the More Stay the Same – It Won’t Replace Fiat Currency
Most analytics believe that crypto will definitely disrupt currency, but it’s probably not going to replace it. “Bitcoin is way too volatile to be used as money. Imagine if you had taken out a mortgage worth $250,000 in Bitcoin last March; you’d owe the bank $2 million today.”, says Andrei Jikh.
“Personally I think we will see a wave of adaptation and adoption of this across the board until we reach a point, of it being widely accepted,” says Eric Spivak. It’s likely that crypto is going to become another payment method, alongside the currency of whatever country a person is in. But even as we move away from “cash” standards, crypto is not likely to get complete adoption.
There are some technical issues that need to be surmounted. People can “lose” their Bitcoin forever; there’s no “Bitcoin” bank that can guarantee them their currency. Because Bitcoin is untraceable, theft cannot be tracked or reversed. And because cryptocurrencies are deflationary, they are inherently volatile. No one will hold onto a dollar bill thinking it will be worth more in the future. But people will hold onto Bitcoin, which means they are extremely hesitant to liquidate and actually use their Bitcoin or Ethereum — thereby reducing usage and exposure.
Once Bitcoin starts to even out and adoption becomes more universal, the desire to keep hoards of wealth will change. But there will still be concerns relative to the technology itself that need to be addressed.
The Next Evolution of Crypto: Where Does It Go From Here?
Fern Murias points out, “Crypto has a long way to go in terms of usability, and in order to expedite widespread adoption, I think it is crucial to build a bridge to legacy payment systems.” Adding Bitcoin to ATMs, Cash App, and other payment apps is one step. But Bitcoin still has to be easier to use.
When people get used to using things such as Apple Pay (tapping their phones rather than using a credit card or cash), then Bitcoin can become virtually indistinguishable from paying with US dollars. There will still be issues of volatility, but people will find themselves using Bitcoin seamlessly; that’s when adoption will increase.
Cryptocurrencies aren’t necessarily required to disrupt the world currency standard. They can simply provide an alternative currency standard. When alternative currency standards are introduced into the mix, it becomes vastly less likely that global powers can influence the world markets — and more likely that people themselves can be in control of a decentralized currency network.
And whether cryptocurrencies remain a niche investment or become a powerful financial instrument, they aren’t going away. At Colure, the success of our agency is built upon the success of our clients. Contact Colure’s Mobile App Development team today to build your blockchain app. Let’s grow!
Mobile search has been transformed from a simple search of the Internet’s content to an index that includes downloadable mobile applications into the results. The evolution is called mobile app indexing. Although Google introduced app indexing in 2013, businesses are only now realizing the advantages it produces. The benefits of app indexing do not only pertain to businesses, but to the entire marketplace, especially mobile users. As the awareness and understanding of app indexing increases, the installation of apps by businesses and users will skyrocket.
In prior years, the results of a Google search (via a mobile device) would primarily be a list of recommended website links. Due to the introduction of app indexing, the results will now include suggested applications pertaining to the search terms. Just as users can click on and connect to a web page link, users can also launch the app directly from the results page if that app has been installed on the device prior to the search. However, if the app is not downloaded onto the device, there will be an option to install the app to receive the desired content. This addition opens up a whole new and innovative way of mobile searching.
If your business does not have an app, it may be smart to adopt one, if you have a valid need. If your business does have an app, make indexing a priority. Since the majority of businesses have not yet adopted app indexing, this act will immediately set you apart from the competition. Now is the best time to take advantage of the numerous opportunities and benefits mobile app indexing will generate for your business. Advantages of app indexing include an increase in customer loyalty, app installations, and user traffic. Additionally, your business will become more visible to the eye of the user through the presence of the app on the results page.
For mobile users, app indexing has created an improved and advanced search experience. The indexing of both websites and apps broadens search results. The expansion of search potential will result in an increase in the amount of useful information that can be utilized by the mobile user. Not only a development in marketing for businesses, app indexing is also a way for mobile users to access information more effectively and efficiently. To help you define your mobile app indexing experience, contact Colure’s project management team.
Personally identifiable information (PII) is any digital data that can locate, contact or identify a specific individual, either by itself or combined with other easily accessible information. It includes information that is linked to an individual through financial, medical, educational or employment records.
PII is considered sensitive information that can consist of information such as fingerprints, biometric data, names, telephone numbers, email addresses, passports or social security numbers to identify a certain person.
It does not include public information that is lawfully made available to the general public from federal, state, or local government record. It is up to federal agencies to safeguard personally identifiable and other sensitive information. It should only be accessed on a need-to-know basis and handled with care.
It is important to protect PII and even personal health information (PHI), which also contains certain aspects of PII that relate to the medical field. People are required to sign statements that specifically allow health care providers to access their records or share the information with a person of choice. The data can help when needed but can be dangerous when misused.
If a data breach were to occur, it can be devastating to a company and its employees. Not only would the loss of a reputation for the company be an issue, but also the thousands of people whose data was stolen would be at risk.
It goes without saying that PII data that is transmitted must be secure and encrypted so that outsiders of the organization or company cannot decipher it.
Object-based targeting allows companies to focus the content of an advertisement to match the content posted by a consumer. If you post pictures of dogs, this technology will marry canine-themed advertisements to appear in your social media.
With real-time social media playing such a big role in the lives of consumers, it was only a matter of time before somebody grabbed ahold of the reigns on real-time advertising. Snap Inc. took a big leap last year by patenting a new technology that will change real-time advertisements in a central way. The technology will allow advertisers to target Snapchat users in a uniquely personal way.
Snap Inc.’s object-based targeting will enable advertisers to promote their product based on the content that Snapchat user posts to their account. If a user snaps an image of a new pair of Nikes, they’re likely to see ads for footwear.
Snap Inc. has yet to enable the technology on Snapchat, but it’s expected that the new features will bring in a significant revenue increase and user growth. In fact, they made $1.2 Billion in 2018 — a big jump from the $59 million they made in 2015.
Consumers repeatedly respond more to image-based advertisements than to written content, so object-based targeting offers a way to speak the language of your consumer audience. Behind Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram are the top social media sites. Both of these rely almost completely on visual content. Not only is it more engaging, but visual content makes your advertisement more memorable. Research shows that when people listen to information, they’ll remember 10% of the information three days later. If that information is paired with a relevant image, they’ll remember 65% of the information three days later.
Snapchat’s new feature will mean that advertisements can be targeted even more specifically than they already are. Advertisers will be able to respond to users automatically and instantaneously, virtually serving up a user’s interests on a silver platter.
Colure Media is an advertising and marketing company in New York. We can increase targeting to reach your audience and brand awareness through marketing and advertising. If you are interested, then contact us now.
Cyber security is critical to your business. No matter your endeavor, the safety of your data is central to your success and security. At the heart of every business is data – passwords, financial transactions, employee data, and a host of other digital concerns. The protection you extend to this data is critical to your success.
October is National Cyber Security Awareness Month, organized by a joint effort between the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and the National Cyber Security Alliance. This alliance between private industry and the U.S. Government is celebrating its 16th year helping you protect your data.
Take a few moments to explore the issue of cyber security. StaySafeOnline.org coordinates many efforts to protect the digital concerns of individuals, small businesses, and large corporations. Simply put – if you have a computer, you are at risk. Anyone anywhere can be hacked. This group has created an extended list of free tools and resources for everyone to help define their individual risk assessment. Here is a technology checklist for your business’s cyber concerns. Examine your company’s digital resources, to become #CyberAware of your network’s security status.
The National Cyber Security Alliance has listed an extended series of events taking place around the globe during the month of October to discuss various aspects of cyber-security. Some of these events are virtual; others are physical. Take a look at this list to see if there are any events in your area that you may be able to attend.
We often use this space to discuss advertising or tech developments. This week, we felt we’d explore an issue that helps to define our security, our independence, and our freedom in the marketplace. If you cannot specifically define the security status of your system, you may not be aware of the actual nature of your exposure.
