The Tablet Marketing Meme is Spreading
April 3rd 2013 will mark the three year anniversary for the release of Apple’s iPad. In just three short years iPads have absolutely changed how people access the internet and consume digital information. Not only have iPads impacted the lives of consumers, but many different types of businesses around the world have also found iPads to be an extremely innovative new tool with many different uses. The success Apple has achieved has obviously lead to a number of other companies joining the tablet market. Now, a few months into 2013, we are starting to see tablets everywhere we go. Businesses all over the world are picking up on the idea of using tablets for marketing to consumers. The Tablet Marketing Meme is spreading…
Tablet Marketing Going Viral
When the four of us (the four Partners in OnSpot Social) got together to discuss the idea of creating OnSpot Social, one of our biggest assumptions was that the Tablet Marketing meme was still in its infancy (approximately 18 months ago), but that soon it would start to grow, and grow quickly. The reason we thought that Tablet Marketing would spread quickly is that once one business owner understood the power behind using tablets to engage customers at a physical location, and put up that first iPad kiosk in their store, other business owners, as well as, employees who work in the Marketing department at their companies would see it and jump on board. This “ideavirus” as the great Seth Godin would call it would simply spread from one organization to the next, all the while picking up speed, until virtually every business on the planet is using a tablet in some way, shape, or form to market to their customers.
Big Brands Are Talking About Tablet Marketing
We received an email today from a woman who heads up social media marketing for a large organic meat company. She wanted to purchase two subscriptions for OnSpot Social, so that she could use our app to build her brand’s email and social media community at events. She sent in the email asking to speak with someone as she had a quick question. When I got on the phone with her we got her question answered, she made the purchase, and then I asked her the most important question any startup business asks a new customer, “how did you hear about OnSpot Social?” Her response indicated to us that one of our other customers, who just so happens to be a large organic iced tea brand, told her about our app while they were at an event together.
What’s all of this mean? To us it means that we have two very big brands who have both realized the potential of Tablet Marketing. Not only are these, and other, big brands investing in Tablet Marketing, but they are helping to spread the Tablet Marketing meme to other big brands who they think can benefit from it too.
Tablet Marketing. There’s An App for That!
As part owner of a company who’s product is a Tablet Marketing app, it is extremely exciting to see the Tablet Marketing meme spreading. It was only 18 months ago now that OnSpot Social was just an idea. A few guys got together, saw what they thought was an emerging trend with the potential to completely change how businesses market to consumers in the real world, and decided to build a Tablet Marketing iPad application. At that point it was rare to see a tablet being used at a business. Some restaurants out in California were doing it. A few retail stores down in Miami and probably in New York, but other than that, using tablets to engage consumers while in-store, at events, on college campuses, etc. was simply not the norm. Fast forward 18 months and we are seeing tablets in so many different businesses. From big brands to mom and pop small businesses, Tablet Marketing is proving to be a very viable marketing strategy. With the pace at which this new trend is growing it will be really interesting to see where we are 18 months from now.
