Mobile search and location-based services @ chinwag live

Another week, another mobile event to write up - this one was an absolute blinder.  The event was hosted by Chinwag on the topic of "Mobile Search and Location Based Services" with a great mix of panelists from across the mobile internet industry and a great discussion.  If you missed this one there is another coming up soon on the topic of Mobile Social Networks on 11th November and also a workshop on mobile advertising and marketing on 6th November. 

Jo Rabin did a fantastic job of moderating the panel and made it look easy - note to moderators Jo's approach was to have a list of questions and go through each panelist in turn to get their view whilst managing interjections/ conversation as necessary.  Sounds simple but it's surprising how often panels descend into circular conversations and one or two people dominating the discussion - a bit of structure does wonders! 

Anyway, here's my notes:

Jo Rabin - Introductory Remarks

- location is coming of age but what form will it take on mobile, is google the be-all and end all of search?

- question is understanding user context is clearly much more important on mobile, is location the most important context information?

Peggy Anne Salz - MSearchGroove

- msearchgroove is a blog, research organisation, network totally dedicated to mobile search and brings together all different types of players, including operators, search engines, content providers, technology companies, media etc

- need to think about the distinction between horizontal search and vertical search on mobile - vertical search may be much more important than we realize on the mobile platform

Andrew Scott -Rummble

- rummble is a social discovery tool, which uses LBS heavily to provide relevant information

- mobile search has got to be quick, it's got to be personalized without that it's in trouble

Adrian Drury - The Cloud

- they provide wi-fi access for a wide range of devices, bundled with 02 for the iphone, have a lot of data on how people use services in particular locations

- currently engaging with agencies to provide LBS ads

 Chris Moisan - Taptu

- Taptu is a mobile super-social search engine, all our algorithms are based on social peraimaters, not page rank/ links, sharing really important to us

- also very interested in mobile social networks, which are driving a lot of traffic on mobile web (Ed - yeah this is true guys like mocospace, peperonity, itsmy.com are really killing it)

- big supporters of location but little bit cautious on it - more focused on high value, high frequency usage, which = entertainment and content on mobile at the moment

- location is a tough nut to crack across multiple markets

Felix Petersen - Plazes/ Nokia

- currently integrating plazes into Nokia maps, might be better to think about "context services" not just "location based services", other infor might be more relevant than latitude/ longtidude

- there is a real need to translate latitude / longitude into something meaningful

Jo Rabin - when people talk about mobile LBS they always give the example of finding a Starbucks, what do you think about that?

Peggy

- Andrew Grill has done a great blog about this - you don't necessarily need to know where Starbucks is, most people already can find Starbucks ok!

- context includes presence, what i am doing, makes it more relevant

- lot of evidence to show that the average user doesnt travel that much and knows their local area so what is on, what's happening, what's available is more important

- need to distinguish between search and navigation - finding a starbucks is navigation...

Andrew Scott

- Objective search (e.g. find me an ATM) - Google will always be best

- Subjective search needs to know what my friends, think, my preferences, personalization is key, i dont want 40-50 restaurants nearby i want to know the 3-4 good ones

- Nielsen say that the average web search takes 30 seconds, on mobile you've got even less time

The Cloud

- location is maybe the LAST segmentation you do after others e.g. user profile is first

- but interesting to target a particular audience, doing X, in a certain location, maybe more receptive

Taptu

- recreational behaviour very important for mobile search e.g. "im bored"

- search no longer about desktop model - new types of needs

Nokia/ Plazes

- Mobile maps will become a mainstream application

- we DO see people searching for starbucks on mapping applications

Jo Rabin - What about privacy and security in terms of location based services?

Nokia/ Plazes

- Privacy comes up all the time so have though this through a lot

- tracking vs publishing - people dont like tracking, but dont mind publishing their location/ checking in (they control it) e.g. geotag a photo or twitter is fine

- controlling location a nightmare to manage do you do it by personal relationship (tell these people, not those), Time (e.g. not after 8pm), kind of place ?

- a real challenge to turn controls into a workable model, make it managable, not too granular (in reality people ask for granular controls but dont use them)

Rummble

- we learnt from Rummble and previous startup Playtxt that people never use complicated settings (only 5% do)

- privacy a big red herring, GPS has done a lot to educate people (e.g. in car GPS) and is helping the transition to mobile location

The Cloud

- who owns geodata? the person who owns it is not necessarily the service provider to the consumer, lots of people moving into this area across the value chain

Peggy

- not so much about privacy, more about SPAM, that's the key concern

Jo Rabin - So what about business models?

Taptu

- local ads a nightmare, telesales based, high costs, touch to build internationally, maybe nokia or carriers could do it

Plazes

- huge potential, google is killing yellow pages, based on adwords, as soon as people are roaming with mobile devices, a lot of ad spend will go to mobile, geocoded ads - the self-serve model will work

Peggy

- Turkcell is doing really well with a proximity service which offers vouchers, other services that offer bargains, relevant info might work, also a link to inventory replenishment, supply chain management

Rummble

- dont need exact location for ads, proximity is fine, real challenge is building the scale to make it interesting to advertisers

The Cloud

- LBS advertising needs scale, scale and scale to work, before it can go to market

Right that's it - had drunk two pints of guinness by now so stopped taking notes on the discussion, which was also very interesting, will link to any other blogs that might pick up comments i may have missed. 

thanks to the organiser @deirdre for a great event - very well curated and one of the best i've been to for a while.  Shouts to @technokitten from Beep Marketing, @freecloud (i missed you maybe next time!) @justindavies from Ninetyten and Buddyping and Daniel - nice to see you again!

You can find some of the services mentioned in this post on mjelly - try them out and leave a comment or rate them if you like them:

Rummble on mjelly

Taptu on mjelly

Buddyping on mjelly

Comments

[Deirdre Molloy]

Wow, what a post! I've blogged the later bits http://snurl.com/4gp4y and the podcast is out next week. Listened to the master mp3 of it today, and you were right about it being good :)

[james (mjelly)]

thanks deirdre for putting it on - great event