Ben Ball

BrainTrust Query: You Are Here ... Like It or Not

August 30, 2010

FROM RETAILWIRE:
A recent study by Forrester Research concluded that, while location-based services (LBS) are intriguing, they are still too small for major marketers to spend much time on. How aggressive should retailers be around investing in location-based services? What do you see as the next evolution of LBS?      [more...]

Both sides are right.

Forrester is reading the reality of what is today and what will likely continue to substantially be true in the future. But that doesn't mean a new social and technological craze isn't sweeping the country that is going to soon be reporting quadruple digit percentage increases in adoption.

This discussion reminds me very much of similar ones we had about the viability of Redbox in a world that was "clearly going VOD (video on demand) via streaming web services within the next two years." Those discussions were quite a few years and about 30,000 Redbox machines ago.

Clearly, for a time, there is a place for both. One will rise and the other will diminish in overall importance. The internet has not put newspapers out of business (yet, anyway). And magazines and books continue to be sold despite the web, Kindles and audio books downloads for MP3s. But the sales of physical newspapers, magazines and books are all on the decline.

The message for marketers is: don't run too fast, either to or away from any one approach. Some of the people are using some of the media all of the time. And all of the people are using some of the media some of the time. Our job is still to pick the best shots for our business.