Over the years, I've observed how communities have been disrupted with the introduction of improved technologies like the modern smartphone. For example: Apple, among other smartphone manufacturers, have had a profound influence on communities around the world. What I find enthralling is the opportunities these platforms provide not only the developer, but the user alike.
Entrepreneurs and developers stationed in the U.S are currently creating mobile applications that grant the ability to discover new restaurants or a local service, all from their very familiar, mobile smartphone. Some even reward the user for discovering the aforementioned. A prime example of this would be the service Foursquare: Upon check-in to a bar or newly discovered restaurant, the user is rewarded with badges. Multiple check-ins earn you more badges and if you become a regular, you get deemed the "mayor" of the restaurant, or local bar.
One question that came up whilst writing this essay was, do these applications possess the power to affect our habits and behavior over time? And if so, how?
My thoughts: Ever notice how most applications implement game mechanics to reward your actions? This sensation causes your brain to release a chemical stimulant called Dopamine. Every time you accomplish a goal via mobile application you feel a sense of accomplishment, right? Lets take a look at the social networking medium in regards to Instagram and Facebook. Almost everyone at some point is guilty of periodically (or perhaps even habitually) searching for a comment or like after posting a picture, status, update, whatever. Whether you're quietly muttering "I wonder if anyone liked the picture I uploaded on Instagram.." Or celebrating that shiny new like, by fully understanding how these mechanics influence our behavior and habits, we empower ourselves with the ability to practice applying these techniques in other areas of our life.
Take a look at a few web-based and mobile applications. Applications like FourSquare, Airbnb and Labortopia connect their users with people within the same community and other small businesses, restaurants, freelancers, etc. In return, these applications encourage exploring and discovery, and welcomes users to visit other communities. To reference a particular personal experience, I recall using Foursquare for a number of weeks. After accumulating hundreds of check-ins, I slowly started to realize how Foursquare brought my daily and otherwise normal, routine to light. I witnessed first hand how some aspects of life can become repetitive or even, dare I say, mundane.
In contrast, these platforms have figured out ways to reward you for using their services. This "risk and reward" type approach stimulates their customers emotions by rewarding their efforts. This delivers a fresh, new way to experience life and explore without fear or constraint. Prior, people had to explore their communities on their own and risk greatly impacted decision making. Whether it had been by walking, biking, or riding a car around town until finally spotting a restaurant, auto repair shop, local laundry, etc. The means of discovering these small businesses hasn't changed, but rather, the method of discovering this new business or service. However, some companies are still deploying old marketing tactics, such as mail marketing and TV ads to bring you to their business, but the best and most effective way of marketing remains, as most of us know, word of mouth.
In contrast, these platforms have figured out ways to reward you for using their services. This "risk and reward" type approach stimulates their customers emotions by rewarding their efforts. This delivers a fresh, new way to experience life and explore without fear or constraint. Prior, people had to explore their communities on their own and risk greatly impacted decision making. Whether it had been by walking, biking, or riding a car around town until finally spotting a restaurant, auto repair shop, local laundry, etc. The means of discovering these small businesses hasn't changed, but rather, the method of discovering this new business or service. However, some companies are still deploying old marketing tactics, such as mail marketing and TV ads to bring you to their business, but the best and most effective way of marketing remains, as most of us know, word of mouth.
Startup corporations like Groupon, Facebook, and Labortopia have deployed social marketing or, inbound marketing, to find new customers and aid existing customers in the discovery/connection of small businesses and people who provide their own services.
Most of the time, we ask our close friends and family to provide us with such information and we trust their judgement, but slowly these applications are changing the way we go about obtaining information from our social network and friends. As mentioned, The application ecosystem hasn't completely changed the way we discover or explore a new restaurant, but has added a new layer from the experienced.
Foursquare, Yelp, Google, and Apple have captured and continue to capture, an abundance of data from their users to analyze and search for certain patterns that would further help developers improve customer experience. This aided the introduction and appeal of the first iphone, which was then followed by Google's Android platform. These titans are responsible for the majority of the growth in the smartphone market. And they continue to contribute to this growing market, which has reached 1.038 billions units worldwide and continues to grow at a rapid rate yearly.
Entrepreneurs are capturing and using this information to recreate or, re-package, an age old idea: deliver simple experience. At the moment, services like Yelp, Uber, Airbnb, and other competing startups, are all disrupting old services like the yellow pages and restaurant review magazines (yeah, they exist) by reintroducing the services that were once absent of technological intervention . We witness it already happening with Amazon and Apple. Both have disrupted the standard of how books were sold and distributed. They have designed a compelling business model to sell books for a cheaper price and deliver this content via iPads or the Amazon hd tablets and kindles.
Netflix, on the other hand, has disrupted movie rental and offers their users a more compelling way to rent movies and stream content to their users. Brick and border businesses like Blockbuster and "mom n' pops" video rental have over the years, started disappearing overnight. Blockbuster and small businesses were too late to recognize the changes occurring around them. You can also witness the same scenario happening with companies like Comcast and Directv (among other content providers) which are worried and currently firing back with their own content delivery solutions.
Other startups are slowly disrupting other markets and outdated business models, by use of technologies already in the creation process by entrepreneurs. A handful of startups are creating interesting new markets like TaskRabbit and Airbnb. Other startups are creating similar ideas or entering the market in a slightly different manner than their competitors. This ripple effect, if you will, hasn't completely disrupted every market segment yet, but as technology keeps improving, smartphone access will become even more available to those around the world. Over time, we will experience a complete shift in technology.
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