Sparrow Mail + Facebook Connect

I love these two screenshots from Sparrow's new iPhone app because they confirm a few threads that I routinely discuss / think about. The screenshots appear after app download and after your mail account is connected - you are prompted of course to connect the mail account with Facebook ("mail is much nicer with your friends' profile pictures!"): 1. First and foremost, Facebook should be considered an identity platform as much as it is a considered a social network. I firmly believe this.

2. Outsource to Facebook (and other major platforms) in areas where they do things better (ie identity, sharing) or where you gain advantage elsewhere (ie Facebook Connect + mail account = superior data / future functionalities).

3. Mail still needs to be rethought and Sparrow gives it an interesting twist.

4. Facebook should play a bigger role in email 2.0.

Yet Another Reminder of Amazon & Kindle's Importance: Proliferation

Reminder yet again that Amazon and Kindle are important parts of the mobile, cloud, content and application universe... these are the registered Kindle devices to my family: it's a combination of devices, platforms, formats, etc. More and more I am using Kindle like Evernote (one of my daily, most-used applications): I forward important documents to my personal Kindle emails. It's great. And for some use cases, its the equivalent of Evernote or iCloud.

And like Evernote - the content is accessible anywhere, nearly instantly. I love the email component of it and think that personalized emails as a content direction / entry mechanism are underutilized - Evernote and Tripit are examples of products that (for me) are most useful through email.

Social, Mobile Web as highlighted by Salesforce

Below are three charts from a longer SalesForce presentation that recently appeared on Business Insider. I wanted to quickly highlight these three charts because they highlight three (very high level) themes I regularly think about and talk about: 1. The future of the web is social (social eats the web)

2. The future web is mobile - not browser-based (next generation devices)

3. Communication is changing: from email to social and mobile - sms, notifications, etc (social networking surpasses email)

The Phone as an Extension

Square: an attachable payments mechanism. PayPal's Square competitor.

The Mophie: a removable juice pack that fits atop the iPhone like an ordinary sleeve. It's a must have for travelers (and got a great TechCrunch write up).

iCache's Geode: an attachable, secure wallet for your iPhone. Remarkably cool.

What's the similarity here? There is a great innovation occurring both at the app level and, more recently, at the device / peripheral level. It's yet another reminder that the future of the web consumption is mobile and companies are racing to improve the phone itself (ie battery) or extend its definition (ie square into a register / payment terminal and Geode into a wallet).

Image credit: USAToday.com

Do More Than Display Tweets, Facebook Posts - Drive Engagement.

I nitpick design... and it's certainly not because I am a designer or artistically talented; rather, it's because I often struggle with the balance of aesthetics and functionality / efficacy. Great example here from The New Inquiry. Gorgeous page header with an integrated tweet directly below. It is visually very clean and looks as though it is part of the core site / design. Even the right sidebar is good looking: Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and email icons all integrated and locked into the sidebar (and a nice hover-state animation).

So my nitpick: that tweet is great, but: what's the point? It's more than displaying dynamic content... it's to build an audience and engage. Therefore, the most important part is a having a follow button - or an in-line reply / retweet function. So while this looks beautiful - it's a reminder that functionality is ultimately at least equally important... and every pixel should work for you - in this case, drive engagement.

Location Targeted Facebook Posts

One of the most effective aspects of Facebook's advertising platform is the ability to target users by demographic, geography and even "likes". Advertisers have become quite efficient at crafting and targeting campaigns for these parameters. Some of those targeting tools are available to Facebook Page owners as well... but it isn't as widely known / utilized. Here is an example: I posted to @dogpatchlabs an upcoming event hosted by Recurly (a Dogpatch graduate). The event is based at their San Francisco headquarters... so Facebook gives me the option of sharing that post only with local fans.

This is quite powerful - particularly for brands with huge followings (ie the NBA and local games / highlights, Art.com with local art, etc).

And as Facebook continues to evaluate engagement rates as the core element of Edge Rank, this is a chance to make sure you are effectively connecting with your audience.

"The article, first published on the SI.com iPad application late Tuesday night..."

This cracks me up: ESPN (who has been criticized for not generously citing sources in the past) ran a front page article on UCLA's troubled basketball team. In citing the source as Sports Illustrated, ESPN strangely noted: "The article, first published on the SI.com iPad application late Tuesday night..."

I find it fascinating:

1. this was called out by ESPN ... why?

2. Sports Illustrated published the article to the iPad before the website... and both before the magazine. It clearly was an attempt to push the iPad app / subscription... which seems to be working (#1 in Sports over last week) but doesn't seem nearly as strategic as launching the article on SI.com.

Siri and Twitter (Facebook and more)

As I have tweeted a few times over the last couple weeks, Siri is a better product in theory than in practice: 'she' simply is too inconsistent and too time intensive to really be worthwhile. The only pieces I find myself regularly using Siri for are sending text messages and location-based searches.

Because Siri does a good job sending SMS's, I figured I'd try sending a Tweet... after all, Twitter is fully integrated into Apple's iOS5. It should work, right? Strangely, it doesn't... and it's a big opportunity for Twitter and Apple. And why not also work with Facebook and other core applications? Or allow those core applications to develop atop / into Siri?

By the way: if you really want to update Twitter (or Facebook) via Siri, you can make it work via some clever workarounds.