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Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet Illustrations by Hannah Waldron Copyright 2016 Contently. All rights reserved. contently by Dillon Munro Baker2 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the InternetIntr oduction I. The Internet Today The device people The death of the open web and the rise of walled gardens Live-streaming and the Internet of Things The chat app alternative II. The Internet of 2020 The coming 5G revolution Virtual reality and alternative reality Even more platform consolidation 4 5 6 7 10 13 18 19 22 27 Table of Contents3 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet “ Websites are unnecessary vestiges of a time before there were better ways to find things to look at on your computer or your phone.” JOHN HERRMAN, THE AWL4 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet The commercial internet as we know it began 22 years ago when AT&T ran the first banner ad in Wireds online presence, then known as HotWired. For digital marketers, this is what advertising looked like for much of the internets early history: website display ads. Despite their questionable design and deceptive tactics, they worked by some measuresat least at first. The creator of the banner claims that first banner ad in HotWired had a 44 percent click-through rate (CTR). Today, marketing on the internet is much different. Banner ads still exist, but CTRs are far lower. A recent study by eMarketer put the average CTR for standard banner ads at a paltry 0.12 percent. Where ads are located and how they function have also changed rapidly. Ads optimized for mobile and social media are growing increasingly popular as powerful ad networks like Facebook prove to be a much more effective, data-driven solution for digital advertising. Meanwhile, new forms of digital marketing have sprung up at every turn. If you want to be a successful marketer, you need to understand the internet and all its mechanisms. But considering how rapidly the internet has evolved, this can feel like a fools errand. In fact, the internet may be undergoing the biggest disruption since the early days of AOL and Netscape, when that HotWired display ad twinkled like the first sign of an alien invasion. If marketers want to succeed, they need to understand how and whythe internet is changing. In this e-book, well dive into the current state of the internet, why its changing so fast, and what platforms will transform our everyday lives over the next four years as we approach the year 2020. Throughout, well keep an eye on understanding how content will flow through it all.Introduction5 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet For most of us, our first experience with the internet was with web browsers: Netscape, Internet Explorer, AOL, and so on. But the internet today is much more than web browsers. Its also your Facebook and Twitter app, your Apple Watch, and your refrigerator sending messages to your car (thanks, Internet of Things). Increasingly, instead of web browsers, those are the ways people experience the internet. In fact, 65 percent of all digital media is now consumed on mobile devices. This is particularly true for Facebook, whose mobile app is synonymous with the internet in some developing nations. At the World Economic Forum in Davos this year, Sheryl Sandberg, Facebooks chief operating officer, said that people in the developing world will often “walk into phone stores and say, I want Facebook.” Increasingly, Facebookand mobile apps in generalis how people experience the internet in the developed world as well. In 2014, more people accessed the internet through mobile apps than desktop computers for the first time ever, while Googles mobile usage passed desktop usage in 2015. So how did we get here? I. The Internet Today Nearly two-thirds of digital media is now being consumed on mobile devices.6 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet I. The Internet Today Tech products are known for lionizing, buzzword-ridden launches, and the iPhones introduction in 2007 was no exception. “Every once in a while a revolutionary product comes along that changes everything,” said Steve Jobs. “This is a revolution of the first order.” Wed heard this before. But this time, Jobs was right, and he nailed the reason why in four words: “internet in your pocket.” In a New York Review of Books article titled “We Are Hopelessly Hooked,” Jacob Weisberg captured just how quickly having the internet in our pockets has changed daily life: When you look at human history from a broader perspective, weve become what Weisberg calls a “device people” almost overnight. The results of this shift are still occurring, and entire industries are being shaken to their core. Our transformation into device people has happened with unprecedented suddenness. The first touchscreen-operated iPhones went on sale in June 2007, followed by the first Android- powered phones the following year. Smartphones went from 10 percent to 40 percent market penetration faster than any other consumer technology in history. In the United States, adoption hit 50 percent only three years ago. Yet today, not carrying a smartphone indicates eccentricity, social marginalization, or old age. Steve Jobs introducing the iPhone in 2007. THE DEVICE PEOPLE ”7 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet I. The Internet Today As mobile quickly began to take over the market, so too did social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram. Rather than surf the web, people increasingly visited individual apps. Facebook saw this trend immediately, shifting its attention and resources to its mobile app. Mobile is now the primary way people across the globe access the internet. More than half a billion people accessed Facebook solely through the mobile app in 2015, according to Facebook. Meanwhile, Facebooks Free Basics and Googles Project Loon are spreading across the globe with the goal of connecting underdeveloped countries to the internet, almost exclusively through mobile phones. Driving this trend is a battle royale between internet giants: Facebook vs. Google, Google vs. Apple, and so on. While Googles domain is the open web (in which search plays the role of navigator), Apple and Facebook have invested in an internet controlled by apps. The app-centric internet seems to be winningin 2015, 85 percent of the time users spent on their mobile devices was in apps. As Chris Mobile ads are driving Facebooks rapid increase in revenue. THE DEATH OF THE OPEN WEB AND THE RISE OF WALLED GARDENS8 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet I. The Internet Today | The death of the open web and the rise of walled gardens Anderson writes in a 2010 Wired feature called “The Web Is Dead. Long Live the Internet,” “As much as we love the open, unfettered Web, were abandoning it for simpler, sleeker services that just work.” As that 2010 Wired article suggests, media analysts have seen this change coming for a while. John Herrman, formerly of The Awl and now a fellow at The New York Times, wrote a series of articles called “Content Wars,“ which outline the implications of a consolidated, platform-centric internet. The most widely regarded of those articles is titled “The Next Internet Is TV.” In it, Herrman argues that the internet is increasingly taking the form of TV, in which users surf from “channel to channel.” In this case, the channels are platforms like Facebook and Snapchat. The subhead of the piece sums up his argument well: “Websites are unnecessary vestiges of a time before there were better ways to find things to look at on your computer or your phone.” This transformation accelerated in 2015 and 2016. Facebooks Instant Articles and native video player have begun to subsume news and video, respectively. Apple is getting into the news game with Apple News. Snapchats Discover works with publishers and brand partners to produce platform-exclusive content. Social media is the future of digital advertising.9 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet I. The Internet Today | The death of the open web and the rise of walled gardens Even Google has tried to adapt to the trend, releasing “accelerated mobile pages” in February in an attempt to match the speed and superior user experience of Facebook Instant Articles while sacrificing some of its commitment to a (relatively) open web. AMP is open to anyone (including brands). Google also introduced Posts in April, a product that allows select brands and publishers to publish directly to Googles search results. Instant Articles opened to everyone in April through a WordPress plug-in. Apple News opened to everyone in March. Facebook has been the main benefactor of this shift from the web to “walled-garden” platforms, as its growth in mobile revenue demonstrates. In general, the past five years have seen a massive shift from web display advertising to social media and mobile advertising. Facebooks revenue growth has been staggering, and its largely been driven by mobile. Its also part of a larger trend. Social network ad spending has risen dramatically in the past two years and is predicted to only grow more, according to eMarketer. Facebooks revenue growth is slowing down, but it still trumps that of all competitors.10 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet I. The Internet Today Live-streaming and the Internet of Things (IoT) are two concepts that have only begun to take hold. Live-streaming has been around for years, but could only scale recently with the spread of high-speed broadband and 4G. Now it seems like every tech company out there wants to get in on the live-streaming game. Amazon purchased Twitcha live-streaming platform that so far has largely been centered around video gamesback in 2014 for a cool $970 million, fighting off Yahoo and YouTube. As the competition suggests, many see live-streaming as the next big content format. Twitter bought mobile live-streaming app Periscope in January 2015 and integrated it into the Twitter app two months later. 2016 has seen Facebook push its Facebook Live product extensively, encouraging celebrities, media companies, and brands to take advantage of the live- streaming feature. Facebook has also forcefully pushed the product to its users, sending push notifications whenever a new stream is live. The New Y ork Times recently reported that Facebook Live is one of the companys highest-priority initiatives and a pet project of CEO Mark Zuckerberg. The rise of live-streaming, via Mary Meeker. LIVE-STREAMING AND THE INTERNET OF THINGS11 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet I. The Internet Today | Live-streaming and the Internet of Things Like many in the industry, Facebook sees live-streaming as a way to bring the excitement of live television to the internet and democratize it. Anyone with an iPhone and the Facebook app can be a live-stream star. So far, marketers experiments using Facebook Live have primarily revolved around events, Q&As, and tours. Whetherand howFacebook will integrate ads into live streams remains unknown, although some form of monetization seems inevitable. (There have been hints that a tip system similar to Twitchs is in the works). Marketers have been experimenting with Twitters Periscope as well. Kohls has had perhaps the most high-profile campaign so far, live-streaming the Academy Awards and an after-party with comedian Vanessa Beyer. GoPro live- streamed the Winter X Games, while Red Bull streamed a party with Lil Wayne at the Red Bull Guest House. While live-streaming has grown, so too has the Internet of Things. The IoT has plenty of detractors (the vapid name certainly doesnt help), but the industry is nevertheless gaining traction and expected to grow rapidly in the next four years. For those who dont live and breathe all things Silicon Valley, the IoT is the idea of connecting all devices to one another using the internet. At the moment, your phone, your laptop, and your wearable (if you have one) are connected to the internet, but the IoT promises to go far beyond that, connecting most every home appliance.12 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet I. The Internet Today | Live-streaming and the Internet of Things A few non-traditional IoT-enabled devices have been released so far, such as Googles Nest line of home products, which includes “smart” thermostats, fire alarms, and cameras. The idea is that all of our devices will communicate on the same network. With IoT, marketers are only scratching the surface of what may be possible. Retail stores, in particular, have been attempting to connect mobile phones to the shopping experience. Home Depot, for example, created an app that uses customers online shopping habits to customize their experience in brick-and-mortar stores. The result is an optimized route through the store for easy shopping. For marketers, more data is perhaps the biggest promise of the IoT . Since connected devices track peoples every move, marketers should be able to create detailed customer profiles. Creepy? Sure. But for the brands that opt in to the IoT lifestyleas Amazon, Google, and other tech giants are encouragingthe promise of optimized shopping and browsing could prove a boon for data-driven marketing. Sales and marketing are most likely to be disrupted by the IoT, according to technology executives. Retail is also primed for a drastic change because of the IoT.13 Media 2020: The Marketers Guide to the Present and Future of the Internet I. The Internet Today While closed platforms like Facebook continue to dominate, more private forms of communication have also taken hold of peoples attention. In China, the dominant internet platform is WeChat. In Japan, its Line. In Korea, its KakaoTalk. In fact, in most of the world, chat apps like WeChat, Line, KakaoTalk, and Facebook Messenger have begun demanding a significant amount of user attention. In the United States, the chat app trend has been slightly impeded by how inexpensive SMS messaging has been. (In many other countries, texting is more expensive, so free chat apps had an easy value to pitch to users.) Snapchat has so far been the most high-profile new challenger in the chat app space. It has cemented its place in the pantheon of Facebook, LinkedIn, Instagram, and Twitter as a “must-have” app, particularly among millennials. Chat apps are
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