We caught up with Carol Barton of Mobile Muse, LMFF’s iPhone app partner, to chat about some of the recurring themes around technology, social media and innovation from the 2010 LMFF business events program.
Tell us a little about your background?
I spent the last decade in online community development for leading travel media companies Lonely Planet and BBC Worldwide.
I cut my teeth on the most challenged and challenging sectors of online; travel & publishing. User generated content, citizen journalism, rating, reviewing, the tyranny of transparency, content aggregation, crowd sourcing – you name it. Terrorism and natural disasters also played a huge role in changes to the business and humanitarian landscape. It was one of the most exciting, enlightening and exhausting periods of my career! During LMFF I sensed some in the fashion industry awakening to the prospect of a similar transition.
I now concentrate on mobile as it’s the fastest growing segment of online, with considerable opportunities.
There was quite a bit of talk about technology and social media. What’s your take?
LMFF did a great job of utilising blogs and micro blogging like Twitter, as well as social networks like Facebook. There’s such a passionate, invested community behind fashion and LMFF. That’s not something you can manufacture. Community respect is earned.
At an advanced level, social media is broader though and it’s also worth brands considering if their media, itself, is social. Are you still slapping a copyright clause over photos or are you adopting more of a ‘copyleft’ Creative Commons approach? Are you nurturing folksonomies – the communities’ way of describing and organising content? Have you opened up your content to allow users to mash it up in new and creative ways?
Authoritative content, married with the very best of user generated content and upcoming talent, is really the sweet spot. I agree with Paul Bennett’s comments about taking on a curatorial role. It’s still about quality over quantity.
LMFF produced an iPhone app. How did it go?
LMFF was the first fashion festival, globally, to produce its own iPhone app and should be commended for taking steps to explore ways of communicating on new and emerging platforms.
There’s now an Australian fashion presence in the burgeoning iTunes app store that didn’t exist previously. An alternate, global audience now has access to hundreds of established and up and coming Australian fashion designers. At the business seminar there was talk of small, iterative steps you can take to innovate – and that’s an example in action.
The app did very well and was recognised by Apple, who selected it to be featured in the app store promo spot. Of course there are always things to change and improve on, but LMFF are in a much better position to evolve their mobile strategy, based on learnings from this festival.
What are the advantages of mobile for retail?
There are 25 millions mobile phone subscriptions in Australia. That’s more than our population! The mobile market is growing at an alarming rate.
Mobile is much more personal. It tracks the behaviour of an individual, rather than that of a computer. It’s portable, it’s always on, it’s always with you.
The advent of smart phones with GPS and a compass allow you to start to bridge the gap between online and offline. If your mobile knows where you are, and knows where a store is, it can lead you straight there. If it knows what you’re looking for and what you like – even more powerful.
It’s not just about technology for technology’s sake. Rather than regurgitating your website for mobile (though many desperately need to make their websites optimised for mobile!), think about how a mobile may complement your communication and engagement strategy and at what touch points.
What developments are we likely to see in mobile?
It will be interesting to see what the mobile environment is like once 2011 LMFF comes around. There’s plenty brewing at the moment:
- Location and contextually aware services
- Augmented Reality – overlaying information onto the real world view you see through your camera view finder
- Greater use of m-commerce and alert systems
- Use of the mobile phone as a scanner, coupon and payment device
- Opportunities around the iPad, especially for magazines and catalogues
- Services for the mobile workforce, in the literal sense.
There are challenges of course; broadband costs, network speed and battery life. Location-aware services may also bring about certain privacy issues. We’ll also see new phones, more app ecosystems and large companies banding together to try to take market share away from Apple! It’s interesting times…
What’s next?
We’ll continue to update the app with designer profiles, their collections and stockist info to build out exposure for our designers and facilitate the connection between retailers and their consumers. The app may even morph into something else that is more relevant and practical for this post-festival phase.
We’re also working with more retailers and retail hubs to encourage them to build a presence on mobile.
Entry by Carol Barton, Mobile Muse visit www.mobile-muse.com.au
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