Barriers to Entry

The perfect product/service needs to be simple, fulfill a need and easily be recognized as superior to others. What's the easiest thing to ensure when launching your product? Simplicity.

Simplicity is directly related to barriers for entry, which describe how much work one needs to do in order to effectively utilize said product or service. In essence, what do you give and what do you get out of it? Is the time investment worth the potential reward?

The clearest example of barriers for entry making or breaking a product can be demonstrated by comparing Twitter and Second Life.

Second Life: Create and live within a complex virtual world with limitless possibilities.

Twitter: Communicate in 140 characters or less.

Both communities were interesting, celebrated and utilized by media early adopters/evangelists. However, Twitter is surging forward while Second Life is slipping into irrelevance within the social space. Why? One did something with ruthless efficiency while the other allowed for limitless customization. Not everyone can get into managing another personality, but everyone can write a sentence.

So now that you are thinking "Great Stu, this is really really basic stuff, why should I care?"

Social Media is going mobile and it's going to launch into the stratosphere as a result.

It already has to a certain extent, but is currently limited to a small amount of phones within the United States. Overseas? The technology has existed for years and the techniques are far more refined then our own. So why hasn't a lot been done with mobile technology and social media? There actually has.

What will the relationship between mobile technology and social media mean? Lower barriers for entry. Greater marketing reach. New strategies, innovations and technology will all be created to manage the faster pace. Plus, we will all get to play with some really awesome toys.

What does this mean for your company and your current marketing/PR strategy? Speed just became a whole lot more important. Instant gratification, ruthlessly simple responses and the emergence of true autonomous mobile warriors. The rudimentary pieces for innovation are here already. We just have to figure out how to incorporate mobile media with social media.

You can be in the middle of the wild and Qik live video. You can tell your friends where you are at any given moment. You can even participate in a scavenger hunt.  It's a new way of doing things and thinking. It's instant media, not social media.