MPH Digital Consulting – Page 2 – Working Online In The Twin Cities Since 1995

Your Phone Knows An Uncomfortable Amount About You

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date June 24, 2019

In our previous post we discussed how cell carriers, Google, Facebook and others seem to know things by using your phone’s location.

All of this seemingly stops when you ‘turn off location,’ but who does that? And your phone still pings a cell tower every so often, so is it really off?

On the other hand, you do actually, literally need the driving directions spoken to you.

You do really want your search to automatically be ‘near me.’

Now, the last layer … because your phone goes with you everywhere, and likely has the location on, your phone knows where you go, too.

Digital Business

How Do They Know That?

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date June 12, 2019

Ever wonder how Google Maps knows how fast traffic is going? Or how you see an ad for takeout pizza?

Believe it or not, they are related and there is a way you can leverage this same ability.

Your phone knows where it is and passes that information along to your carrier (Verizon? Sprint? T-Mobile?) and also to any app to which you’ve given permission to track your location (Facebook? Google? Instagram? Gmail? Angry Birds? That photo app you use?).

Back to the traffic … Google Maps tracks where your phone is at all times, so it knows how fast your phone is traveling. Google Maps overlays the speed limit on I-494, tracks phones and sees where persistent slowdowns occur.

Complex but simple.

That is the Macro example.

Digital Business

Your Site Is Fine On A Phone, Right?

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date May 12, 2019

Your business web site may be exactly what you want it to be and if it isn’t broken why fix it, right?

However, in today’s mobile world your site may still look great on your computer, but check it on a phone and see how it stacks up against the sites you use on our phone every day.

Makes a difference, right? And it does in more ways than just looking nice on a phone. Here are other reasons:

— Google now penalizes sites that aren’t ‘responsive’ to a phone … Google simply doesn’t send mobile search traffic to the site.

Direct To Consumer

Google Maps Is More Than You Think

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date February 4, 2019

Another ‘golden rule’ of the digital experience is if you are doing something you think is clever and extremely useful, so are millions of other people.

Really.

Take Google Maps. I use Google Maps to get satellite images of locations in movies or that I read or hear about. I zoom in and use Street View to see what the neighborhood looks like.

When Street View isn’t available for the location I’m disappointed.

I also use Google Maps like everyone else … type in an address, click “Navigate Me” and have ‘the lady in the phone’ take me where I want to go. Don’t even need to know what direction I’m facing!

Brick And Mortar

New Behavior Driving Brick-And-Mortar Consumers

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date December 9, 2018

You don’t need to own a brick-and-mortar business to understand the consumer behavior that is driving customers these days. You do this behavior yourself.

Like this:

— You are in a part of the cities you don’t know well

— A ‘hangry’ mood is in the car

— You pull out your phone and search Safari, Chrome or Maps

— Find one close, click it and either call or get directions spoken to you

Right? Or this:

— Your lawn mower won’t start

Digital Business

Small Business Digital Management

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date October 6, 2018

Today’s small business owners — particularly direct-to-consumer businesses — are faced with a new, unfolding risk to the health of their company.

The risk rises from the intersection of mobile phones and the Internet.

Word-of-mouth and referrals likely remain key sources of new business, but a growing business is finding new customers independent of a business’ good name.

Those customers are found at the intersection of the mobile phone and the Internet.

They are there researching a problem or seeking a solution … they are looking for the service you offer but don’t know who you are.

Security

Your ‘Business Digital Platform’ Awaits

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date August 12, 2018

Think of Internet security and most think of ‘firewalls’ and passwords.

For a business owner that is true, too, but mix in a website, online ad accounts, email, a web hosting service, social media and employee email accounts.

There is an unfolding part of a modern small business that is permeating all direct-to-consumer companies … maintaining and cultivating a ‘digital presence.’

That means that your customers are using more devices to access the Internet more often, in more ways and for more reasons.

This behavior is expanding exponentially and has become ingrained, to some degree, in the everyday life of all of us. That means a small business looking for new customers needs to be there, too.

This new part of a business isn’t solved with a piece of equipment or a one-time spend soon forgotten.

Direct To Consumer

New Digital Success: Attracting And Converting Prospects

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date July 5, 2018

Used to be a website is what kept you ahead of your competitors. Then it was a newly designed website. Now, are you wondering what is next?

Mobile phones and other new devices are pushing digital change faster, taking more of the time and attention of your customers. You need to be where your customers are now and where more of them are headed.

Accessing the new digital environment where customers are spending more time researching, following and learning is where smart business owners want to be.

But, how to get there?

Direct To Consumer

The New Yellow Pages

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date April 29, 2018

If you owned a consumer-facing business in the 1980s the Yellow Pages is where you had to be, or so I am told. Including by several clients now working hard to extricate themselves from those contracts.

Local versions were delivered to homes and business across the country. A mainstay for homeowners, the book was an in-home advertising resource like none before, right? ‘Brick and mortar’ businesses that rely on people calling and walking through the door competed for space in ‘the book.’

Well, obviously, those days are long gone. Disappeared.

First it was bulky computers and cathode-ray monitors with access to ‘the Internet’ in the late 1980s. Then it busted wide open when Netscape released the first ‘browser” and “www” entered the lexicon in the mid-1990s.

Brick And Mortar

Is Your Business Effective In The Mobile Marketplace?

Post author By Parker Hodges
Post date March 15, 2018

As someone who watches and reports on website analytics for dozens of companies I can tell you that mobile web traffic is likely at the start of a ‘hockey stick’ of growth.

But you don’t need me to tell you anything about the growth of mobile traffic. Just think of yourself, your family or anyone of nearly any age in any waiting room anywhere.

Heck, think of yourself as you are watching television. Thumbing through your phone, right? As are nearly all of those people in all those waiting rooms.