Experience Matters

2008 Prediction: All Roads Do Not Lead To Rome.com

Over at my personal blog, I stated that if 2007 was the year of social media, that 2008 would be the year of mobile media. I was fortunate to have the post get lifted over at places like Adweek and a few prominent blogs—but in each write-up, while they played up the mobile device part of it, no one focused on this nugget which was buried in the post.

“The hub and spoke model of the Web where all roads lead to Rome.com is becoming obsolete.”

The reason why I’m calling this out as my contribution to “prediction week” here at Critical Mass, is that while I’m framing this as part of a discussion around “mobile experience”—what I’m really saying is that in 2008 we’ll see continued fragmentation in the digital space where people access distributed content + functionality on their terms. This could be a mobile device, it could be an aggregator, it could be through feeds and widgets. It may always not be on your Website. Why? Because chances are, you are already working on supporting the different ways people want to engage your brand. You realize it’s increasingly on their terms and not yours.

So my prediction is a simple one. More of the same you can say. It’s just that advances in mobile technology are helping to accelerate the process and making for a better “Web in your pocket” experience. And though many interactions may still happen through a browser—the roads that once lead to Rome.com may also lead to other digital cities, provinces and communities. Some call this phenomenon “networks”—which definitely do not resemble a centralized hub and spoke model.