McGuire’s Law

Danny Briere commented on yesterday’s post.  Among other things (Danny’s rarely at a loss for words ), Danny said “All of the things they announced — all of which are good, subject to comments below — are either already available or will be soon from competitors that have a bigger and bundled relationship with their customers.”

Somewhat to prove that point, one of the companies I met with today was Ace*Comm.  This week, the company announced Enterprise Patrol, which builds on their core Parent Patrol product platform.  As you’ve probably guessed, Parent Patrol is very similar to the “manage the danger” features of Disney’s offer that I described yesterday, and Enterprise Patrol extends those same capabilities to business customers, as I recommended need to happen.  Unlike the Disney approach, Ace*Comm’s solutions can operate with any handset, so teens can pick a cool handset and executives can pick a boring Blackberry…

Back in 1995 when I was part of an Internet startup, we had a saying “If you have a really good idea, chances are five other companies are already working on it.”  I’m starting to get the sense that the mobility space is now operating at that pace of innovation.

That and, oh yeah, Danny’s right again.

I’m at the CTIA conference this week and this morning I attended the official launch of the Disney MVNO.  By definition, this is a consumer-focused mobile offer, but I’ve got to say I was impressed.

I’d summarize it down to two key things Disney got right:

1. They understand that adoption of mobility requires both capturing the power and managing the danger.
2. They get it when it comes to the value of connectivity.

In introducing the service, Steve Wadsworth, the president of Disney’s Internet Group, laid out four unique features of the “Family Center” software built into every Disney Mobile phone:

• Family Monitor: Allows parents to set a monthly limit each month for how much each family member can use their phone for calling, texting, or other applications.  This feature also provides parents with reports on actual usage.  When a family member hits their limit, they can still make calls to other family members or 911, and both the over-extended kid and the parents get notified that they’ve hit the limit (which can then be extended if appropriate).
• Call Control: Allows parents to set the times when each family member can use their phone for each type of application.  Again, emergency calls can still be made during prohibited times.  Parents can also enter banned numbers that are blocked from either calling or being called for any given handset.
• Family Locator: Provides GPS-based mapping and address for any family member.
• Family Alert: A simplified way to connect with the entire family or any given family member.  Steve described it as even being simple enough for adults to figure out.

Clearly this offer has been designed to uniquely address the dangers that parents fear when giving their children a cell phone.  Will the kids run up the bills?  Will they be talking or texting when they’re in class or should be studying or should be sleeping?  Are they using the phones to stay connected with banned friends?

Just as importantly, this offer has been designed to capture the power that mobility brings to families – providing a sense of security of knowing where your kids are and being able to easily connect with the entire family no matter how dispersed everyone is.

And connecting the family together is a really big part of what Disney is hoping to accomplish with this offer.

As I said, businesses could learn a lot from Disney.

Compass Intelligence recently completed a study of 1600 business wireless decision makers.  Their most recent newsletter highlighted one of the key takeaways from this study – that 79% of those surveyed would seriously consider purchasing some sort of business-oriented community of interest service.

Those aspects of community of interest services that had the greatest appeal include:

• Making the company’s applications available for employees to access via a mobile device or PC: 42% would seriously consider buying this
• Making some of the company’s information available for employees to access via a mobile device: 39% would seriously consider
• Making it easy for employees to interact in real-time: 32% would seriously consider
• Doing each of the above for a network of employees and trading partners: 24%, 22%, and 19% respectively

Of course, at Sprint Nextel, we’ve understood this value for a long time.  Within certain segments of the business market (e.g. construction) our Nextel ReadyLink Push-to-Talk solution for easily connecting with co-workers and trading partners is so highly valued that it’s almost a competitive necessity in those industries.

As mobility gets built into more and more products, services, and processes, it will be critical for businesses (and their technology partners) to truly embrace this concept of connectivity and to capture this aspect of the power of mobility.  But it will be equally critical to ensure that the various dangers of mobility are being effectively managed.

Cord cutting is in the news this week.  Forrester Research has just released a report indicating that the percentage of cord-cutters has increased from 5% to 8% of U.S. mobile phone users.  These are people who have given up their home phone line because their mobile phone serves them better. 

Friday’s Wall Street Journal also pointed to a study by NPD Group indicating that 12% of U.S. cellphone users reported their mobile was their only phone.  Another 42% indicated that, although they still had a land-line phone, they used their cellphone most. 

What does this mean?  It means that, in American’s minds, mobility has clearly been built into how they use telephones.  When was the last time at home that you used a telephone with a cord attached to it?  Even if you’re still using a land-line at home, you’re probably using a cordless phone so you can carry on your conversation anywhere in the home (or even in the yard) that’s convenient for you.  The value of mobility is obvious, even within these limiting constraints.

So, why don’t more people take the next step and fully buy into mobility – why have only 8% (Forrester) or 12% (NPD) switched entirely to a mobile phone, which eliminates those constraints and basically makes your “home” phone available to you virtually 100% of the time?  Well, both research and logic tell us that the following factors all come into play:

• Signal strength/call quality inside the home may be lacking
• Multiple people in the home all share one fixed phone line
• If DSL is your preferred Internet connection, the phone company often requires you to buy fixed phone service to get a decent broadband rate
• Mobile phone minutes are generally more expensive than fixed phone minutes

Given these factors, it’s amazing that even 8% have cut the cord.  But many of these concerns are being addressed (e.g. see here and here).

To me, the more interesting question is why more businesses aren’t cutting the cord.  If anyone can appreciate the value of mobility, it should be businesses who can translate increased productivity, faster response times, and better access to information into measurable financial returns.

Network World recently reported on Ford Motor Company’s experience with 8,000 employees that had cut the cord.  Ford’s experiences have generally been positive.  The employees in the plan are highly mobile and they’ve responded very favorably to the change.  They work in collaborative teams that have taken full advantage of instant connectivity, wherever team-members happen to be (or at least almost – if you’ve seen the TV ads…)

However, Ford doesn’t plan on significantly expanding the program.  Specific issues raised in the article include lack of business-focused mobile devices, lack of wireless-wireline integration, and mobile services are still too consumer-focused.

Knowing that these are big areas of focus for the country’s largest wireless carriers (see here and here and here and here), I hope that more businesses will begin to realize the viability of a mobile device as the primary communications tool for their employees.

That doesn’t mean they will immediately cut the cord, but as that big old phone increasingly collects dust on the desktop, you never know…