Mobile Commerce: HUGE or tiny. Yes!

Two MediaPost articles caught my eye this morning. One on M-Commerce derided the minuscule $6 billion in sales that retailers can expect this year from mobile sales, and projected a paltry $31 billion by 2016. The other on SmartPhone data use, trumpeted that smartphones had almost doubled their data access over the last 12 months from 230 MB to 435 MB - and that's not counting tablets and e-readers.

On the face of it, those numbers don't seem to add up. While data use rises exponentially, mobile sales creep up arithmetically. You have to wonder if those two writers even speak to each other… until you notice that they are one in the same, Mark Walsh.

However, when you read further down in Mark's M-Commerce story, two paragraphs jump out at you:

Despite rising smartphone adoption and the burst to roll out new mobile payments, mobile "shopping" often isn't about buying. When consumers use their phones, it's usually to get product information or compare prices -- rather than actually completing a transaction. Shopping never ranks high on any list of Web activities.
Furthermore, retailers are not spending much to optimize their sites for mobile. They are also confused about the best way to approach the medium -- the mobile Web versus apps conundrum. While most retailers have not pursued apps, the potential for location-based services and other tools enabled by more sophisticated devices cannot be ignored.

So, it's not the technology or the adoption rate that is curtailing mobile commerce, but rather Retailers' inability to keep up with the technology. In fact, Marks writes, the "innovation is likely to drive paralysis" as retailers struggle to find vendors and partners who understand this rapidly changing landscape.

Part of the conundrum is that mobile commerce isn't as much about electronic purchasing as it is about in-store shopping. In lieu of those bygone days of knowledgeable human assistance, people use their phones to compare products and prices. Most retailers are singularly unprepared for the convergence of e-commerce and in-store interaction. And many consider their in-store and e-commerce (mainly web) departments as competition.

Ironically, in this economy, when retailers have the least time and money to spend straightening that out, those who spend the most, most wisely, will spring ahead of the others.

IMHO
Tony Nino
Pasadena Advertising Marketing Design

WINNNINGGGGG!

No, really. We won!

Pasadena Advertising Marketing and Design, working with Green Street Ads, has won a yearlong contract with the Orange County Transportation Authority (OCTA) to get people to give up riding alone in their cars. Our silent partner is of course the oil companies whose 4-bucks-plus for a gallon of gas is an excellent motivator to get solo drivers to strongly consider alternatives.

In the spirit of full disclosure, I admit I’ve been into alternative transportation for well over a decade. It all started off with riding my bike to work one day every week, then two days, then three, four and finally five. Now I get in between 60 and 100 miles every workweek depending on the weather and whether or not I have time to take a loop around the Rose Bowl. In addition to staying in shape and looking smashing in Spandex (as long as you keep your eyes closed). And I figure I’ve saved between $2,500 and $3,000 a year in gas. Those alone are not bad motivators.

For this contract, we are working together with fellow biker and long-time cigar buddy John Espinoza and his crew at Green Street Ads. We’ve worked together before on projects for Old Pasadena Management District and the Pasadena Department of Transportation. OCTA promises to be even more interesting. They have a great story – beginning with a wealth of alternatives to driving solo: Standard bus and rail services, a robust “Share the Ride” ridesharing database, a vanpool program, very efficient carpool matching services, employer transportation plans, and an extensive network of bike paths, lanes and routes. And they’re open to having fun.

Fun is good. Fun is a key ingredient to success in many media, but social media most of all.  With Facebook, Twitter, podcasts, blogs, and YouTube, the more fun, the more powerful the impact. If we make real fun an integral part of our events and promotions, that can play out in other media as well, and OCTA has set its sights on a broad media mix. We’ll be in traditional and electronic media ranging from print and broadcast to billboards and bus shelters, as well as in some pretty unconventional places. Drivers in Orange County are going to find our message in front of their eyes no matter who or where they are.

Our first meeting is July 1st.  Can’t wait.

Phil Sands – Yo! You wanna go diggin' in MY brain?

To call Phil Sands a character would elevate the definition of that word to dizzying heights. He's a force of nature. But when he was hit with an excruciating and debilitating headache, he bowed to his wife's wishes and got some serious imaging studies done, a CT scan, MRI and finally an angiogram. The doctors discovered an eight mm basilar tip aneurysm that not only caused his headache, but was in imminent danger of a crippling or deadly rupture. Suddenly, the worst headache of his life was the least of his problems.



But Phil was Brooklyn born and bred, and too hard headed to take anything or anyone at face value. He did his homework, and searched all over his adopted home town of Los Angeles to find the right place and the right people to make this problem go away for good. He checked out numerous hospitals. He grilled the doctors. He grilled the neurosurgeons, neuroradiologists, and their staffs. Only after he was completely satisfied that he had found the right place, did he decide to proceed.
Arun P. Amar M.D., from the USC Keck School of Medicine, explains how he and his Neurosurgical/neuroradiological team - Arun Amar, M.D., William Mack, M.D., and Medical Director, Donald Larsen, M.D., treated him using stenting and coil embolization. For all his bravado, Phil recognizes how close he was to disaster, and how much he owes to his wife, his family and friends and the doctor's and staff who became some of his biggest fans.
This is just one of thirteen videos: true stories of normal, healthy people whose everyday lives were suddenly shattered by catastrophic medical emergencies no one could predict or prepare for.  The patients themselves tell their stories of survival with the help of their doctors: the neurologists, neuroradiologists and neurosurgeons of the Keck School of Medicine at USC. 
This is the kind of information my wife and I wished we'd had when our daughter’s life was nearly ended by a brain hemorrhage in Scotland in 2007. We spent hours pouring over the Internet scouring all the information we could find on aneurysms and the treatment, coil embolization. Most of what we found was so arcane and technical that we could not truly grasp what was happening. We created these videos for people like us – people who need immediate answers, to urgent questions, in idioms they can easily understand.
With these videos at their fingertips, patients, friends and families dealing with life threatening neurological threats will finally have a place to turn for practical answers that they can understand.


These videos were conceived and produced by Tony Nino and Suzanne Marks at Pasadena Advertising Marketing Design.
The director and DP was James OKeeffe and the editor was Peter Bayer.

Stella Kuymjian, A Stolen Life, Restored

Stella Kuyumjian was a teenager when her brain short circuited sending her into waves of debilitating, paralyzing seizures. They call it "status epilepticus," a state of persistant seizure that can last up to an hour. It is always life threatening, but for Stella, it was the only life she knew for eleven years.



After 11 years of massive seizures, and countless rounds of frustrating, failed treatments, Stella was finally taken to USC Keck School of Medicine's Neurosurgical Unit. At USC, she was diagnosed by neurologist Christianne Heck, M.D., and her team of epileptologists as a candidate for surgical solution, a temporal lobectomy to correct her intractable grand mal seizures.
However her particular form of epilepsy would not yield easily. Her neurosurgeon, Charles Liu, M.D., was unable to pinpoint the site of the temporal scarring. In fact the epidermal electrodes were unable to even identify which side of the brain was causing the seizures. Before Dr. Liu could proceed, he first had to pin point the location using cranial sub dural electrodes, placed on the surface of the brain itself and construct a composite neuro navigation map of her temporal lobe.
Now after 11 years of persistent, life threatening grand mal seizures, Stella is seizure free. Finally she can begin to tell her story of this living nightmare. Doctors Keck and Liu, USC Keck School of Medicine, explain the dizzying array of complications surrounding her condition and the exacting procedures necessary to find her cure.
This is just one of thirteen videos: true stories of normal, healthy people whose everyday lives were suddenly shattered by catastrophic medical emergencies no one could predict or prepare for.  The patients themselves tell their stories of survival with the help of their doctors: the neurologists, neuroradiologists and neurosurgeons of the Keck School of Medicine at USC.
This is the kind of information my wife and I wished we'd had when our daughter’s life was nearly ended by a brain hemorrhage in Scotland in 2007. We spent hours pouring over the Internet scouring all the information we could find on aneurysms and the treatment, coil embolization. Most of what we found was so arcane and technical that we could not truly grasp what was happening. We created these videos for people like us – people who need immediate answers, to urgent questions, in idioms they can easily understand.
With these videos at their fingertips, patients, friends and families dealing with life threatening neurological threats will finally have a place to turn for practical answers that they can understand.

These videos were conceived and produced by Tony Nino and Suzanne Marks at Pasadena Advertising Marketing Design.
The director and DP was James OKeeffe and the editor was Peter Bayer.

The Story of Kelly Mitchell

Every expectant mother has doubts. Will she be a good mother? Will she make the same mistakes her mother made? How can she protect her baby from harm? Never do expectant mothers ask what happens if an undiscovered brain tumor threatens both her life and the life of her baby, or whom does she turn to for help.

Well into her seventh month, Kelly Mitchell began experiencing symptoms that were way beyond anything her mother had ever warned her about. Beyond the nausea, daily milkshake cravings, and frequent bathroom visits, she began to encounter severe memory lapses and loss of vision. After visiting numerous doctors and specialists, an MRI revealed a terrifying development. She had a Craniopharyngioma, a benign brain tumor that, while not cancerous, was approximately the size of an avocado. She desperately needed a craniotomy, an hours-long, open brain surgery that would threaten the life of her unborn baby.
In this video, Kelly tells the story of her journey through this terrifying time. She felt her memory slipping away and her vision fading with each passing day. Her neurosurgeon, Dr. Charles Liu, USC Keck School of Medicine, explains the issues surrounding the precise timing necessary for the Pterional Craniotomy to save the lives and quality of life for both mother and baby. Setting the exact date was crucial, and there was virtually no room for error. He worked closely with her OB GYN to determine the earliest possible date to deliver her baby, and leave enough time for  surgery before the ever-increasing pressure of the growing tumor caused irreparable brain damage. 
This is just one of thirteen videos: true stories of normal, healthy people whose everyday lives were suddenly shattered by catastrophic medical emergencies no one could predict or prepare for.  The patients themselves tell their stories of survival with the help of their doctors: the neurologists, neuroradiologists and neurosurgeons of the Keck School of Medicine at USC.
This is the kind of information my wife and I wished we'd had when our daughter’s life was nearly ended by a brain hemorrhage in Scotland in 2007. We spent hours pouring over the Internet scouring all the information we could find on aneurysms and the treatment, coil embolization. Most of what we found was so arcane and technical that we could not truly grasp what was happening. We created these videos for people like us – people who need immediate answers, to urgent questions, in idioms they can easily understand.
With these videos at their fingertips, patients, friends and families dealing with life threatening neurological threats will finally have a place to turn for practical answers that they can understand.
For more information contact USC Neurosurgery.

These videos were conceived and produced by Tony Nino and Suzanne Marks at Pasadena Advertising Marketing Design. The director and DP was James OKeeffe and the editor was Peter Bayer.

Attention Small Businesses

Under the general heading of "Important Safety Tip," this falls right under "Don't cross the streams."
According to the Center For Media Research, 37% of small businesses are not planning to survive this year, they are planning to GROW. And they're exploiting social media to do it.
Good strategy? Signs point to a definite "maybe." But we are seeing other signs that this might be the right time, including an AP analysis that shows a dramatic lowering of economic stress.
Not advising anything rash, just pointing out things that are going on.
Don't we live in interesting times?

COMING SOON: Thirteen Stories

It sounds just too, too theatrical.

Thirteen Stories
Everyday people face catastrophic attacks by invisible killers.

But that is exactly what we are about to post on YouTube. Except these horror stories aren’t epic cinematic attacks by aliens or terrorists or criminals or pod people, but simply normal people betrayed and under attack by their own bodies. A talented teenage girl has her budding singing career shattered by a mysterious and devastating, cerebral hemorrhage. A father collapses in front of his 3-year old daughter, the victim of a spinal tumor. Intractable epilepsy steals 11 years of life from an innocent young girl. An actress and writer has to face the imminent failure of her aneurysm treatment and subsequent loss of her language and memory.

Real survivors of life threatening conditions tell stories of that anyone can understand.

These are stories of normal, otherwise healthy people whose everyday lives were suddenly shattered by catastrophic attacks of conditions no one could predict or prepare for.  The patients themselves tell their stories of survival with the help of their doctors: the neurologists, neuroradiologists and neurosurgeons of the USC Keck School of Medicine.
The inspiration for this series was derived from my own family’s experience when our daughter (the actress and writer above) was struck down by a burst aneurysm in Scotland in 2007. The resulting hemorrhage devastated her Brocca’s area and robbed her of her speech and ability to read. At that time, her mother and I were so ignorant of what exactly an aneurysm was that we actually asked the surgeon over the phone if it was serious. He answered with an unequivocal “Yes!”  Nineteen hours later, we were by her bedside when she woke up from her 11-hour surgery in Edinburgh.
We spent hours pouring over the Internet scouring all the information we could find on aneurysms and the chosen treatment, coil embolization. Most of what we found was so arcane and technical that, even though we ourselves had long worked closely with doctors, we could not get a firm handle on the full implications of what was happening. We realized that if even we had trouble understanding, then there were an enormous number of others even more lost than we were. We set out to find a remedy for that.
In these videos, patients and doctors speak for themselves, in their own words, directly to other patients with similar conditions, and their friends and families.  Every situation is personal. The fears, hopes and emotions are raw and crystal clear. There’s no jargon, no obscure, unexplained medical terminology.  Viewers might not learn that a basilar tip aneurysm is a distal bifurcation of the basilar artery, but they’ll see how a man in searing pain and his family worked with a team of doctors to find a life saving treatment. 
With these videos at their fingertips, families dealing with life threatening neurological threats will finally have a place to turn for practical answers that they can understand.