Digital Marketing and Web Strategy by Bob Hazlett | One Half Amazing! » apple

Have you been to an Apple store lately?

Bob Hazlett — Wed, 11 Jan 2012 11:09:01 +0000

The quote above is from a piece by Larry Downes about the downfall of Best Buy which was also covered by John Gruber of Daring Fireball. Gruber covers Apple related news and gives great insight on the industry. I’m a fan of both Apple and Gruber, but let me ask you this. Have you been to an Apple retail store lately? Recently the experience is not much better than Best Buy in my opinion.

The last few times I’ve tried to go to an Apple retail store, I’ve been met with a barage of customers waiting around for an employee to basically ~~hold their hand~~ reset their iPhone. You’re herded into a queue as soon as you enter and store employees no longer have time to get to know you or ask you about your needs. In my opinion, it’s difficult to experiment and test products anymore because all the popular products and accessories are packed into one main corner and the folks waiting around are usually fiddling on a device just to pass the time. I used to spend hours in their stores, but now I get easily frustrated and walk out. Maybe I’m just getting old and cranky. Pay attention next time you go to an Apple store and tell me if I’m way off base.

Have you been to an Apple store lately? is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

The Trojan horse hidden inside of Siri

Bob Hazlett — Thu, 13 Oct 2011 23:30:43 +0000

I had lunch the other day with the ever-brilliant Future Josh. I had some ideas that I wanted to run past him. When we get together though, the conversation invariably keeps coming back to Apple. We talked about my ideas, but mostly we floundered around all things iPhone 4S, Steve Jobs’ legacy and more.

Then he said something utterly futuristic about Siri, Apple’s voice-command software, and where he envisioned it going. Right now, on the surface it resembles a virtual personal assistant and note taker, but as we talked he unfolded how it could be more than just a helper application. Josh proceeded to eulogize that Siri was Apples decoy into Google’s search market. He believes that Apple is already making plans to fast forward what we consider basic search today. So instead of simple text searches, Apple could be positioning itself as a natural language search engine to compliment its array of products and essentially squeezing Google and Microsoft out of the picture. This idea is beyond the browser and is already made up of a large (and willing) audience.

As voice recognition and technology evolves, searches and commands could be seamless. Can you imagine a search engine that could actually sense your tone and factor such into its results? A more sophisticated example might be the day where you can ask Siri the temperature inside your house and then instruct it to increase or decrease the thermostat – all without picking up your device.

Apple won’t depend on advertising revenue to pull this off either since their model is different than Google’s. Apple creates services for its users to sell more products while Google on the other hand creates services to sell more ads. Bingo bango!

The Trojan horse hidden inside of Siri is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

An overview of all the new stuff that Apple introduced today

Bob Hazlett — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 18:33:00 +0000

Here’s your handy-dandy cheat sheet for all the cool stuff that Apple introduced today including new iPods, an update to the Apple TV and a new version of iTunes which incorporates a music social network. Click here for an overview of it all.

An overview of all the new stuff that Apple introduced today is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

Apple to stream live event to mass of nerds

Bob Hazlett — Wed, 01 Sep 2010 02:40:39 +0000

Steve Jobs was pretty pissed last time when all those damn bloggers kept taking down his precious wi-fi, so for their event tomorrow, they are finally opening up to the public and streaming the entire thing live on their home page. Finally, common folks can to sit at their desks and eat lunch while a man in a black turtle neck sells them things that he knows will be obsolete in 3 months.

All you need to check it out is a Mac running Safari, an iPhone or an iPad. Regular Windows nerds should call that one hipster friend that they secretly despise.

This Apple nerd is pulling for an update to the Apple TV (so I can finally get rid of satellite) and an update to iOS 4 for the iPad. I swear to God, if Steve mentions anything about a new iPhone, I’m going to go get $200 worth of quarters and shove them directly in his hard drive.

If you’re in the Central Time Zone, the event starts at 12 noon. You can view it at apple.com

Apple to stream live event to mass of nerds is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

iPhone 4 Details in 30 Seconds or Less

Bob Hazlett — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 19:25:14 +0000

Here are the details on iPhone 4

Better battery life, faster processor, sharper screen
Improved 5MP camera with flash
Shoot 720p HD video and edit right on your phone
Second front facing camera so you can video chat (only over wi-fi)
Updated operating system (available on June 21)
Pre-orders start June 15, due out on June 24
$199 for 16GB, $299 for 32GB

more details at Apple.com

iPhone 4 Details in 30 Seconds or Less is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

Question Of The Day

Bob Hazlett — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 09:39:02 +0000

If Google or Apple went out of business tomorrow, which one would you be more disappointed about? Discuss. Question Of The Day is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

Question Of The Day is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

How To Jailbreak Your iPad

Bob Hazlett — Thu, 06 May 2010 23:00:32 +0000

Jailbreaking Your iPad: How You Can and Why You Should

via Gizmodo

How To Jailbreak Your iPad is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

How to Alienate a Fanbase

Bob Hazlett — Sat, 01 May 2010 13:41:06 +0000

via The Brads

How to Alienate a Fanbase is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

2010 Digital Marketing Predictions in 140 Characters

Bob Hazlett — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 20:50:28 +0000

Everyone and their brother seem to be doing online marketing and social media predictions for 2010 so I thought I’d dust off my crystal ball and take a deep look into what I think the new year will hold. In the spirit of your sanity I kept each prediction to 140 characters or less (I thought this was a novel idea, but it looks like TrendSpotting beat me to it). Let’s hope these are better than last year.

My predictions

Everybody gets their own iPhone and mobile app. Sites like MotherApp, GameSalad and Swebapps make it too easy.
Apple, Facebook or Google will open up and allow publishers to do micro transactions across web with ID & buy digital content everywhere.
Google Nexus One phone = game changer. Google will disrupt wireless industry, create new business model for cell phones.
Buzzword of the year will be “experience.” Companies figure how to create engaging touches & inject customer love in every level/dept.
^^ above companies forced to create small hybrid groups of PR, Mkting, HR & Cust Service focused on set of clients rather than specific duty
Adwords gets a 2010 upgrade – smarter, better customer choice, maybe even image ads in results…gasp. Advertisers forced to get better.
Advertisers & Marketers will put QR codes everywhere – ads, websites, physical products. Objects will all be connected & enhance experience.
SEO gets disrupted because of personalized search and Google Caffeine. Folks who dominated will whine as they lose position.

Predictions from friends

@clayhebert - Consolidation, mainstream adoption, snake oil exposed, budgets shift from trad to digital, real experts valued & rewarded
@buckdaddy – Whrrl beat FourSqaure in location based social network. FTC rules will hurt 1 person badly like w music piracy. Available SM jobs will grow
@jtrigsby – Multiple feeds will converge and enable filtering to produce a more usable life stream of information. Some are doing it now, look for more
@skippytpe – Social games continue further into meat-space. Mobile media consumption continues to outstrip capacity. Revolution: there’s an app for that.
@jtrigsby – Number of followers will become less important than quality of friends. Numbers will still be important though, so maybe friend tiers?

Give me your thoughts/predictions/wishes in the comments below.

2010 Digital Marketing Predictions in 140 Characters is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!

Searching the App Store Just Got Much Easier

Bob Hazlett — Sat, 12 Sep 2009 19:55:54 +0000

Searching the App Store can be less than fruitful sometimes. Check out uQuery, the search engine that indexes all the apps for the iPhone.

Searching the App Store Just Got Much Easier is a post from Bob Hazlett, a digital marketer who writes at One Half Amazing!