Thursday, January 29, 2015

Innovative Logo Goes Viral for Sonos

Logos rarely go viral in a good way, but kudos to Sonos, a well-known wireless speaker company, for a new logo with a visual effect so hot that it's literally making waves in the digital space, per a Fast Company Design report by Mark Wilson. The logo radiates energy in a burst of lines that, when scrolled over, begin to vibrate as if emitting sound waves from the core. The "sound branding with a visual beat" captured the attention of the web tech pros of The Verge, who sent out a tweet that quickly went viral, notes Wilson. The logo is part of a rebranding effort meant to demonstrate the idea of "amplification," as Sonos seeks to reposition as an umbrella to cloud music services. The Sonos mobile app already manages other apps like Spotify and Pandora in concert, and the 2014 hiring of Microsoft's former head of Xbox, Marc Whitten, as Sonos chief product officer signals the company's ambitions. What makes the logo story more interesting is that the optical illusion was a "happy accident," according to its design team, who noted the animation effect during development and polished it. And the viral buzz came as a surprise to Sonos execs as well. "We didn’t know people were going to notice it so prominently," admitted Webb Blevins, vice president of brand design for Sonos, in the article. "We’ve done quite a bit of animation studies making that more prominent, but I thought, personally, it was going to go unnoticed." A happy marketing accident indeed! To see the new logo in action, go to
http://www.fastcodesign.com/3041367/sonoss-hot-new-viral-logo-was-a-happy-accident

Tuesday, January 27, 2015

U.S. Hispanic Market More Likely to Buy Via Mobile

U.S. Hispanic mobile users are more likely to make a mobile purchase than non-Hispanics, according to recent research reported by eMarketer. Nearly half of U.S. Internet users (48%) have never used their mobile device to make a purchase, per a 2014 survey by cloud commerce provider Avangate, but, of the 52% who are comfortable making mobile purchases, U.S. Hispanic consumers are more likely than their non-Hispanic counterparts to buy via smartphone or tablet. According to 2014 data from ThinkNow Research and Zpryme Research & Consulting, approximately half of U.S. Hispanic mobile buyers had purchased clothes, electronics, music or movie tickets within the past month. Non-Hispanic mobile buyers were significantly less likely to have made any of these purchases within the past 30 days. U.S. Hispanic mobile buyers also were more inclined to use their devices to research products; 53% of Hispanic mobile buyers looked for online product reviews on their smartphones and tablets, compared with 44% of non-Hispanics. And expert opinion counted more with Hispanic buyers. Overall, product ratings by experts are the second-most-utilized source when conducting research via smartphones and tablets. Some 36% of U.S. Hispanic mobile buyers searched for experts' advice, compared with 26% of non-Hispanics. For the complete eMarketer story, go to http://www.emarketer.com/Article/US-Hispanic-Mobile-Buyers-More-Inclined-Buy-Research-on-Device/1011528