Wearables are tiny technological devices. Even so, within the past few years they’ve become even smaller. According to a research study by IDC the smart wearables shipments will reach to 89.4% by 2019! This means that wearables will be more popular and the use of them more extended; similar to what happened with mobile phones. We will also consume content form raw data; therefore we will need to adapt the content in a user-friendly way. And not only the size of these devices is a special challenge for content providers. Luckily there are already quite a few smart solutions out there that aim to tackle the special requirements of a wearable device:
Spritz provides a solution that delivers “spritzed” text quickly. For example, the Redicle is a special display of single words up to 13 characters. The words flash on the screen one by one. The reader can consume books, articles, Web pages – any written text – more quickly. The text is delivered right where the person is already looking .There’s no lag time for reading because there are no eye movements, no pages, just fast-streaming text that is easily viewable on small screens.
News Republic is another company that wants to bring meaningful content to your wearables. It has already appeared on the first Samsung smart (what feels like a long time ago). Reports state that users not only browsed headlines from their wrist, but the majority actively read entire articles. Android Wear is a limited platform that is designed for customers to simply glance the screen. Thus becoming the primary way mobile readers discover news alerts. This trend lends itself perfectly to smartwatch applications. Wearables allow new alerts to become more immediate; while evolving to be more intimate because they are closer to the reader. This increased intimacy puts additional pressure on making sure the user gets the alerts they find the most important. The next innovation for news alerts should include smarter understanding of context by connecting the user to their location and interests.
Will advertisers and marketing companies ride the wearables wave? The answer is clear: Yes. One example of wearable marketing is with FiTAD. FiTAD delivers advertisers a curated audience who seek fitness & health content. They encourage engagement through fitness lovers’ passions by giving improving advice through use of mobile applications, sites, and wearable technology. precisiontap™ is the ad serving and publisher platform integrating fitness & health apps and mobile web sites into specific private exchanges. With an SDK for in-app advertising or ad tag provisioning for mobile web advertising, publishers gain access to complete monetization & analytics across all smartphone and tablet operating systems.
Another example is TapSense a mobile advertising exchange. The platform provides solutions for developers and brands to get started on the Apple Watch platform -including SDK for app developers and programmatic APIs for brands, agencies, and marketers. It provides an opportunity for brands and industry at large to get rid of banner ads. Instead, designers can innovate user experiences for increasingly intimate and miniature devices. The TapSense platform for Apple Watch delivers such experiences through convergence of Apple WatchKit and other mobile technologies.
If you are not yet freaked out by the capabilities of this kind of advertisement, you might be by the next one. Undertone, has tested pushing coupons for a candy bar to consumers just as they pass a candy display at a grocery store. Also company Freckle (thanks to their network of beacons) enables their location partners and application publishers to reach consumers in—and out—of the retail environment. This symbiotic relationship allows Freckle to attribute who was in or within proximity of a store and retarget them with relevant advertising, send them a notification or more passively to mine the data to provide insights on consumer behavior.
The question here is: Will we be bombarded by advertisements every time we look at our wearables? The answer once again is Yes. Revenue from ads that run on smartwatches is expected to jump to $68.6 million by 2019, from $1.5 million this year, according to Juniper Research. Although it’s a fraction of total digital advertising spending, the growth prospects have prompted many companies to work on wearable ads. Smartwatches let advertisers grab consumers’ attention immediately. Extra sensors that collect data such as the pulse, movements and even skin temperature could help marketers better target their ads. Advertisers could use smartwatches to gather valuable data and send more effective ads to larger screens….
