TOP 10 TRENDS
FOR WINNERS
IN MOBILE 2016

Every year we talk to our customers, partners, employees and analysts about the big trends for the coming year. We focus on things that will
have a real impact on organizations in terms of revenue generation, customer satisfaction and mobile investments. Therefore, most of the trends
are evolutionary rather than revolutionary.
Last year, the biggest discussions were about the explosion of enterprise apps, wearables and smartwatches, privacy, backend as a service
(BaaS) tools, beacons, user testing, small data vs. big data, securing mobile applications and mHealth. Not all trends were applicable to everyone,
but they generated a great debate about how mobility is impacting society and businesses.
This year, we've put ‘Customer First’ as a theme across most of the trends. With the speed of innovation in mobile including new smartphones,
operating system upgrades, wearables, software platforms and big data, we often forget about the user. In 2016, all organizations should put the
customer first in mobility whether it's consumers, employees or partners.
As usual, we've also attempted to provide practical recommendations and actions on what you can do to be a mobile leader in 2016.
Enjoy the trends and best of luck!
Welcome to the Mobile Trends of 2016

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PUTTING CUSTOMER EXPERIENCE FIRST
RE-INVENTING (NOT JUST MOBILIZING) YOUR BUSINESS
SECURITY AND PRIVACY HITTING THE BOARDROOM AGENDA
REAL SOLUTIONS BY THE INTERNET OF THINGS
OMNI-CHANNEL AND MOBILE PAYMENTS BREAKING THROUGH
ACCELERATING INNOVATION THROUGH PARTNERSHIPS
DEVELOPMENT TOOLS AND PLATFORMS EVOLVING RAPIDLY
MOBILE AD FORMATS CHANGING
PUTTING DATA INTO ACTION
WEARABLES FINDING THEIR PURPOSE
Top 10 Mobile Trends 2016

When IT advisors such as Forrester and Gartner highlight customer experience (CX) as
the top priority, you know it will be on the agenda of every boardroom. But isn’t customer
experience already top of mind for every product, marketing and IT organization you
might ask? Based on our experience the answer is “absolutely not.” Companies delivering
better customer experience and satisfaction have outperformed the S&P 500 by more
than 100% over the past 5 years according to the ACSI index.
The average organization has less than 1 in 100 employees with CX skills versus e.g.
eBay that has 1 in 4. Customer experience must be embedded in every part of the
organization including sales, customer service, development, product management,
marketing, administration and even finance to deliver great results. However, in most
organizations it’s limited to marketing and customer service. In 2016, customers will
demand one consistent cross-channel experience.
1. Putting Customer Experience First
“CIOs who get CX are the
heroes while others watch.”
Forrester

For most organizations the first step is to map out the customer journey. This starts with
getting a cross-functional team together to describe the customer touch points,
engagements and tools from first hearing about your company through purchasing
decision to getting the service/product, post-delivery feedback and returning
customers. With ‘customers’ we mean both external and internal users.
Next, identify the projects you already have ongoing, top areas to improve, benchmark
against other leaders in your space and put together an action plan/roadmap based on
priorities and feasibility.
Finally, continuously listen to your customers and measure progress through KPIs such
as net promoter score and customer satisfaction.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Putting Customer Experience First
FURTHER READING:
> Harnessing Mobility In Retail
WHITE PAPER
> Mobile Moments to Drive Retail Sales
WHITE PAPER
> How Mobile Can Transform Your In-Store
Shopping Experience
RESEARCH
EXAMPLES:
> CEMEX
> Fitness First

Enterprise mobility goes from “we need mobile device management (MDM), responsive
websites and mobile apps” to “we need a holistic mobility plan that will change the way
we do business.” Organizations are looking to transform their workforce by liberating
them from the desktop, re-engineering processes, reinventing products and creating
new business models. Examples of killer mobile solutions include field sales, field
services but also sensors collecting data that enable smarter decisions and
recommendations.
Very few organizations routinely think about how they can tweak business models to
find better, more efficient, greater value-creating business models from their existing
products and services.
2. Re-Inventing (Not Just Mobilizing) Your Business
“By 2020, 60% of existing processes
will be optimized for mobile.”
Gartner

Think about what you would do if you redesigned your business, product or service from
scratch today for mobile. Don’t just mobilize what you have. Look at the bigger business
opportunity of transforming your business through mobility. To reinvent products,
processes and business models look at the key drivers for each one including e.g.
changes in customer experience/behavior or improvements in quality and reliability,
pricing and offering, distribution and channels, productivity and efficiency. Use Customer
Experience First (see trend #1) as the starting point to identify problems and
opportunities in the interaction with your customers.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Re-Inventing (Not Just Mobilizing) Your Business
FURTHER READING:
> Don’t Mobilize Your Business - Reinvent It
BLOG POST
EXAMPLES:
> MCH (Art Basel)
> Virgin

With a constant flow of news about big corporations being hacked with serious damage
to shareholder value, security is high on the agenda for every CEO. More than a third of
UK cyber security pros say their companies were attacked in 2015. And the reported
intrusions are just the tip of the iceberg as at least 9 out of 10 cases are never reported.
The biggest threat to security, however, is usually your employees whether it’s
clumsiness (losing their mobile phone or laptop) or on purpose (revenge for losing their
job or not getting a raise).
What you can do is implement tools and processes to minimize risk. Therefore, there is
a growing demand for improved physical security, mobile device management, app
management, enhanced authentication, security testing and protection as well as
ongoing monitoring combining analytics with other monitoring tools. At the same time,
organizations are challenged by complex privacy regulation and balancing internal
demand for customer data versus customer privacy.
3. Security and Privacy Hitting the Boardroom Agenda
“The only truly secure system is one that is
powered off, cast in a block of concrete and
sealed in a lead-lined room with armed guards.”
Gene Spafford, Professor of Cybersecurity

Assume that you will be hacked and plan accordingly. Get your smartest people
together to analyze the risk and come up with a plan. Hire external auditors to test your
systems but also leverage employees and partners for security hackathons to find holes.
Make sure your security systems are not only secure but also user friendly as employees
will find workarounds that might create new risk and holes. Evaluate security monitoring
systems such as Splunk. Combine Dev Ops and Security team expertise to achieve
security aware application design.
Define your customer data and privacy approach. What data do you ask for? Do you use
social login for your users/customers? How do you protect your customers’ data?
Most people use the same passwords everywhere, exposing both the customer and
company. This is not a new problem but companies need to help their customers stay
safe, not just add tougher password requirements. For example this can mean double
authentication from new devices and locations or fingerprint biometrics for low-security
access such as bank balance or loyalty card.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Security and Privacy Hitting the Boardroom Agenda
FURTHER READING:
> Privacy in Pole Position
BLOG POST
> Can Someone Hack Your Banking App?
BLOG POST
> 5 Ways to Invest in Privacy in 2015
BLOG POST
EXAMPLES:
> Lloyds Bank
> WING

Did you attend an IoT conference in 2015? Most of them are honestly a waste of time.
We found more than 200 IoT software providers in 2015 and 4 out of 5 were solutions
looking for a problem to solve. Too many software and hardware products are
opportunistic attempts to do something in the IoT space rather than real products.
In parallel there is a real revolution that is happening in manufacturing, transportation
and the consumer space with IoT. Sensors collecting data are improving logistics,
production, product development, efficiency and user experience. Companies such as
Telit, SAP and Salesforce offer working solutions
for this. There is also a revolution happening in the consumer space with
connected devices led by Sonos and Nest and followed by thousands of
crowdfunded start-ups.
4. Real Solutions by the Internet of Things

The opportunity across industries is enormous, so monitor what others are doing and get
inspired by the best ideas. You don’t need to be an innovator to be successful.
Start with the problems you need to solve rather than an IT solution for IoT. Prioritize the
biggest opportunities and use rapid prototyping to test them in smaller pilots. Test, test,
test and then find the best scalable solution once you’ve figured out what you need.
Don’t let existing products, services and business models be a limitation when scoping
out your IoT and wearable opportunities. The most successful projects involve product
and service reinvention. If security is a blocker for 2-way communication, then start with
data collection which is more manageable.
For more inspiration, read our white paper on industrial IoT (see links).
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Real Solutions by the Internet of Things
FURTHER READING:
> How the Internet of Things Will Change Everything
WHITE PAPER
> How & Why the IoT is Transforming Manufacturing
WHITE PAPER
EXAMPLES:
Consumer space
> Sonos, Nest, Philips
Enterprise space
> CEMEX, London Heathrow, Tennant

Last year we talked about how other retailers and brands can replicate the success of
Starbucks by focusing on simplicity and loyalty. We also observed how Amazon got 50%
of their revenue from mobile at the end of the year. So why do other companies find this
so hard? Most commerce players simply took the existing desktop experience and
adapted it for mobile from the start. With the majority of online commerce now coming
from mobile devices we see a growing need to redesign the omni-channel user
experience including payments. It's not just about enabling Apple Pay, or other
payment services but also redesigning bottom up for mobile. The same thing applies
to the mobile commerce with mobile driving in-store sales as well as mobile
commerce sales. According to a recent survey by DMI, about 86% of customers are
willing to pay more for a better customer experience. Nearly 75% of millennials
surveyed indicated they’d purchase more from retail stores that offer great mobile in-
store shopping tools and over 80% of high income shoppers ($100K income) believe
they would improve the overall in-store shopping experience.
5. Omni-channel and Mobile Payments Breaking Through
“By 2017, 50% of all online
transactions will be from
mobile devices so get ready.”
DMI Research, 2015

Omni-channel needs to become business as usual for every retailer and customer
centricity needs to be at the center of all online businesses. Customers expect you to
speak to them with one voice across all channels with a single view of the customer.
Start by understanding what your customers want across the channels and interaction
points.
Don’t wait for the next big software upgrade to provide a better customer experience.
Take smaller steps to achieve what customers want on the front-end while you wait for
back-end solutions to be “omni-channel enabled.” Ask your business intelligence
analysts to report on multi-channel analytics such as mobile impact on in store,
conversion rates across channels and customer satisfaction scores of each channel.
Be careful about investing in digital store displays that will quickly become obsolete.
Customers prefer to speak to the store staff (with support from technology) or use their
own device.
Review your payment experience for mobile users, remove steps whenever possible and
replace your existing payment provider for mobile if they don’t live up to customer
experience expectations.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Omni-channel and Mobile Payments Breaking Through
FURTHER READING:
> Quick Guide to Mobile Payments
BLOG POST
> How Mobile Can Transform Your In-Store
Shopping Experience
RESEARCH
EXAMPLES:
> Shoe Carnival
> Target

The enterprise turns to APIs and partnerships to innovate. Big companies such as Bank of
America, Unilever, Coca Cola and Nike struggle to innovate by themselves. Therefore,
we see a growing trend in opening up internal APIs and partnering with companies of all
sizes to bring more innovation to your customers. Sometimes also referred to as front-
end integration, it allows new services to be created in less than a month’s time by
innovative partners without major investments in legacy systems once the APIs are up
and running.
6. Accelerating Innovation through Partnerships
“The API is actually the
driving force behind most
of the digital disruption.”
Mark O’Neill, Axway

Think about what others could do with the data, online services and capabilities from
your organization. Could they create new products and services that you can benefit
from? Can they innovate faster? Look at what you really do. Examine the business model
and infrastructure at your core.
Define an initial MVP plan and try hackathons and competitions for your employees and
partners to drive innovation. Start small. If the opportunity is big enough then set up a
team whose only objective is partnerships and monetization of your APIs.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Accelerating Innovation through Partnerships
FURTHER READING:
> Top 3 Tips to Accelerate Mobile Innovation
BLOG POST
> Innovation through Hackathons – A 3-Step Guide
PRESENTATION
EXAMPLES:
> Addison Lee
> Pernod Ricard

This year has been extremely exciting in terms of trends in software development
languages and tools. We saw (1) Objective C drop out of the top 10 as Swift is rapidly
growing; (2) Angular.js and Node.js continuing to grow in popularity; (3) Browser
performance improving, which means that web apps do better; (4) BaaS platforms
continuing to grow with Google and Amazon in the lead and with Microsoft catching up;
(5) NoSQL seemingly taking over from MySQL; (6) Microsoft Surface gaining traction in
the office which means that C#/.Net continues to play an important role.
For next year we believe that a mix of Java, Microsoft C#/.Net and Java script will
continue to dominate development generally and Swift taking over iOS entirely. Web
apps and app wrapping using PhoneGap/Cordova will make up the bulk of enterprise
application development with Xamarin as the fastest growing cross-platform tool
leaving the others behind. Native app development continues to be the first choice for
consumer apps.
7. Development Tools and Platforms Evolving Rapidly
“Web Apps vs. Native?
It’s complicated!”
Forbes

Don’t jump on the latest trends, but also don’t stay behind. Many developers like sticking
to the languages and tools they are familiar with as it gives them an edge. Make sure you
experiment and train people on the new tools that have now gone mainstream. New
programming languages and tools can provide short-term advantages in speed and cost,
but make sure to consider the long-term effects. Make sure you can find enough people
with skills on whatever platform you choose.
On the 5+ year old debate of web vs. native vs. hybrid, be scientific about your choice.
Check out our technology scorecard or use Gartner’s or Forrester’s guidelines. The
winning cross-platform development tools at the moment are PhoneGap and Xamarin,
but this will also change over time so make sure you stay informed. For consumer apps,
don't duplicate existing web functionality through native apps if it's already well
optimized. Even Apple now supports the use of webview where the user experience is
good.
Developers embedding a myriad of SDKs, APIs and tags in their services including
e. g. analytics, A/B Testing, push notifications, bug reporting, payments, content feeds,
advertising, attribution tracking, performance monitoring, social networks, translation and
customer service. Remember: reliability is degraded with the number of processes,
network calls and memory usage. Consolidate if you can!
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Development Tools and Platforms Evolving Rapidly
FURTHER READING:
> Scorecard for Choosing Mobile Technology
BLOG POST
> The Key to Successful Hybrid Apps
BLOG POST
> The Only Mobile App Cross-Platform Solution That Works
BLOG POST
EXAMPLES:
> CEMEX (hybrid)
> Warburtons (native)

Mobile ads still mostly suck despite bigger screens, better performance and improved
targeting. When was the last time you intentionally clicked on a banner ad on your
mobile? Probably not recently. With ad blockers, more ad dollars shifting to mobile and
differences in user behavior on mobile, it's time for change.
Companies that embrace the change such as Facebook, Google, Vice and Quartz are
growing despite ad blockers while others are seemingly struggling.
Mobile video advertising has now reached mass market penetration and delivers the
most engaging format on Facebook, Instagram and, of course, YouTube.
8. Mobile Ad Formats Changing
“Mobile ads suck.”
Steve Jobs, 2010

If you’re an advertiser, then make sure your media buyers understand and embrace the
changes that are happening. Offer great content or utility rather than selling people
something, make it location and context aware, encourage engagement/interaction, go
for quality rather than quantity and make sure the size is right for each device. Follow
new best practice and monitor your ad spend and ROI closely with a good attribution
platform.
Publishers need to work with their end users and the media buyers to find the right mix
of use of ad space, frequency, targeting and formats.
Ensure that mobile video is part of your marketing mix and experiment with more
engaging formats such as VR 360° recently launched by YouTube in partnership with
Samsung.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Mobile Ad Formats Changing
FURTHER READING:
> Geo-Targeted Mobile Ads: Creepy or Convenient?
BLOG POST
EXAMPLES:
> Quartz

For several years it’s been all about big data but the tide is changing. The focus for 2016
will be what we do with all the data. How do we make smarter recommendations? How
do we provide better customer service, better products, increased productivity and give
customers what they need?
Algorithms are of course nothing new in software development and analytics. The
difference, however, is that they will play a much bigger role in real-time service
monitoring, smart buildings and cities, smart cars, manufacturing, finance, healthcare
and home electronics where they learn through behavior and make better
recommendations and decisions than humans can.
Algorithms and smart machines have redefined how humans will interface with
technology in the coming years, according to Gartner and others and will be a hot
topic at IT conferences throughout 2016.
9. Putting Data Into Action
“We don’t have better algorithms.
We just have more data.”
Peter Norvig, Google

Analytics and big data tools are great to segment, analyze trends, measure effect of
multi-channel sales and campaigns and provide intelligence back to the business.
However, the next step is to experiment with and later commercialize implementations
where the data is leveraged through machine-based optimization leveraging artificial
intelligence and beautiful algorithms.
The incentives for getting this right are big - early movers should be able to speed up the
quality and pace of decision-making in a wide range of tactical and strategic areas and
gain new insights from analysis of unstructured data, such as e-mails between sales
representatives or social media discussions.
As with all new trends it will begin with understanding what data you have access to,
defining the desired outcome and testing, testing, testing. But before you even consider
smart algorithms and big data, make sure you get the basics right to understand your
customers and their behavior.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Putting Data Into Action
FURTHER READING:
> Leveraging Big Data, Big Time
BLOG POST
EXAMPLES:
> Tennant
> Victoria’s Secret

2015 was supposed to be the year of the smartwatch after a breakthrough year for
wearables in 2014. Apple Watch delivered on the high expectations, but smartwatches
have by no means reached mass market yet. Most wearables and smartwatches end up
in the drawer after 3-6 months showing that the demand is not there year. Market
penetration of actively used devices will be less than 10% in North America and Europe in
2016. In 2015 wearables apps were all about experimentation and PR.
Addison Lee and Uber got great PR from being first out on Apple Watch, but how
many people actually used them? There are success stories. Wearables have become
useful devices for health, safety and security in the workplace and at home. They are
being used by professional athletes and enthusiasts. 2016 will be all about delivering
great products to serve these niche target segments and for service providers to
deliver great services for these devices. Athena, a crowdfunding project on safety
jewelry for women, is a great example of this.
10. Wearables Finding Their Purpose

Make sure that you immerse your team with the latest devices including Apple Watch,
Fitbit Surge and Moto360. Think about what problems these devices can solve for your
company and customers. If you can’t, then don’t worry. You won’t be left behind unless
you work with athletics or healthcare.
If you work in spaces where there is real disruption happening in wearables then
experiment a lot. Make sure that your product serves a real need and doesn’t end up
with the sports wristband in the drawer. For companies in the health, beauty or pharma
space look at what wearables including patches can do for you. There are a lot of
exciting things happening in this space.
WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR YOU?
Wearables Finding Their Purpose
FURTHER READING:
> My First Date with the Apple Watch
BLOG POST
> Apple Watch - Flip or Flop?
BLOG POST
EXAMPLES:
> Addison Lee
> Lloyds Bank

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