The new iPhone has been announced and it’s finally offering the kind of services and functionality that make it an important tool for business rather than just a piece of cool tech-hand-candy for gadget lovers and iPod fans.

But it’s just another phone, surely? What difference can it make to my business?

We’ve looked at the specs and the functionality and we think it’s a pretty important device that in the long term WILL have a major impact on your digital approach to business….

Web Browsing

Okay first and foremost this is a tool for the mobile web, we’re not talking about a half-baked mobile web browser like Internet Explorer, this is a fully featured web browser that shows you exactly what your site looks like on a desktop machine. It’s a scaled down version of Apple’s Safari browser so 

if nothing else make sure your site works in Safari on a Mac or PC (there are a few peculiarities on sites built for Safari vs Internet Explorer and Firefox so get your web guys to check this out…or ask us to do it.) Our monthly stats the users who are using Safari on all platforms accounted for 195 visitors last month.

So What ? It’s just another phone, the stats for visitors to my site using an iPhone will be too small to care about !

Maybe at the outset but Apple are looking at selling 10 Million of these by year end which if they do will mean its the worlds most popular mobile phone, so if your site doesn’t work on it means you’re potentially losing business to this demographic.

GPS and Location Based Services (LBS) are going to be huge

We’ve been harking on about LBS services for years (ever since Matt did his MA on the subject back in 2001) and with the iPhone they are finally going to hit primetime. LBS is all about location aware contextual information; 

• an example would be when you’re walking down a street and your phone tells you information about the businesses you go past. 
• Obvious examples for making use of this include bars and restaurants; 
• less obvious examples include estate agents, property developments, insurance brokers or, in a non-urban environment, the wildlife around you (like the Mobile Explorer). 
• This takes your website away from the confines of an office/home environment and means re-thinking design and development for on-the-spot location relevant and contextual information.

It’s Got PUSH email.

Finally it’s taking on the Blackberry and Windows devices by featuring a proper business exchange supported email system - a well needed addition. Push email “pushes” email to the phone rather than requiring you to send and receive every so often. Your next email marketing campaign can be pushed when and where you want it to, so any call to action in your newsletter could be actioned by an iPhone user literally anywhere.

Web App Support

This is the stuff that excites us, create custom applications that appear as icons on the phone that are branded to your business, utilising RSS feeds you can get your organisations news on the phone in its own web app (like ours here), or a countdown app that generates a countdown device counting down to a specific product launch or event - the list here is endless..

Also, with support for video now allowing you to really showcase your work in a dynamic, exciting format there has never been a better time to produce really great video work - demand for video content is going through the roof thanks to sites like YouTube. 

Our showreel, for example, gets the most number of visits of any page on our site.

So the iPhone IS going to make a difference to your business. Even if you don’t buy one there will be people actively consuming your services using it so there’s never been a better time to look at your digital strategy. The web is now no longer just about your site on a PC - it’s about your site anywhere, at any time.

If you want more information on how we can help get your site iPhone ready or to read our research on Location Based Services then get in touch.