WAN Amsterdam Conferences: thinking of mobile as an equally important platform

"You need to make a mobile site," said Ilicco Elia, Head of Mobile Europe at Reuters, at the 3rd World Digital Publishing Conference & Expo held in Amsterdam. He also said media organizations should begin thinking of mobile as an equally important platform, rather than as an isolated venture.

A number of newspapers have yet to even create a mobile edition, but Elia encouraged them to try to launch a basic version.

Take your regular website, strip it from its pictures, RSS feeds and every other bells and whistles but text.

Once the content is made available to users, then developers can begin implementing fancier features.

According to him, Reuters' current mobile site was initially designed to be as simple as possible, "so you can get what you want as quickly as you want."

But "First things first, get the content available on a mobile phone."

Relative to business opportunities, "You need to start thinking of mobile as a part of a much bigger platform," said Elia. "This as a package is worth more than the sum of each part."

He did warn publishers and editors not to expect generating substantial revenue through mobile, at least in the short term.

Source: Ilicco Elia, Head of Mobile Europe, Reuters - Photo credit: Emiel Muijderman