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Hey Siri, download Cortana to my iPhone later today, would you?
Microsoft has been offering the iOS version of its intelligent assistant Cortana as a small-scale beta since last month, and it’s now ready to go live. Cortana is available on the App Store now.
Don’t expect it to match Siri for functionality, however – with Siri deeply embedded into iOS and Cortana a mere app, it will have limited capabilities, but you can at least see how it compares when it comes to answering questions …
You’ll need to be running iOS 8 or later, and it will initially be available only in the U.S. and China.
Siri in the meantime just learned a new trick: as of yesterday, it can play Apple Music on the new Apple TV.
Photo: Windows Central
Filed under: Apps Tagged: Cortana, Cortana for iPhone, Cortana iPhone, Siri
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Is Ecommerce to Blame for Black Friday’s Slow Demise?
With Black Friday totals down from last year, according to a survey by Nielsen, and total sales for the day slipping more and more each year, is it safe to say that the biggest shopping day of the year is losing its luster?
Sure, Black Friday sales topped out at around $10.4 billion, but that’s down almost 10% from last year’s $11.6 billion. There are quite a few possibilities for the decline, with many shouting that opening on Thanksgiving will harm Black Friday sales. However, Thanksgiving sales were also down by 10%. One of the reasons for that might be the number of stores that decided not to participate in Thanksgiving sales this year, but it still couldn’t account for such a large drop in sales.
Enter Cyber Monday
Reports for Cyber Monday show a total of $3 billion in sales, which is up almost 16% from last year. Quite a few different factors were involved in this unprecedented rise. First, Cyber Monday sales were offered just after the Black Friday buying frenzy, with some of the first deals available Saturday. Brick-and-mortar stores with an online presence even offered their Black Friday deals online before they were available in the stores.
There were also delivery methods that made online shopping easier than ever. Amazon Prime provides two-day shipping, but they’ve topped themselves with Amazon Prime Now. Buyers can order online and receive their purchase in an hour or two. That kind of instant gratification is what most store shoppers are looking for. If they can enjoy the immediate ownership without leaving their homes, why would they go to a store?
Target partnered with Curbside, which allows buyers to order online and pick up at the store. Even better, they don’t have to get out of the car. Shoppers who prefer spending while wearing PJs can get a lot of mileage out of that kind of service. Since it’s available to more than just Target, we can expect to see more pick-up orders in the future.
The Mobile Shopper
One of the big reasons for the uptick in online sales is the overall ease with which buyers can browse and purchase on mobile devices. Thanksgiving sales reached $639 million from mobile devices. This may be the result of sheer boredom after everyone in the family fell into a turkey coma. The next day, Black Friday, sales hit $905 million from phones and tablets.
Of the more than $3 billion in online sales during Cyber Monday, 26% were from mobile devices. That’s a record-breaking $799 million in sales from phones and tablets. Whether those sales came from ecommerce sites, social media buttons, or mobile apps, the message is still the same: companies without mobile friendly shopping options are missing out.
While ecommerce and mcommerce certainly didn’t outstrip store sales this year, it is clear that online shopping is growing while in-store shopping has declined. Is this the beginning of the end of Black Friday, or will retailers find a way to incorporate multichannel marketing and sales for a streamlined experience? We think that’s the way to go.
Aurora HDR adds OS X Photos plug-in support, extreme noise reduction, free Pro bonuses
Aurora HDR, the Mac App Store Editors’ Choice-winning high-dynamic range (HDR) photography tool, is receiving significant updates ahead of the holidays. Released last month by Macphun and leading HDR photographer Trey Ratcliff, Aurora HDR automatically and intelligently merges multiple exposures of an image together, radically expanding details in light, shadowed, and colorful portions of the photo. It comes in basic (regularly $49.99) and Pro ($99) versions, the latter with a free trial.
Working directly with Apple, Macphun is adding OS X Photos plug-in support to version 1.1.1 of the app, enabling multiple images to be grabbed directly from the Photos library. Also added since the initial 1.0 release are new “realistic” HDR presets, a “super smooth” control that provides “extreme noise reduction,” and a faster, superior tone-mapping algorithm. Users of the Pro app can access many of the new features in version 1.1.0, out now, while the Mac App Store version will receive the update over the next week or so.
Aurora HDR’s Mac App Store version is currently discounted from $49.99 to $39.99, while the Pro version is offered directly through Macphun for $99. The Pro version currently includes a free bonus package worth $135, including the impressive noise reduction app Noiseless CK (reviewed here). Additionally, Macphun’s superb $150 six-app photo editing bundle, Creative Kit 2016 (reviewed here), is currently available at a discounted price of $99.99, including a collection of exclusive holiday gifts.
Filed under: Apps Tagged: Aurora HDR, Noise reduction, OS X Photos, photos, Plug-ins
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djay Pro lands on the iPad with Split View, tons of keyboard shortcuts, 4 track support, much more
A year ago Algoriddim introduced djay Pro to Mac, the professional version of the company’s highly popular DJ software that ever beginners can love, and today djay Pro is coming to iPad. It’s a whole new app for the tablet with a super clean look, loads of new features, and a highly responsive design. That means features like Split View and Slide Over totally work, letting you mix in djay Pro and actually use a second app alongside it. And while djay Pro is one of the first pro class apps to hit the iPad Pro where it really shines, it’s fully available on newer iPads as well. Check it out:
The all-new djay Pro was built with the iPad Pro in mind with impressive support for iOS 9 multitasking through Split View and Slide Over in both landscape and portrait. Like all side-by-side apps, this works best on the iPad Pro’s 12.9″ display but also works on the 9.7″ iPad Air 2 and 7.9″ iPad mini 4. This lets you put djay Pro next to Safari, Tweetbot, or even Crossy Road for some mixing while weaving through traffic. It’s unclear if GarageBand will support Split View and Slide Over when it updates for iPad Pro, but ideally djay Pro and GarageBand running side-by-side would be killer and Algoriddim is ready.
Adding to the desktop level features, djay Pro supports more than 70 keyboard shortcuts for hardware keyboards including Smart Keyboard and Bluetooth keyboards. That’s more keyboard shortcuts supported by any single app I’ve seen yet that the shortcut list that pops up when you hold the Command key is paginated across multiple sheets. Compare to these to see for yourself.
This should be huge especially for DJs moving from the Mac to the iPad. djay Pro also features hardware integration with DJ controllers like Reloop Beatpad, Reloop Beatpad 2, Pioneer DDJWeGO, Numark Mixdeck Quad, Numark iDJ Pro, plus more, and multi-channel USB audio interface support.
Plus djay Pro now supports up to four audio tracks at the same time on the iPad, and up to two 4K video streams at 6o frames per second. You’ll also discover highly impressive video effects that mix right with the music including transitions, titles, and overlays.
There’s also Spotify integration for subscribers so you can have their massive streaming catalog right within djay Pro, of you can use your own music or a mix of both. And Cue Points, beat grid edits, metadata, and FX purchases sync now between Mac and iOS so you can access these on both platforms.
[YouTube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gY6ZdiKsXx0&feature=youtu.be%5D
You can grab djay Pro for iPad at a launch price of $19.99 from the App Store today so both new customers and upgraders pick it up before it goes to its regular $29.99 price. Marking the djay Pro for iPad launch, djay for iPhone and Apple Watch is free for a limited time.
Filed under: Apps Tagged: algoriddim, Djay, djay Pro, iPad, iPad Pro, keyboard shortcuts, Spotify
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The numbers on why you probably don’t want to buy AppleCare, at least at retail price
It’s a truism that insurance is a business where you bet you’ll break your toys and insurance companies bet you won’t – and that insurers have the stats on their side. The WSJ uses the example of a broken screen on an iPhone 6 to show how the numbers stack up, illustrating that most people are better off taking the risk.
Without AppleCare, Apple will charge you $109 for the repair. With AppleCare, Apple still charges a $79 deductible, and you laid out $99 for AppleCare in the first place, so you’re now out a total of $178. In effect, you paid $99 to cover a $20 cost.
Of course, you may manage to destroy your phone completely, and you may – if you’re an exceptional klutz – even manage to do it twice, when AppleCare could save you a lot of money. Some MacBook repairs are also very expensive, so again things could work out in your favor.
But overall, insurers make money because it makes more sense just to pay for things when they break. The WSJ got some simple advice from an economist on the most sensible approach for most of us.
Yet for most of us, here’s a better plan from Richard Thaler, a renowned economist at the University of Chicago Booth School of Business: “Every time someone offers to sell you insurance on a non-large purchase say no, and take that money and put it into a rainy-day account. With any luck, there will be plenty of money in that account the next time you drop your iPhone.”
The economics may be slightly different if you can get a deal on AppleCare. You can save a few bucks buying direct from Apple on Amazon, while B&H and Adorama also have deals. Apple’s education store currently offers the best saving if you qualify.
How has having or not having AppleCare worked out for you? Let us know in the comments.
Filed under: iOS Devices Tagged: AppleCare, iPhone repair
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iOS 9.2 ‘might’ fix the blackout problem some iPad Pros have, says Apple
Shortly after the iPad Pro launched in November, Apple acknowledged an issue facing some numbers of users (luckily not myself) where the tablet would become unresponsive after a period of charging. At the time, Apple said it was aware of the issue and was investigating.
Three weeks later, Apple has updated its support document that details the issue with some good news. While the fix was previously to hold both the sleep/wake button and the Home button for several seconds until it restarts, Apple now says to update the software to hopefully totally fix the issue.
Following yesterday’s release of iOS 9.2, Apple has updated the support document to add that the latest software update “might prevent this issue from occurring in the future.”
Come to think of it, I’d personally been running the beta version of iOS 9.2 on my own iPad Pro and hadn’t experienced the issue. The last beta version of iOS 9.2 and the shipping version yesterday featured the same build number, so hopefully iOS 9.2 is the fix for new iPad Pro owners.
Filed under: iOS Devices
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Apple plans to bring Siri Remote features to the iOS Remote app in 2016
Yesterday Apple released tvOS 9.1 for the new fourth-gen Apple TV which adds support for the Remote app on iPhone, iPad, and Apple Watch just like the previous Apple TV model. This makes setup and text input much easier from iPhones and iPads as you can use the software keyboard versus relying on swiping left and right across a keyboard, but many have wondered if Apple would update the Remote app to offer features more like the new Siri Remote for Apple TV. Eddy Cue says the answer is definitely, speaking with Buzzfeed, and it’s coming during the first half of next year…
“We’re working on a new Apple TV remote app that will give you the full functionality of the Siri Remote on your iPhone,” Cue said. “We’re hoping to ship that in the first half of next year.”
That’s especially good news to fans of the iPhone’s Remote app that just find it more convenient to use. The new Apple TV’s Siri features are neat, but it’s often easier to control it with the iPhone already in your hand rather than hunting down the little black controller. It’ll also be useful in situations where you find yourself needing to replace the $80 remote …
The interview highlighted Apple’s new Apps of the Year list, and Cue shared that Apple TV now has more than 2,000 apps available on the platform. He didn’t talk about the rumored TV service that has been expected from Apple, but he did discuss the new Apple TV as a gaming platform:
“I think the vast majority of people around the world probably aren’t looking to buy an Xbox or PlayStation. But that doesn’t mean they don’t enjoy playing games. I think Apple TV expands the gaming market to those people.”
And an opportunity for news delivery during the US election season:
“There’s so much interest in the current presidential election across so many age groups and demographics, etc. — there is a huge opportunity there. If was a news guy covering the elections I’d create an Apple TV channel. If I was one of the candidates I’d create an Apple TV channel.”
From my count, at least one candidate actually has an Apple TV channel so he may be on to something. You can read the full interview here.
Filed under: Apple TV
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Apple names its iPhone Apps of the Year, shares bestsellers across all categories & more
Apple has named live video sharing app Periscope its App of the Year 2015, and Tomb Raider’s puzzle spin-off Lara Croft GO as its Game of the Year. iPhone automation app Workflow won Most Innovative app, while Instagram took home the prize for Best App on the iPhone 6s.
In all, Apple picked 25 iPhone apps each for both general and games categories. It also shared the top 10 best-selling paid apps, most-downloaded free apps and top-grossing apps …
The best-selling paid iPhone apps of 2015 were Heads Up!, Fantasy Premier League 2015/16 and Minecraft: Pocket Edition. For free apps, WhatsApp, Dubsmash and Messenger headed the list, while the top-grossing apps were Clash of Clans, Candy Crush Saga and – despite Apple Music – Spotify.
Eddy Cue told the Telegraph that the developer community never failed to impress him.
“You kind of have to pinch yourself, the developer community is a huge part of what we’re doing and they continuously impress the heck out of me and our customers with the apps they’re able to create,” he said. “Just when you think there can’t be anything new, they come and innovate and come up with things we didn’t think were possible.”
Apple also shared its best-selling downloads in other categories:
- Album: 25 – Adele
- Song: Uptown Funk (feat Bruno Mars) – Mark Ronson
- Film: Kingsman: The Secret Service
- TV Show: Game of Thrones
- Book (fiction): Grey – EL James
- Book (non-fiction): American Sniper – Scott McEwen, Jim DeFelice, Chris Kyle
Apple’s top 10 picks for Apps of the Year are:
- Periscope
- Enlight
- Robinhood – Free Stock Trading
- Workflow (Most Innovative)
- Instagram (Best for iPhone 6s)
- HBO Now
- Hopper – Airfare Predictions
- Darkroom – Photo Editor
- Lark – Personal Weight Loss Coach
- The Everything Machine by Tinybob
Its top 10 games are:
- Lara Croft GO
- Fallout Shelter
- Mr Jump
- Dark Echo (Most Innovative)
- Warhammer 40,000: Freeblade (Best for iPhone 6s)
- Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft
- Vainglory
- Dungeon Boss
- Puzzle Craft 2
- PAC-MAN 256
Filed under: AAPL Company, Apps Tagged: App Store, Apple Apps of the Year 2015, Best-selling apps 2015, Highest grossing apps 2015, iTunes, Top-downloaded apps 2015
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Why We Unsubscribed 250K People From HubSpot’s Marketing Blog & Started Sending Less Email
A few weeks ago, we deliberately unsubscribed 250,000 people from HubSpot’s Marketing Blog — people who had opted in to receive emails about new content we published on the blog. This subscriber purge brought our total subscriber count from 550,000 down to 300,000.
We’re crazy, right? We must be crazy. We’re the same people who just recently blogged about how important growing subscribers is to increasing blog traffic. What gives?
Graymail. Graymail is what gives …
Graymail? What’s Graymail?
Graymail is email you technically opted in to receive but don’t really want.
Graymail is kind of like spam’s risk-taking but law-abiding cousin. It’s not against the law like spam is, but it’s also not as pure as spam’s straight-edged cousin “ham” (which is apparently what they call email that people actually want to receive). I guess that’s why some people call graymail “bacn” (bacon). Email deliverability experts can be so clever, huh?
Here’s an example: Let’s say you signed up for an ecommerce website’s email list because doing so got you a 15% off coupon for a fishing pole you bought for your brother as a birthday gift. But you’re not into fishing yourself, and now you’re getting emails from them that don’t interest you.
That’s one type of graymail. It’s not considered spam because you signed up for it, but you’re still not likely to engage with it.
Why Graymail Hurts Marketers
Although it’s not considered spam, sending graymail is problematic because it can hurt the deliverability of your email overall. Tipped off by low engagement rates, email clients may deliver email from known-graymail senders straight to recipients’ “junk” folders … even for brand new subscribers who haven’t even had the chance to engage with your email. In other words, the email technically gets sent (and delivered), but it’s not necessarily seen.
Yuck, right?
Well, as it turned out, the HubSpot Marketing Blog had a bit of a graymail problem on our hands. Our email deliverability team wasn’t mad, but they were disappointed. So we took action.
Here’s What We Did
We did a couple of things, actually …
1) We Created Automated Workflows to Unsubscribe Subscribers Once They Became Unengaged
The first thing we did was set up a workflow using HubSpot’s Workflows App that automatically unsubscribes people once they hit a certain threshold of unengagement — specifically, the workflow unsubscribes someone from the Marketing Blog if they haven’t clicked on an email from us in the last 6 months. While it was a slightly more aggressive approach, we chose “clicks” over “opens” as our criteria for engagement since open rate is an unreliable email marketing metric.
Our workflow also triggers an email to these unengaged recipients to let them know they’re getting unsubscribed, and attempts to re-engage them.
As you already know, this workflow unsubscribed about 250,000 unengaged subscribers right off the bat. It also continues to unsubscribe people as they become unengaged, strengthening the quality of our email list and helping to prevent the ill-effects of graymail.
Here’s What Happened …
If you think we didn’t have anxiety about unsubscribing 45% of our list, you’re dead wrong. But once we got over the sticker shock, we realized there wasn’t really anything to be worried about.
After all, 550,000 subscribers is nothing but a vanity metric if 250,000 of those people aren’t actually engaging with your content. And the people we were unsubscribing hadn’t clicked through to our blog from any of the emails we’d sent them over the course of the last 6 months, so we weren’t at risk of losing any email traffic.
2) We Eliminated the Marketing Blog’s “Instant” Subscription
Shortly after we activated our unengaged subscriber workflow, Marketing Blog Manager Ginny Soskey also made the decision to completely eliminate the Marketing Blog’s instant subscription option, which had been sending instant subscribers a separate email for each new post we published. Instead, she moved those instant subscribers over to our daily subscription, which sends a once daily round-up of our best new posts.
When we made the switch, we also sent an email to our former instant subscribers to let them know we were discontinuing our instant subscription in favor of our daily email, and that they’re inboxes would be a little lighter for it.
We did this for several reasons, but I’ll highlight a couple of the major ones here. For one, the graymail problem. Because of the volume at which we publish to the Marketing Blog, we were sending 4+ emails per day to our instant subscribers, which at the time consisted of about 10,000 people. That’s a heckuva lot of email, which leads me to my second point.
4+ emails per day isn’t a very lovable amount of email. In fact, it’s a very unlovable amount of email. What if we ever decided to increase our publishing frequency? That would mean we’d be sending even more email. Consolidating all that into one daily email that includes our best content was logical and lovable.
Here’s What Happened …
Compared to the unengaged workflows we set up, getting rid of our instant subscription was a riskier move because.
- We didn’t want to sabotage the traffic we were generating from our instant subscribers. Would fewer emails to our former instant subscribers lead to less blog traffic?
- We didn’t want to upset subscribers who actually liked receiving multiple emails per day about our latest blog content.
On the traffic front, we basically broke even. Sending just one email per day instead of multiple emails didn’t translate into less traffic to the blog from email. This wasn’t that surprising to us, because in order to lose traffic, lots of subscribers would’ve needed to be clicking on more than one email per day, which was an unlikely scenario. We knew that was an unlikely scenario because we did our due diligence and analyzed the traffic to our blog from our instant emails before we made the decision to discontinue that subscription option … just to be safe.
And as it turns out, what we did was actually a welcome change for most of our instant subscribers. The majority of the email replies we received were very positive and included sentiments like this:
- “Thanks for giving me some breathing room. I can use it.”
- “Thanks for that. I was close to ending my subscription, to be honest 🙂 But now, never.”
- “This is a much better solution for me. Thanks for practicing what you preach to make my experience better.”
From the few people who spoke up and said they were actually disappointed about the discontinuation of our instant subscription, we noticed two common themes:
- People like being in control of their own inboxes. Of the blog emails we send them, they like being able to choose which ones to click on, and which ones to delete.
- Some people genuinely like to read every email/blog post we send them.
Time to Reinvent Blog Content Distribution?
While most people were in favor of our switch to fewer emails, the reasons some people were disappointed shed light on an opportunity for improvement on the blog content distribution front.
In other words, there’s got to be a better way to give these subscribers what they want than by flooding their inboxes with email messages.
For blogs, content distribution to subscribers has always boiled down to either email notifications or RSS, but is there a better way — particularly when it comes to instant notifications? For instance, what if there was a way to automatically send instant subscribers a tweet whenever a new post was published? Could someone invent a completely new platform or tool that helps to solve this problem?
Perhaps better personalization is the solution here. If people want to have control over their own inboxes, maybe offering more robust subscription options is the answer, allowing subscribers to decide which types of blog content they were emailed about. If people were able to subscribe only to the content they’re interested in, instant email notifications would become much more tailored to the subscriber and a whole lot more valuable as a result.
This is definitely something we’ll be noodling on, so let us know if you have any ideas 😉
Apple adds third-party Lightning headphones to online store (at a cool $800)
If you’re looking for a pair of headphones with a Lightning connector, either because you want better quality or for future-proofing, there aren’t yet many options out there. Apple has now added one option to its online store – but they’re not cheap at $799.99.
The Audeze EL-8 Titanium Closed-Back Headphones are the real deal, however. An audiophile brand whose headphones more typically run into four figures, the EL-8 gets you a 28-bit DAC and the company’s planar magnetic driver – four times larger than most other headphones – borrowed from its high-end LCD Series. Industrial design is by BMW.
Apple describes the driver as offering “exceptional transient response and extended bass—virtually flat to 25Hz—along with the lowest Total Harmonic Distortion.”
As an aside, Apple really needs to sort out the accessory sections of the store: you get different results depending on whether you browse headphones within Mac or iPhone categories, with no discernible logic behind the differences (you don’t get lighter or smaller headphones within iPhone, for example).
Via The Verge
Filed under: iOS Devices Tagged: Audeze, Audeze EL-8, Audeze EL-8 Titanium Closed-Back Headphones, Audiophile headphones, headphones, Lightning headphones
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Patent issues suggested as explaining bulging design of Apple’s Smart Battery Case
A lot of us have been wondering how it was that Apple’s design team went off the rails when designing the new iPhone Smart Battery Case. Nilay Patel at The Verge, has now put forward one possible explanation: Apple had to find a way to avoid infringing the patents of the market leader in battery cases, Mophie …
Patel’s argument is that Mophie has a whole set of patents that cover the most obvious ways of designing a battery case that doesn’t suck. These include design patents describing the visual form. One patent, for example, covers a rounded back which – somewhat ironically – resembles that of the original iPhone.
Others describe various approaches to two-part cases.
Mophie has an entire suite of patents on this kind of two-part design — here’s #8,971,039, which covers a slight variation of a two-piece design in which the top part slides over an extended piece of the bottom part. There’s also any number of design patents at play here; virtually every popular Mophie case has a design patent on its ornamental, nonfunctional elements. (For example, newer Mophie cases have a detachable bottom part; the company has design patents on that variation.)
The weakness in the argument is that there is no shortage of competitors out there with designs similar to Mophie. Patel argues these are too small for the company to pursue, while Apple’s exceedingly deep pockets would make it an obvious target. But those deep pockets also could buy the best legal team.
One other factor that may have played into Apple’s decision. The one downside of Mophie’s approach is it makes the entire unit look extremely thick. Apple’s design does at least reveal that there’s a slim phone in there somewhere. When only a minority of customers will want a battery case at all, Apple may take the view that it’s more important what potential Android switchers think of the phone than the case.
Incidentally, Apple isn’t the only company to have opted for the “bulge” approach – HTC did something similar with the Droid Incredible 2 – and arguably made a worse job of it with the camera lens and flash within the bulge.
Filed under: AAPL Company, iOS Devices
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6 YouTube Tips to Improve Your Search Rank
Are your YouTube views falling? Do you need to rank higher in YouTube search results? Understanding how you can take advantage of YouTube’s algorithm will help your channel and videos be seen by more people. In this article you’ll discover how to make your video rank higher in YouTube search results. #1: Align Content Development With Viewer Searches To get a leg […]
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20 Secret Santa Gift Ideas Your Coworkers Will Love
They see you when you’re slacking. They know when you come in late. They know if you’ve been bad or good so be good for your work’s Secret Santa exchange.
But that’s not how the song — or the Secret Santa exchange — really goes …
You spend all day with your coworkers, but come time for your annual gift exchange, you’re stuck trying to figure out exactly what Suzie will want that’s also in your price range.
We want to help. We’ve compiled a list of awesome gifts that are bound to meet all different budgets and personality types. From hot sauce kits to leather mouse pads, this roundup should take some of the stress out of your shopping experience.
20 Secret Santa Gifts for Your Coworkers
$10 and Under
1) Toaster Grilled Cheese Bags
Price: $9.99
While almost every office has a toaster, few have a stovetop. This rules fresh, delicious grilled cheese off the list of lunch options … or does it? When you give the gift of toaster grilled cheese bags, your recipient can toast up the perfect sandwich in minutes. The reusable, Teflon-coated bags can also be used for heating up other foods like pastries and leftover pizza.
Got a gluten-free coworker? They can even protect their food from cross contamination using these handy bags.
2) Printed Socks
Price: $8.00
Nothing beats a great pair of socks, am I right? Not only does everyone need them, but also there is such a wide variety of options available online that you’re bound to find a pair for any and every personality.
Know of a few pizza lovers in the office? This pepperoni-clad pair would make the perfect gift.
3) Tech Cleaning Compound
Price: $4.99
Let’s face it: Computer keyboards are gross. Between the lunch remnants and dust, it’s likely that your keyboard has seen better days.
The solution? Cyber Clean. Simply smoosh this cleaning putty into the crevasses of your device to pull out all the gross stuff in one swoop.
4) Sushi Pushpins
Price: $9.00
Shopping for the office sushi addict? Look no further than this trendy desk trinket.
Stuck in a maki cushion, each pearl-shaped fish egg is a pushpin in disguise. Pin up your favorite notes, photos, and menus using these handy tacks — or just admire the holder on your desk.
5) Waterproof Notepad
Price: $7.00
You never know when your next great idea is going to strike. In fact, it might even be the shower.
With a waterproof notepad from AquaNotes, you can jot down important shower notes before they slip your mind — perfect for whipping up impromptu grocery or to-do lists.
$25 and Under
6) Wine Infused Coffee
Price: $19.95
Gift hunting for a coffee drinker who also loves wines? Why not pick up a bag of Merlot-infused coffee beans.
This brew is made with 100% Arabica beans that are aged in oak wine barrels. Serving as the perfect post-meal treat, this unique gift will be a hit with any adventurous coffee enthusiast.
7) Travel Tervis
Price: $14.99–$19.99 (+$3.99 for travel lid)
There are a ton of travel mugs out there to choose from, but Tervis tumblers seem to offer it all: customization, portable cooling, self-warming system, dishwasher armor, and a lifetime guarantee.
Whether you’re buying a gift for an avid golfer, shopper, foodie, or Patriots super fan, there’s bound to be a Tervis that lines up with their interests and personality.
8) Portable Hot Sauce
Price: $14.99
Coming from a hot sauce addict, there’s nothing worse than suffering through a bland meal without access to your favorite spicy condiment.
Thanks to this convenient Sriracha2Go key chain, you can carry a personal stash of the good stuff around with you at all times. Simply toss it in your purse or attach it to your keys to ensure you’ve got access to heat when you need it most.
9) Apples to Apples
Price: $19.99
This well-known party game is a great gift for people of all ages. And it’s easy to play, too: Simply select a card from your hand that best describes a card played by the judge.
The game is based on funny comparisons, so you’re bound to share some laughes with whomever you play with.
10) Fruit Infuser Water Bottle
Price: $21.21
Stay hydrated and enjoy the sweet taste of your favorite fruits with this handy water bottle from Fruitzola.
Fill the inside tube with fruit or a combination of your choice — strawberries, lemons, kiwis, watermelon, and mint all work well — and enjoy the taste of fresh, flavored H20 all day.
11) Plantable Pencils
Price: $17.95
When you wear this set of pencils down to the stub, you don’t toss them — you plant them. Each pack includes eight varieties: cherry tomato, sage, sunflower, lavender, forget me not, basil, mint, and thyme.
This is a great gift for anyone with a green thumb, as it provides them with a sustainable way to grow new life from old instruments.
12) Iced Coffee Sampler
Price: $20
Is there anything more refreshing than an ice-cold cup of coffee?
Treat your coworker to this four-part specialty coffee sampler from Seattle’s world-renowned roasters. Each sampler comes with tasting notes, roaster profiles, and an iced coffee recipe. (If you’re lucky, maybe they’ll share.)
$50 and Under
13) Smartphone Projector
Price: $31.95
Transform your smartphone into a big screen projector with this retro-inspired cardboard structure. Simply slide your device into the compartment for an instant cinema-like feel.
You can make this gift even better by throwing in a box of popcorn to complete their viewing experience.
14) Make Your Own Hot Sauce Kit
Price: $39.99
Whether you’re making chili for a rainy day, wings for the big game, or tacos for Tuesday’s dinner, a little homemade hot sauce can make all the difference.
With this awesome kit, recipients can whip up six signature sauces that are seasoned to their exact liking. The kit even includes a handful of heat-inspired recipes, mixing tips, and suggestions.
15) Leather Mouse Pad
Price: $36
Looking for a sophisticated, practical gift option? Grab a leather mouse pad from Ugmonk’s shop.
Not only does this sleek pad provide a smooth surface for your mouse, but the leather is also known to weather and darken slowly over time to take on a one-of-a-kind look. How cool.
16) Tile
Price: $25
There are few things worse than misplacing your keys. But with a Bluetooth tracking device like Tile, you never have to worry about losing track of your keys — or any important item — ever again.
Simply attach Tile to your keys, slip it in your wallet, or hang it on your bag, and you can ring your item like you would a lost phone.
Lost your phone? Tile works in reverse. Simply tap your Tile to make your phone ring — even if it’s on silent.
17) Gourmet Marshmallows
Price: $30
Step your hot chocolate game up with a box of gourmet marshmallows. From boozy flavors like bourbon to sweet flavors like eggnog, these handcrafted marshmallows are good enough to eat straight from the box.
18) Streaming Stick
Price: $49.99
The Roku Streaming Stick works with any television that has an HDMI port, and offers over 1,200 apps, including Netflix, HBO Go, Hulu Plus, Pandora, and many more. It’s a perfect gift for nearly any coworker.
19) Wireless Speaker
Price: $39.99
Wireless speakers are the perfect gift for anyone in your office. Whether they use it to listen to podcasts while they cook, bring tunes to the beach, or create a custom surround sound movie experience, this little Jam Plus speaker packs a big punch. (Full disclosure: I love this speaker so much I bought another one … and one for my brother.)
20) Cacti Coasters
Price: $38.00
Help your coworkers keep their desk nice and neat with this buildable set of cacti coasters.
The set comes complete with six green leaf coasters that you can mix and match to create different landscapes within the pot. Build them up or stack them close, they’re there when you need a place to put your drink — and still look really cool when you don’t.
What are your go-to gift ideas? Share them with us in the comments section below.
Facebook Lead Ads: Guía Completa para conseguir leads de forma inmediata con publicidad
¿Te gustaría poder conseguir miles de suscriptores y clientes de forma inmediata a partir de la publicidad que pones en Facebook?
Recientemente Facebook ha lanzado Facebook Lead Ads, un producto publicitario que te permite captar suscriptores sin salir del propio anuncio de Facebook (en español los han llamado Anuncios para Clientes Potenciales).
En este post te voy a explicar cómo puedes conseguir suscriptores a bajo coste combinando la potencia de Facebook Lead Ads y una nueva herramienta, ConnectLeads (¡¡cuyo EarlyBird termina hoy mismo!!), que te permite completar el ciclo de venta para que tu campaña sea realmente efectiva y te ahorres mucho dinero en la captación de clientes a través de publicidad de Facebook.
Empecemos por Facebook Lead Ads.
Qué es Facebook Lead Ads
Te dejo un vídeo que te lo muestra de forma muy gráfica, pero te explico a continuación cuáles son las principales características de Facebook Lead Ads:
Las características principales de Facebook Lead Ads son las siguientes:
- Puedes crear formularios de suscripción desde el propio anuncio de Facebook.
- El usuario no tiene que rellenar su nombre, dirección o los campos que te interese que te deje. Únicamente con un clic se le rellena de forma automática.
- Las direcciones de email que recoges son reales (¡y personales!), es decir, la propia dirección con la que cada usuario se ha registrado en Facebook.
- Tienes que aceptar las condiciones de privacidad que indica Facebook con respecto a los datos personales de los usuarios, por lo que se hace todo de forma legal y transparente y te olvidas de problemas de privacidad.
- Los datos los puedes descargar en un .csv para subirlos a tu propia herramienta de email marketing (y más abajo te explico cómo puedes hacerlo automáticamente en tu CRM o herramienta de email marketing).
Cómo configurar Facebook Lead Ads en 3 pasos
A continuación voy a explicarte en cómo configurar Facebook Lead Ads en X pasos y dejarlo preparado para cuando lo conectes con ConnectLeads, de modo que puedas sacarle todo el rendimiento posible a este tipo de publicidad y aumentar la efectividad de tus campañas en un porcentaje muy elevado.
# 1. Crea una campaña
Dirígete a Power Editor y crea una campaña. En este caso la llamaremos “Campaña Lead Ads de Prueba”.
El tipo de compra tiene que ser ‘Subasta’ y el objetivo ‘Generación de Clientes Potenciales’:
A continuación creas un conjunto de anuncios y un anuncio:
# 2. Establece los públicos
Una vez lo creas, en el nivel de “Conjuntos de Anuncios” seleccionas la página y aceptas las Condiciones de Servicio para esa página:
A partir de aquí perfilas todos los detalles que te interese relativos a tu público. Aunque es obvio mencionarlo, piensa que cuanto más concreta sea tu campaña, mayores posibilidades de llegar al target que esperas y más fácil será que se suscriba a tu lista gente que convierta en el objetivo que te hayas planteado para la campaña.
También debes tener en cuenta que estos anuncios de momento solo están disponibles para usuarios que los reciban a través del móvil. Probablemente cambiará más adelante, pero por ahora tienes que aceptar que solo se vea en el newsfeed del móvil de los usuarios:
# 3. Crea el Anuncio
Te diriges al nivel ‘Anuncios’ e, igual que harías cuando creases cualquier anuncio, rellenas toda la información requerida. Pero antes fíjate que te indica que crees un formulario o escojas en uno de los que tengas si ya tienes alguno creado:
En este caso te interesa poner un nombre específico para el formulario, el que vayas a utilizar para un anuncio concreto, pues ese es el que ConnectLeads relacionará con la lista específica a la que quieras enviar a los suscriptores.
Nosotros en este caso lo llamamos “Descarga eBook ROI” porque es lo que querremos que haga la gente en el anuncio:
El idioma que selecciones será aquel en el que tus usuarios vean el formulario, por tanto es importante que también lo selecciones en función de tu campaña.
Y en el siguiente paso llega un aspecto interesante: escoger qué datos querrás que el usuario comparta contigo en el formulario. Ten en cuenta una cosa: a menos que ofrezcas, por ejemplo, un producto de consultoría en el que sea necesario que el usuario te deje muchos de sus datos, no te compliques y pide los que vienen por defecto (nombre y email), que son los que se pasarán automáticamente a tu lista.
En este tipo de publicidad se trata de ganar agilidad y que el usuario no tenga que pensar mucho en qué datos te deja y cuáles no, pues lo que quieres es conseguir que tu llamada a la acción sea efectiva para captar los datos del usuario e introducirlo directamente en tu campaña por email.
Otro aspecto interesante es que te permite agregar preguntas para el usuario que va a recibir el formulario de suscripción: o creas la tuya propia y le añades las respuestas que quieras o bien seleccionas una de las que Facebook te ofrece por defecto:
Si dejas el campo en blanco quedarán preguntas abiertas. Al final podrás ver cómo queda tu formulario y las preguntas que has hecho, y editarlo de nuevo si quieres.
Y el siguiente paso -muy importante y que deberás tener preparado- es indicar tu Política de Privacidad. La herramienta que te menciono más abajo lleva incluido un “Creador de Políticas de Privacidad” que, si bien está en inglés, puedes traducirlo una vez incluyas el nombre de la empresa que recogerá los datos y su ubicación.
Una vez terminado esto tendrás que indicar la página a la que quieres que vayan los usuarios que se han registrado. Te recomiendo que no los lleves directamente a tu Home, sino que crees una página específica (página de aterrizaje) en la que expliques al usuario que le has enviado un email y que se ha registrado correctamente.
Invéntate una URL como esta:
Y lo único que queda ya es lo que harías con cualquier otro anuncio: crear el mensaje publicitario, el título del anuncio, la URL y la imagen. Y quedaría algo así:
Una cosa importante: cuando te lo solicite, selecciona el botón de llamada a la acción relativo a la acción que quieras que realicen los usuarios que se suscriban a tu lista.
En este caso, como queremos que se descarguen un eBook, indicamos sencillamente ‘Descargar’, pero estas son las opciones que te ofrece Lead Ads:
Cómo importar automáticamente los datos de Facebook a tu CRM o herramienta de email marketing
Dentro del proceso de captación de datos este es sin duda uno de los más importantes, pues lo que buscamos como marketers es que los usuarios reciban directamente aquello que le prometemos en el anuncio.
Si te quedas solo con Facebook Lead Ads, recogerás los datos del usuario pero te los tendrás que descargar en un .csv para luego subirlos, de forma manual, a tu CRM o a tu herramienta de email marketing. Y eso es un problema porque perderás mucha efectividad.
Cuando haces una llamada a la acción para que alguien descargue un material, se suscriba a tu newsletter, reciba más información o un presupuesto, lo último que quiere es que se lo envíes al cabo de unas horas (o unos días, si no lo descargas a diario).
Es absolutamente imprescindible hacer que ese proceso sea directo e inmediato.
Y aquí es donde entra ConnectLeads.
ConnectLeads es una nueva herramienta que te permite importar directamente los usuarios a tu herramienta y conectarlos con la lista que te interese para realizar una acción inmediata.
Y además el proceso es muy sencillo:
# 1. Conecta tus cuentas con ConnectLeads
En cuanto accedes a la herramienta lo primero que ves es un panel de control como el siguiente en el que puedes conectar tus cuentas:
Conectar tu cuenta de Facebook Ads significa registrarte con la cuenta de Facebook en la que administres todas tus páginas. Podrás acceder a todas las páginas que tengas asociadas a esa cuenta.
Luego integras tu herramienta de email marketing y ya puedes empezar a enlazar los Lead Ads que tienes creados en tus páginas.
Para integrar la herramienta de email marketing te pedirá que proporciones una API (de ese modo puede extraer información de ella), pero te explica claramente dónde encontrarla en la que utilices.
# 2. Selecciona una Lead Form (Formulario del Anuncio)
Cuando pulsas en “Create a Lead Form” lo que haces es asociar la herramienta con los Lead Ads que ya tenías creados en tu página.
Te pide que selecciones una página y un formulario. Como ves, aquí seleccionamos el que habíamos creado anteriormente para esta campaña (‘Descarga eBook ROI’):
A continuación seleccionas la herramienta de Email Marketing que hayas integrado previamente (en nuestro caso GetResponse, como explicábamos en este post con 3 alternativas a MailChimp) y, en el siguiente desplegable, te aparecerán todas las listas que tienes creadas en ella. Seleccionas la que te interese para la campaña y continúas.
Es importante que en este paso tengas ya preparados tus autorrespondedores en esa lista, es decir, los emails que enviarás automáticamente una vez se suscriba la gente a tu lista a través del formulario del anuncio, pues de otro modo no tendrá sentido todo lo que hagas (bueno, recogerás direcciones en tu herramienta de email marketing, pero perderás efectividad de conversión).
A continuación debes indicar qué datos quieres recoger en tu herramienta de email marketing aparte de los que vienen en Facebook por defecto (nombre y email). Debes poner el nombre del campo exacto que requiere cada herramienta, por eso, por si no lo sabes, te dejan un enlace hacia la página en la que tu herramienta lo explica.
¡Pulsas en Guardar y ya la tienes creada!
En el siguiente panel de control te aparecerán todos los formularios que hayas creado y podrás editarlos o consultar los datos que te interese:
Conclusión
Como ves, ConnectLeads, enlazado con Facebook Lead Ads, es una herramienta sencilla pero muy potente e imprescindible en este proceso, pues te permite completar tus campañas de captación de leads sin necesidad de crear un lead magnet (el propio anuncio actúa como tal) y entregar inmediatamente al usuario lo que le has prometido en el anuncio.
De otra forma, tendrías que realizar manualmente el proceso, con todo lo que implica de pérdida de tiempo y de efectividad.
Evidentemente, con un poco de imaginación puedes crear campañas muy variadas: desde descargas de eBooks hasta registros en webinars o incluso registros a concursos.
Lo importante aquí es que, una vez captas el lead, termines el proceso de venta y conduzcas al usuario hacia tus espacios de conversión de forma inmediata.
¿Has probado ya Facebook Lead Ads? ¿Qué resultados has obtenido? ¿Con qué problemas te has encontrado?
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Deezer Music app gets CarPlay support for paid subscribers
Deezer Music, the music streaming service with around six million subscribers, is today launching support for Apple’s CarPlay platform.
The service has both free, ad-supported and paid plans, but the CarPlay feature will be limited to its Premium+ and Elite subscribers. Premium+ is the company’s paid monthly plan that removes advertising and adds a few features, while Elite is an upgraded plan with high definition audio available only to Sonos users currently.
Some might remember that Deezer briefly added support for CarPlay before removing it earlier this year, but with today’s official launch the feature is here to stay (at least for premium subscribers).
Some features you’ll find in the app for CarPlay include:
- Listen to albums, playlists and tracks
- Use Flow to discover new music or hear your favourites based on your individual
- listening behaviour
- Listen to one of Deezer’s many Mixes to suit your mood
- Access your music in offline mode
Deezer has around 35 millions songs and 40,000 podcasts and it’s available in 180 countries. In the US the service is currently only available for Cricket Wireless subscribers, and Sonos and Bose customers.
The updated Deezer Music iOS app with CarPlay support should hit the App Store sometime today.
Filed under: Apps Tagged: app, App Store, CarPlay, Deezer Music, iOS, Podcasts, premium, subscribers, update
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Best Buy makes a splash with the lowest Apple Watch prices ever, deals start at just $249
From 9to5Toys.com:
Apple Watch is at the top of many holiday wish lists this year and luckily for gift shoppers it’s received numerous discounts since Black Friday. In fact, Target and B&H are both offering significant Apple Watch promotions right now.
This morning Best Buy jumped into the fray with the best straight up Apple Watch deal we’ve ever seen: $100 off any Apple Watch Sport or Apple Watch model. More than 20 different watch configurations are eligible for this discount. The smaller 38mm Sport models start at just $249 with free shipping. In comparison, past deals only offered a savings of $50 on Sport models and some also tossed in a free gift card. Best Buy’s deal represents the lowest out-the-door price we’ve seen for any Apple Watch in new condition.
Use your savings to grab a charging dock for your nightstand or desk. I’d recommend Nomad’s Apple Watch Stand (on sale for $41), Twelve South’s HiRise ($50), or one of Spigen’s low-cost options (from $11).
Filed under: Tips and Tricks Tagged: 9to5Toys, apple deals, Apple watch, Apple Watch deals, Apple Watch Sport, Best Buy
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Quick unboxing and review of Apple’s new iPhone 6/s Smart Battery Case
Earlier today Apple surprised us with the release of its first ever Smart Battery Case for the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6s. The case, which runs $99, adds an extra 1877mAh of battery power to the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6s. Popular YouTuber DetroitBorg has gone hands-on with the accessory and explained all of what we need to know about Apple’s first battery case…
One pro of the design choice Apple made is that it makes the case feel less bulky around the casing. This means that when you’re handling the phone, it doesn’t feel quite as bulky as some third-party cases. This doesn’t change the fact, however, that the case adds a significant amount of weight to the iPhone. In fact, in Apple’s quest to make the iPhone 6 and 6s battery life comparable to the larger Plus models, it has actually made the 6 and 6s heavier than the Plus.
With Apple’s Smart Battery Case installed, the iPhone 6s weighs about 8.6 ounces, whereas the iPhone 6s Plus with Apple’s leather case installed weighs about 7.4 ounces. That’s definitely a notable difference for those that have gotten used to the smaller form factor of the iPhone 6 and 6s.
Another positive, however, of the Smart Battery Cases’s design is that the speaker and microphone are now front facing. This improves the speaker quality of the device as the speakers are now pointed directly at the user as opposed to firing away from them.
As some of the reviews noted this morning, the Smart Battery Case also features a recessed headphone jack. This means that a lot of headphones available on the market aren’t going to be compatible with Apple’s battery case. Apple’s EarPods, of course, are compatible with the case, but any headphones that feature a slightly thicker bumper around the 3.5mm headphone jack are not going to work.
Apple’s Smart Battery Case features a capacity of 1877mAh, which is enough to take a dead iPhone 6 or 6s to around 80 percent battery. Apple touts that its Smart Battery Case increases the talk time of the iPhone to 25 hours and the Internet use to 18 hours on LTE. Thanks to integration between the software and hardware, you can easily monitor the battery life of your phone and case with the battery widget in the Ntoifcaiton Center on iOS.
Apple’s Smart Battery Case is available now in Charcoal Gray and White for $99. This makes Apple’s offerings competitively priced with similar offerings from Mophie ($99.95), although Mophie’s offering includes 2700mAh of added power.
Filed under: iOS Devices Tagged: Apple, iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, smart battery case
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Opinion: The 2015 Apple product that most excites me for the company’s future
Apple this year introduced several major new pieces of hardware, the iPad Pro, Apple Watch, fourth-gen Apple TV and 12-inch MacBook. Like most Apple fans, the one that had me the most excited at launch was the Apple Watch. I thought Apple Watch would have a huge impact on my daily life, but 8 months in, the new Apple device that’s actually affected by day-to-day technology usage the most is the 12-inch MacBook.
I was incredibly skeptical of the 12-inch MacBook when Apple initially announced it. As someone who types for a living, I was worried about the new butterfly keyboard being less conducive to productivity than the standard scissor keyboard. I was worried that the single USB-C port would prove to be a huge roadblock in day-to-day use. 8 months later, however, I’m entirely sold on the 12-inch MacBook and think it’s the best new product Apple introduced in 2015 and I can’t wait to see where Apple takes it in the coming years. The 12-inch MacBook has renewed my faith in the fact that Apple can still design gorgeous pieces of hardware that actually improve on and fulfill a need in the market.
Before pulling the trigger on the new MacBook, I used a 13-inch MacBook Air. One of my biggest qualms about the MacBook Air was the low-quality display, especially when I made the switch to a 4k monitor at my desk. I used the MacBook Air because I loved the portability and how easy it was to slide in my backpack and take it to and from classes. The performance of the MacBook Air was always good but not great, but I was willing to sacrifice performance for portability. And I still am. I never use my laptop for hardcore video editing, gaming, or anything of that sort. I use it to do research for homework, write things like this article, browse Twitter and Facebook, and listen to music, which the MacBook Air was more than capable of handling.
Then came the 12-inch MacBook. The design of the device (which we leaked months before its announcement) was seemingly unrivaled at the time. With an ultra-thin profile, even thinner than the MacBook Air, the 12-inch MacBook is incredibly easy on the eyes. It features the same tapered design as the MacBook Air, but it starts tapering at a thickness much thinner than the MacBook Air’s.
Unlike any MacBook released in recent years, the 12-inch model was also launched in three color variations: space gray, gold, and the traditional silver. I opted for space gray to match my other Apple products and I have no regrets. The space gray color does tend to show fingerprints and smudges more easily than the traditional silver design, but nevertheless, the aluminum build has held up very well throughout 8 months of usage.
When I first bought the 12-inch MacBook, however, I didn’t immediately get rid of my MacBook Air. I wasn’t sold that the 12-inch screen, Core M processor, USB-C port, butterfly keyboard, and battery life were going to be changes that I welcomed. 8 months later, however, some of those things have grown to be my favorite features about the device.
Coming from a 13.3-inch MacBook Air, which I always found to be the perfect size, I was skeptical of the smaller 12.4-inch display. That is, until I laid eyes on the gorgeous Retina display. The MacBook features a 2304 x 1440 resolution, which comes out to 226 pixels-per-inch and it’s eye-popping. I was always annoyed by the 1440 x 900 resolution on the MacBook Air and upgrading to the 12-inch MacBook was incredibly welcomed.
The Core M processor was another factor of which I was skeptical. The MacBook Air was never a powerhouse of a machine, but it was always able to get the job done. Despite my skepticism, I decided to go with the base model MacBook, which packs a 1.1GHz dual-core Intel Core M processor and 8GB of RAM with Turbo Boost up to 2.4GHz. 1.1GHz seemed unfathomably slow to me, but I’ve been pleasantly surprised. Like the MacBook Air, the MacBook is in no way, shape, or form a powerhouse, but for me, it’s still able to get the job done. I rarely notice any slowdowns, although they do appear occasionally when I have a handful of windows and tabs running. Playing a video and trying to do too much else is also a recipe for disaster at times.
Like I said, I’m willing to compromise performance in favor of portability and the MacBook is a perfect example of having to do just that. It’s by no means the fastest machine Apple offers and for the price, you’re definitely paying a premium for the sleek, first-gen design.
Like everyone else, I was skeptical of having a laptop with a single USB-C port, but it’s proved to not be as big of an issue as I expected. I’m really reminded that I rarely plug anything into my laptop except a charger. I couldn’t tell you the last time I plugged my iPhone in to sync it with iTunes or plugged in a flash drive. I use Dropbox for all of my file storing needs at this point and all of peripherals are Bluetooth. Obviously, I can’t speak for everyone here and many people have needed to purchased adapters on top of adapters to use the MacBook everyday, but for me, this hasn’t been an issue.
Likewise, the butterfly keyboard and Force Touch trackpad are things I’ve grown used to, as well. At first, the butterfly keyboard is definitely a bit tedious due to the lack of movement from the keys, but now that I’ve gotten used to it, I’m able to type just as fast with it as I was the traditional scissor mechanism keyboard on the MacBook Air. Regarding the Force Touch trackpad, I really wouldn’t have been able to tell that it was a different kind of trackpad technology had Apple not disclosed it. The vibration that you feel when you press is nearly identical to the feedback received from a normal trackpad. I will say that using Force Click is not as useful as I expected it to be. 3D Touch is far more useful on the iPhone 6s than Force Click is on the MacBook due in large part to the more ample screen space on MacBook.
If I had one complaint regarding the MacBook it would have to be its battery life. Apple touts that you can get 9 hours of web browsing from the device, but I don’t think I’ve ever gotten that much life from a single charge. More realistically, I’m getting about 5 to 6 hours on a charge. This is somewhat frustrating because if the MacBook could last a workday – 8 hours – then it would be the ultimate on-the-go productivity machine, but having to worry about your laptop dying a little more than halfway through the day is just an added layer of stress.
In The Future
The good thing about the 12-inch MacBook is that it’s a first-gen product. There’s so much room for the device to grow. Personally, I would love to see Apple work on improving the device’s battery life before it does anything else. As time progresses and battery technology gets more affordable and smaller, Apple will undoubtedly improve the battery life of the MacBook, but in the interim it’s far from great.
I would also like to see Apple add one more USB-C port to the device. With the shaky battery life of the device, it would be much more conducive to productivity to be able to charge the device and still have a free USB-C port. This again comes down to technology within the MacBook shrinking as it progresses.
Finally, Apple, can you please upgrade that horrendous 480p FaceTime camera? In 2015 using a 480p camera should be a crime. When FaceTiming, people can always tell when I’m using my MacBook and when I’m using my iPhone. The quality is just undeniably bad.
Wrap Up
2015 was a big year for Apple. The Apple Watch, iPad Pro, and MacBook were all released, as was Apple Music. All of these things have greatly impacted my daily tech usage (Apple Watch maybe less so), but the MacBook is by far my favorite Apple device or service of 2015. The combination of the gorgeous Retina display and ultra-slim hardware design makes the MacBook the best Apple laptop I’ve ever owned.
The MacBook allows for such seamless portability that it’s hard to make the case for ever needing a larger machine. Sure an extra USB-C port and improved battery life would be welcomed, but we have to remember that this is a first-generation product. Apple undoubtedly has some changes up its sleeve.
In a time when many are skeptical of Apple’s design trends and changes, the MacBook proves that the company still knows how to create a beautiful piece of hardware with a premium and elegant feel (and price tag). The MacBook is a prime example of an Apple product that is somewhat ahead of its time, but will gradually become the ‘norm’ for both Apple users and other users. At this point, you’re paying a premium for being ahead of the curve, but it’s undoubtedly worth it.
Read Dom’s take on the 12-inch MacBook here and Zac’s full in-depth review here.
Filed under: Mac, Opinion Tagged: 2015, Apple, MacBook, Opinion
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