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China now largest mobile market : Business development impact on multinational law firms

flipboard-chinaFlipboard, a very popular social-network aggregation, magazine-format application for the delivery and sharing of news, just launched a Chinese version for the iPhone. Flipboard already has a Chinese iPad app which has proven to be very popular. The new iPhone app and existing iPad app will include a feature which learns from a reader’s interactions with the content and offers a quick shortcut to the day’s essential posts on a cover page. Why the strong push into China by Flipboard? As reported by Jon Russel (@jonrussel) of The Next Web:

A recent report from Flurry shows China is the world’s fastest growing smartphone market, having overtaken the US to become the biggest single market for Android and iOS devices worldwide. By the end of this month, the country is estimated to account for 24 percent of all Android and iOS phones worldwide, that’s ahead of the US (21 percent share) for the first time.

China’s growth against the U.S. is pretty dramatic.

China largest mobile market

What’s this mean for law firms doing business development in China?

  • You need to develop for mobile. Primarily developing content and networking through browser environments is misguided with how the China market is now consuming and sharing news, insight, and commentary.
  • Mobile does not necessarily mean apps. Having content mobile enabled through HTML5 and WordPress is more than sufficient.
  • You should work with partners who understand how news, information, and insight is shared on mobile. Make sure that they just don’t know how to do it from a technology standpoint, but are they personally networking for business development via mobile.
  • Don’t focus as much time and expense on websites and SEO. Network through mobile to engage, build relationships, and enhance your individual reputation as a lawyer.
  • Work with networks, curators, and aggregators. They’ll act as an AP (Associated Press) for you.
  • Look for networks on mobile which don’t just focus on content distribution, but also provide the opportunity to build relationships with real people.

It’s a new world in many more ways than one. Law firms have offices around the world. You can personally engage an in-house counsel or exec who is using an iPad or iPhone. You have technology available to you that just a couple years ago you could not have imagined. The key is your willingness to change and your ability to change fast.

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