In the wise words of Brian Solis – our favourite thought leader in Digital who we interviewed in November – “in a post-PC era, mobile is no longer a strategy or technology; it’s a lifestyle”.

He is so right. We can’t ignore the fact that consumers are now using mobile more than ever to engage with brands and make purchases. In his latest eBook, “Mobile is Eating the World”, Brian emphasises just how engaged mobile consumers have become. For instance, did you know that they spend on average 177 minutes on their phone every day? Their phones are their first go-to resource; the shiny toys that they love to use whenever possible. And the more they use them, the more they learn about mobile technology, actively or intuitively.

Brian challenged the convention of what a book should be. He did research into how our brains process long-form content, given the short attention spans of today. After all of his research, Brian determined how the reader could have a very different kind of book experience. Besides creating a book that is rich with content, he also built in experiences with joys and pleasures, resulting in a book that you not only want to read, but also experience. As a result, Shep Hyken places X: The Experience when Business Meets Design on his list of the all-time top 10 business books.

Solis knows his stuff, so the irony of writing a book about the digital experience was not lost on him when he started the process. What did catch him unawares, though, was how quickly the reading experience was changing. People now approach reading books like they do using an app, he said, with the most obvious end result being a very short attention span.

When he started the book, the average attention span for reading was six minutes. Six minutes to capture someone’s attention before they turned to their smartphone. When he finished the first draft, that had dropped to 60 seconds.

Brian Solis (principal analyst bij Altimeter Group en schrijver/spreker over customer experience) legt het goed uit in zijn onvolprezen laatste boek X: The Experience When Business Meets Design (2016, aff.): ‘Experiences are more important than products now. In fact, experiences are products. […] People increasingly share their experiences with companies and products in our connected economy, and we can either be active participants in creating and nurturing desired experiences or spend more and more time in trying tot react or make up for bad experiences’. De eisen die klanten aan organisaties stellen nemen alleen maar toe: ‘We’re just getting started.’

All companies—including cloud companies—claim customer-centrism, but in 2017 those with true CX will outperform, according to business guru Solis

When you speak to Brian Solis, the acclaimed digital analyst and anthropologist and author of books such as X: The Experience Where Business Meets Design, you get the impression of a student of life. While many follow his professional outputs and utilize them as best practices in business innovation, digital transformation, experience design and other initiatives, he does not spend much time burnishing his credentials. He’s too busy looking for the next opportunity to engage customers, employees and potential stakeholders….

“We need to re-engineer the customer experience,” Solis says. “The question is how do you take the friction out of an aging or outdated process. Everything from the table of contents in books outward has changed. We don’t need to pretend CX has always been the same.”

Brian Solis is principal analyst at Altimeter Group (a Prophet company). Solis is globally recognized as one of the most prominent thought leaders, speakers, and published authors in new technology, digital marketing and culture shifts.

His new book, X: The Experience When Business Meets Design, explores the importance of experiences and how to design them for customers, employees and human beings everywhere. Solis also designed the book to be an experience as a physical example of what’s possible when you take a step back to rethink products, services and models in a new economy (and world). www.xthebook.com.

In the special show, that has little to do with sport directly but everything to do with business change and understanding your audience.

Solis has been recognized with innumerable awards and titles. He has made more than 450 presentations to universities, businesses and organizations, and has appeared at events ranging from South by Southwest (SXSW) and TEDx, to engagements with clients such as L’Oreal, 3M, Oracle and Google.

As a result, Brian has been named as one of the “100 Most-Wanted Speakers” at tech conferences, ranked as an “Influential Keynote Speaker,” listed as one of “14 Speakers to Book for Conferences Right Now” and one of “25 Keynote Speakers You Need to Know.”

In this episode of the Breaking Bank$ podcast: Host Brett King speaks with Brian Solis, an expert in technology and customer behaviors who shared thoughts from his new book X: The Experience When Business Meets Design.

Whether you personally love or hate listicles that mention industry influencers and people to watch, you can’t deny the value of knowing who your audience pays attention to. Anyone your audience follows closely and perceives as influential is someone who should be on your radar…

True influence is hard to nail down, so it’s good to look at the big picture and keep these people on your radar: […]

9. Brian Solis, Principal Analyst, Altimeter Group; Author; and Keynote Speaker

Brian Solis is globally recognized as one of the most prominent thought leaders, speakers, and published authors in new technology, digital marketing, and culture shifts. He is the author of “X: The Experience When Business Meets Design,” along with three other bestselling books.

VR gives you that Jay-Z feeling, where you could almost high five Knicks and Nets or trip a referee. And while you aren’t seated next to a celebrity and you won’t get a rebound, you can’t get much closer to the action without suiting up. Altimeter Group principal analyst Brian Solis, who literally wrote the book on user experiences (called “X”), says that while the current VR setup may be somewhat isolating, “it’s as good as you can get without being at the game.”