NEW YORK ? A mobile industry executive said that there is no commercial reason to build an Android or BlackBerry application, claiming iPhone is the important platform to build for during a panel discussion at the Luxury Interactive 2010 Conference.

Jason Taylor, vice president of global product strategy at Usablenet, New York, stressed the importance of the iPhone, especially for the luxury industry. The experience that is possible on the iPhone really matches how luxury brands are looking to engage their audiences, he said.

?We built a mobile Web site first,? said Kerry Kennedy, vice president of ecommerce at Omni Hotels, New York. ?From our perspective, 80 percent of our customers have a BlackBerry so we had to have a presence on BlackBerry.

?However, we went to market with an iPhone application first anyway,? he said.

Mr. Kennedy said that mobile checkout for business travelers on the Omni mobile site is due to roll out next month.

iPhone mania
The moderator of the panel was Ronit Weinberg, former vice president of ecommerce and online marketing at Diane Von Furstenberg, New York.

She brought up the fact that the Obama Administration announced its support to free up 500 MHz of spectrum as part of its wireless broadband initiative yesterday.

That means more bandwidth for iPhone application users. AT&T has seen 50 percent more wireless data traffic this year than it has in the last three years combined, per Ms. Weinberg.

?There is potential to have great mcommerce functionality and stability, which is everything we need to grow this space,? Ms. Weinberg said.

The growth of smartphone adoption is the biggest trend in mobile that influences the luxury marketer, per Russ Moorhead, New York-based vice president of online strategy at Aveda, an Estee Lauder brand.

?The first thing to realize is the different device dynamics in different parts of the world,? Mr. Moorhead said. ?In the U.S. most of our mobile Web audience comes from the iPhone but the same does not hold true for our site visitors in Japan.

?Mobile for sure is very appropriate for the luxury market,? he said. ?More luxury customers than the average will be on smartphones like the iPhone.?

Mickey Alam Khan, editor in chief of Mobile Marketer, New York, said that brands across the spectrum are getting into the application space.

Already brands such as Gucci, D&G, Chloe, Jimmy Choo and Bergdorf Goodman have applications for the iPhone.

?Right now these are shopping apps, but I suspect they will soon have mcommerce capabilities,? Mr. Alam Khan said.  ?I have seen an increase in the mobilizing of print ads and if you have a reader on your phone you can snap a picture and get more information from a brand?s print ad.?

Mr. Alam Khan said that Jimmy Choo and Rolex did a good job mobilizing their print ads in W Magazine. Pongr was responsible for the image recognition technolgy that mobilized the ads.

Video on mobile is becoming big as well. It is a great way to position a brand and engage with consumers while they are on the go.

?For Omni Hotels, we have built our culture on interaction with the guests,? Mr. Kennedy said. ?We don?t have kiosks, so we had to grapple with the idea of whether mobile is this something that can present a luxury front for us.?

Omni created applications with Usablenet to communicate with people.

?You will always have people in the luxury space that want a call center and want a travel agency,? Mr. Kennedy said. ?And there are people that want mobile and want to be left alone.?

Mr. Kennedy said that the Omni mobile Web site is seeing a 25 percent conversion. The site traffic is not there yet, but there are people who are ready and want to buy.

Usablenet currently has 157 clients and has been in the mobile business for 10 years.

?Five years ago it was all about the business traveler,? Mr. Taylor said. ?We were mobilizing the sites for Delta and American Airlines.

?In just the last two years, the rest of the world has caught up,? he said. ?The iPhone has made people view the mobile device differently.

"They no longer just have a mobile phone in their pocket. They have a small PC.?

The pinch and zoom functionality on the iPhone is great for luxury brands, which can use it to present their products via high resolution photos to mobile consumers.

Start with a mobile site
?The one thing luxury brands should do right off the bat is create a mobile site,? Mr. Alam Khan said. ?Start with a site.

?Consumers are beginning to expect the same experience on mobile as they expect on the PC,? he said. ?If they are going to New York they want to know where the Gucci store is and expect to be able to find you on the mobile Web.?

Aveda?s Mr. Moorhead said that the company?s mobile commerce platform lets people engage with the brand in a specific way (see story).

?It is driving people to the counter,? Mr. Moorhead said. ?Traffic patterns are different than on the PC, but it is exponential growth each time we check analytics.?

Mr. Alam Khan offered some best practices:

1. Have a mobile-friendly Web site.
2. Make sure a site or application has a search function on every single page.
3. Invest in a common short code to build a CRM list.
4. Run mobile banner advertising.
5. Use large images. Nothing like an image to sell your brand.

?Pick the right partners,? Mr. Kennedy said.