The PC isn't dead yet, we've just got to get SoLoMo

It's Monday morning and I'm scanning the Guardian's Technology blog – on my iPhone. I take particular interest in the 'Monday Note' from Jean–Louise Gasseé titled 'Do mobile, the cloud and social spell the end of the PC era?'.

My immediate thought is – probably not yet – considering the majority of us use one most days. I then get into the main thrust of the article which profiles Apple, Facebook and Google as the main players who are set to 'disrupt' the technology industry at detriment to previous leaders such as Microsoft.

In the main, Mr Gasseé is correct – gone are the days when one player dominates the market and gets it right first time, every time. He also makes a valid point about the three main players in the industry today; Google is at the top of its game when it comes to the cloud and Android, Apple is steaming ahead with mobile and using the Cloud to unlock the iTunes business model and Facebook has got social covered.

But not one of them has dominated all three areas – yet – and this is what they have to keep an eye on. I believe those who collaborate the best will be the winners in the future; the boardrooms who see the value of a slightly smaller piece of a much bigger pie rather than blindly trying to keep all of the pie to themselves. This brings me onto SoLoMo or Social, Local, Mobile – something I took away following my recent panellist slot at the excellent Think Local event hosted by Google.

The words that still ring in my ears are from Emma Frazer of Google, who opened her presentation with "Be found, be relevant, be local, be mobile, be fast". This really resonated with my own thoughts and is the type of message that I relay back to clients who are unsure on using these technologies.

Another speaker, Bonin Bough of PepsiCo, spoke about the digital health of businesses and posed the question; 'Are organisations prepared for a world where digital innovation happens at this pace?' and then explained that survival of the fittest is now more apparent than ever in this industry.

If you're waiting on the sidelines waiting to get involved, you've already lost the battle. You must act, even if that means taking a few (calculated) risks. As Bonin said "Failure to adapt = Failure to survive".

It was then that I knew I was surrounded by like minded people.

At Rockpool, we believe that there are three touch points in any retail activity now; in–store, mobile and your PC. Everything you do needs to be 'consumer centric', so it's not about the technology anymore but what the consumer wants and how they want it to be delivered.

So the key is where the data ends up in all of this. You must have one centralised profile – we call this a unified profile, so that you can communicate with the consumer on an intelligent level no matter where they last interacted with you. This will enable you to personalise your messaging and create a targeted conversation both online and in person that will naturally bond you with your customers.