ReadWriteWeb

As mobile phone penetration continues to surge, the years-old hype about the mobile Web being the next big thing is no doubt coming true. But despite all of the industry gurus, conference keynotes and trade magazine articles imploring you to get your business ready for the mobile space, it's not always easy to know where to begin. Sure, you could hire a team of top-notch mobile developers, but not every business owner has that luxury, especially with the economy still in limbo.

Here are a few tools to get started:

One of our favorite new trends here at ReadWriteWeb is the quickly growing field of mobile technology and how we can take more of the Web along with us when we leave our computers. Because of the expanding popularity of smartphones and mobile data use, startups these days need to develop plans for marketing their brand on mobile devices at very early stages of their development. Cindy Krum, CEO of Rank-Mobile, a consulting firm focused on mobile marketing and SEO, is the author of this week's featured read, Mobile Marketing: Finding Your Customers No Matter Where They Are.

Everyone has been talking about how this year's SXSW will be the "year of location" as Foursquare and Austin-based Gowalla go head-to-head in a location-based battle royale. Location, however, is not the only emerging technology that will be on display in Austin; American auto maker Chevrolet announced it will be debuting new augmented reality promotions at SXSW this year.

While 2009 has been the year of the API, it's the codeless creative experiences that drive mainstream adoption. Every December, ReadWriteWeb's writers collect up their thoughts from 2009 and make predictions for the year ahead. My first prediction was that augmented reality applications would gain popularity. Part of that prediction was informed by a recent interview with Metaio Marketing Director Lisa Murphy.

Google's Android mobile operating system isn't as popular as the iPhone, but its application marketplace is wide open and one service tracking Android apps reports that there are now more than ten thousand available. Below are my five favorite Android apps so far, along with QR codes you can scan (I'm using the BarCode Scanner app) to find them immediately in the marketplace.

Androlib is the service that's identified the 10k apps and is also where I got the QR codes to jump to my favorites. Robin Wauters caught and reported on the 10k news first.