Mobile App Trends

Review: Temple Run 2 for iOS

Posted on January 31, 2013 by KiwiTech

Temple Run 2, the follow-up of the hugely popular game TempleRun, has landed at the Apple’s App Store as well as Google Play Store. Surprisingly, within the first week of its launch at the Apple’s App Store, the app has drawn 20 million downloads.

Such a magnificent figure has also made Temple Run 2 the fastest growing game to ever hit that mark, according to Polygon, besting the previous top app Angry Birds Space.

The sequel promises to be a greater hit than its predecessor, which has been downloaded more than 170 million times. If you enjoyed Imangi Studios’ iconic endless runnerTemple Run, this sequel is an essential download.

Just like the original TempleRun, which took the users through some danger-filled action-packed experience, this game features the same action but in a new and exciting environment. The game now offers power-ups, a mine cart, zip lines, and an even bigger monkey, according to the App Store description. The new iOS title also comes with improved graphics.

Imangi Studios says it rewrote Temple Run 2 from the scratch and worked on making the game more agreeable with future updates.

“Right from the first boot up you’ll get a sense of déjà vu. You’re still being chased by freaky monkeys and you’re still using a combination of swipes and tilts to jump or slide past obstacles and collect coins. This is totally TempleRun,” the company said.

Players must now guide the hero over rivers, across ziplines, up hills, and even through caves in a mine cart.

TempleRun, as you may be aware, is an endless running game in which you play a treasure hunter being chased by demon monkeys. Since the character runs on its own, all you need to do it to tilt the device to collect coins and swipe on the screen to turn corners and avoid obstacles. It’s easy to learn, but one has to be careful as the character speeds up when you remain longer on the gameplay scene. The new version doesn’t seem to mess up with the tried and tested success formula of the previous title.

The gameplay also appears to be more fluid and brings in a lot of variety. Developer Imangi Studios used the Unity development platform for Temple Run 2 and has convincingly fleshed out the game’s world.

Temple Run 2 has also introduced the mine-cart section, where your character reaches the mouth of a mine then leaps into a cart, which you then steer safely through forks by tilting left and right, while ducking under stray beams.

You are given four characters to choose from: Guy Dangerous, Scarlett Fox, Barry Bones, and Karma Lee. In terms of power-ups, shield protects you from the obstacles, boost whizzes you ahead at a faster pace, and coin magnet attracts all the coins – all for a limited period of time. Each of these characters also has one power-up built in, which you can use by double-tapping when you’ve collected enough coins to fill up the coin meter.

Since Temple Run 2 is a free game, the currencies available are same as the predecessor: coins and gems. Coins play a really important part as you can use them to increase the distance and duration of their power-ups, making the coin meter fill faster, and multiplying them. At the same time, gems are being used for restarting from the point you died rather than the very beginning, or one-time boosts of power-ups.

In order to boost your performance, you can purchase coins as in-app purchases: coins run from $0.99 to $9.99, while gems go from $4.99 to $19.99 for 500.

Overall, the Temple Run 2 is a stylish and interesting fresh take on the already popular free running genre with the added dose of fun. What’s good about it is that it does a good job in keeping up the user’s interest level high. It will surely appeal to those users who don’t always want to learn a complex new game with a lot of depth. The frenzied game is mindless, addictive, fast, fun, and free.

Posted in Apps of the Week | Tagged Mobile apps, Temple Run, Temple Run 2 | Leave a comment

Facebook is now the most used mobile app in the United States: comScore

Posted on January 28, 2013 by KiwiTech

Facebook has become the most popular app in the United States in terms of unique users, according to numbers released by comScore.

The social network’s app, which had 85,574,000 unique visitors in December, surpassed Google Maps after September. However, the analytics firm also notes that Google may make a comeback looking at its new and popular Maps app for iOS6 which is now available.

ComScore also said the mapping app “has been clawing its way back in the past few months.” The study added that Apple’s decision to replace Google Maps on the iPhone with its own equivalent service in October 2012 was “largely responsible for the position swap.”

In terms of the overall popular apps, Google still claimed five of the top six spots in the U.S. market at the end of 2012. After Google Maps (74,631,000 users) came Google Play (with 61,461 users), Google Search (60,567,000 users), Gmail (53,934,000 users), and YouTube (52,572,000 users).

Facebook also tops the charts when it comes to how much time the users spend of the app. comScore data shows that for Facebook it is 23% of time that the users spent considering all the apps. It is followed by Instagram which has 3% stake and then by Gmail and YouTube. Overall, all of Google’s apps combined account for 10% of time spent. That means that more than 1 out of every 3 minutes spent of mobile apps is spent on Facebook or on a Google app.

“2013 will present an interesting dynamic as Google and Facebook wrestle for app supremacy, while other media properties look to carve out a niche or establish a more prominent position,” comScore’s vice president of industry analysis, Andrew Lipsman, said in blogpost.

Mark Zuckerberg, Facebook’s Chief Executive, said late last year that its app users were particularly important, as they had a 70 per cent likelihood of logging on every day versus 40 per cent for desktop-only users.

“People use our mobile app to visit Facebook more frequently,” he asserted. “Facebook is the most widely downloaded app on basically every smartphone platform, so we’re well positioned to reach the growing smartphone population.”

The comScore figures should come as a boost for the social networking giant, which has faced Wall Street pressure to generate revenue from its growing mobile audience.

“If there is one thing we can all bet on, it’s that the market will look very different a year from now.”

Posted in Mobile App Facts | Leave a comment

Windows 8 Apps Store Cracks 20,000 Mark – Most of the Apps are Free

Posted on November 27, 2012 by KiwiTech

As reported by a site called “Win App Update,” Microsoft superseded the 20,000 apps mark at the global level for its Windows 8 apps store. Although it may seem paltry as compared to over 7000,000 apps available in the Apple Store and over 600,000 present in Google Play, this achievement is significant for a company like Microsoft, as it is quite new in the app trade market.

These are worldwide numbers; however, they vary if we take a look at the regional numbers. For example, the Canadian Windows 8 app store has somewhere around 14,000 apps, while the US and UK have almost 12,675 and 11,000 apps, respectively.

What seems good for Microsoft is the number of apps that are being added to its online market. According to “The Next Web,” the company is adding close to 500 new apps everyday. At this speed, the Windows Store would have relatively 40,000 apps by the end of 2012. Moreover, the number is expected to rise, as the buyers of new Windows PCs would begin their search for new apps as the holiday season approaches. Earlier this year, Microsoft enhanced the number of markets that contributed to the app store. Microsoft added 82 new markets (more than double the original amount), bringing the total to a robust 120 countries, where the Microsoft market has been established successfully.

For Microsoft to surge ahead in this field entirely depends on their ability to lure app developers to create new apps for Windows 8 platform. Some of the features that the company is offering to the developers include financial backing, multiple options of programming languages, and permitting the developers to only write the code once for several different devices.

The company took numerous steps to speed up the app development process – for example, at their recent annual Build developer conference, Microsoft gave away new Surface tablets and Nokia Lumia 920 phones, 100GB free cloud storage on their SkyDrive, and a discount on the developer’s registration to the Windows Store.

A lot depends on the apps that Microsoft Windows 8 offers to the users for them to become really popular. The company has already said that they will provide 70 percent of the apps’ selling price to the developer who created it. Once the app earns over $25,000, the developer will receive 80 percent of the selling price. The revenue sharing method sets this particular app developer apart from the other leading players in this sector.

“Microsoft realizes it is not the big monopolist now and they know they have to conquer the market again,” said an app developer at Methylium, Tom Verheoff. This Holland-based app development company has just created Windows 8 Booking.com app for making online reservations.

Analysts say the potential of the audience may be “very appetizing” to a developer. Besides, within the new Windows 8, Microsoft is also offering more programming languages. Apart from the conventional languages such as C#, C++, and Visual Basic, the company also includes certain web development languages like HTML, JavaScript, and CSS. The variety of language also gives the company an edge over others; let’s take into account the iOS platform, it limits the developers to use Objective C. The same goes for Android, Google only supports Java.

Overall, it seems that Steve Ballmer’s focus on developers! developers! and developers! is paying dividends for Windows 8 adoption.

Posted in Mobile App Facts | Tagged App Store, Microsoft, windows 8 | Leave a comment

Mobile medical apps gaining ground in health care industry

Posted on September 28, 2012 by KiwiTech

The market for healthcare-related mobile apps has shown signs of dramatic growth throughout 2011, largely because of demand for better and improved healthcare among consumers. Healthcare apps are popping all over. A large number of doctors are incorporating them into their practices as they find them useful and efficient. Patients find them useful to monitor their health and for their overall well-being. Kalorama Information, a division of MarketResearch.com and a healthcare market research firm, in its latest findings said the market for mobile medical apps was worth about $150 million in 2011.

A striking revelation in the research was that the market share of medical apps competes with very large and popular app categories like gaming, entertainment, social networking and navigation.

One of the reasons for the growing popularity of medicals apps is the influx of iPads throughout the healthcare industry, and especially physician using iPads that has nearly doubled since 2011. A report by consumer analytics firm Manhattan Research showed that 62 per cent of the 3,015 US practicing physicians surveyed use the iPad professionally in some way, with half reported using the popular tablet at the point of care.

These results should not come as a surprise since iPads have introduced a fundamental shift in the way technology is being used to manage healthcare. An iPad can help a physician do quick calculations, manage schedule, open EMR, refer to a medical dictionary, and even easily show the medical information to the patients. The good part is that such lightweight endpoint devices enables physicians to carry the information with them wherever they go: exam rooms, hospitals or their homes. An iPad is something that just works for them.

Although healthcare-related mobile apps make up just 1-2 per cent of the entire market for mobile apps, they are expected to witness growth to the tune of 25 per cent every year for the next five years, as against 23 per cent growth estimated for the standard apps market.

There are apps for doctors, nurses, medical students and of course, the casual non-medical professional. Category-wise the apps can range from medical dictionaries, nutritional guides, weight calculators, EMR system, blood pressure monitor to calorie intake calculators.

The biggest boost to the mobile medical app sector seems to be the sector going paperless and opting for Electronic Medical Records (EMR). A number of organizations that have opted for EMRs now also offer apps for mobile. An EMR based app lets you access medical chart, diagnostic result, billing and insurance related information.

Main categories of medical apps

Clinical Reference: This refers to apps offering textbooks, web references, and medical literature management to clinicians for them to keep up-to-date information.

Medical Calculators: These apps are used by lots of healthcare professionals to accurately work out drug dosages and other formulae.

EMR Access: This allows doctors to review patient notes, order tests, and arrange follow up.

Patient Education: Apps like Orca Health Decide series and drawMD allow physicians and surgeons to educate their patients and inform them about their procedures and pathology.

Physicians can prescribe medical apps to patients under pilot program

Mobile application management company, Happtique, has been working to certify medical, health and fitness apps for users based on standards that address operability, privacy, security and content issues. The company says it helps the users to know whether a fitness, health or medical app is reliable or not. Happtique developed the app enables doctors to directly e-prescribe the healthcare apps found in the company’s databases. Happtique’s certification program include both clinical and consumer apps.

Ben Chodor, Happtique’s chief executive officer, believes that the app prescribing is a great tool to promote positive behavior change as it fosters self-management and monitoring that gives overall positive result in terms of health outcomes.

Health apps now playing doctor

Given the vast variety of health-related apps available in the market, consumers are encouraged to use them to take care of their health. One such use is seen with patients suffering from diabetes, as they need to constantly monitor their glucose levels to know about the recommend dose of insulin. For instance, Glucose Buddy is one such app that proved a lifesaver for 29-year-old Zani. Now after every meal, he inputs his food intake and the app tells him how much insulin he should use.

So whether you have diabetes, chronic pain, a food allergy, blood pressure – remember there’s an app for that.

Stephanie Bryant, a mother of two, have found the medical apps to be helpful. Taking time out of her busy schedule she uses few healthcare apps to stay on top of her family’s health. “I use few apps to keep track of my health along with my baby’s,” she said.

Interestingly, a lot of apps are capable of interacting with your household appliances that makes it easy for you to send your healthcare readings to care provider, your family friends, and others that are helping you manage your condition. Thus, an app not only serves as an informative and low-cost source for users who need advice on healthcare, it also helps doctors looking for ways to improve their communications with patients. Thus, it is not hard to guess that apps are making consumers better patients and doctors more thorough and communicative.

Medical apps offer a great solution to wellness, healthcare delivery and preventive medicine. Health and medical apps a fast growing category and the opportunities for them in both the developed and developing are profound.

Posted in Mobile App Facts | Tagged apps for healthcare industry, health related apps, healthcare apps, medical mobile apps, patient self-care apps | Leave a comment

Want to become ‘App’reneur? Here’s how to generate new ideas and spark creativity

Posted on September 17, 2012 by KiwiTech

Do you remember the Apple’s 1997 “Think Different” advertising campaign that laid the groundwork for the image for which Apple is known today? It was a masterpiece of marketing that celebrated the soul of Apple brand.

“I want to be much better. I don’t care about being different. We’ll have to be different in some ways to be much better, but that’s the prize–wouldn’t you agree?” Steve said this at the 1997 Apple WWDC conference.

“Every good product I’ve ever seen is because a group of people cared deeply about making something wonderful that they and their friends wanted. They wanted to use it themselves,” Steve had said.

Undoubtedly, Steve Jobs was a creative thinker who was also commercially aware. In fact, Steve’s influence and popularity among the so-called “Apple generation” made him the second greatest innovator of all time, behind Thomas Edison, in the 2012 Lemelson-MIT Invention Index. This was not because of the wonderful and innovative products he created, but for his willingness to think differently about how we work and the methods or tools we use.

It is true that the first skill you need to become successful as an ‘App’reneur is to think differently. You need to have some fresh ideas and you got to be creative around here. The process in developing a mobile app is not as hard or as simple one might think, but given the ever changing app landscape it becomes all the more important that you keep on coming up with creative ideas to develop amazing consumer-centric apps.

However, you need to remember that you can’t approach innovation and growth initiatives with the same thinking pattern that you have been following for quite a while. You can’t keep doing the same things everyday and expect different results. You need to expand your possibility box in order to find a clever way to communicate and visualize an innovative product idea.

And as you begin the process, you may find that your idea really isn’t that original, but maybe you are! You can easily make the difference in your approach towards the solution, your product knowledge, your passion, and your determination. As an ‘App’reneur, you would certainly want to make an impact in terms of entertaining your customers and giving them really value for money.

One can enhance their creative capabilities by understanding the underlying principles and grasping some important rules. Creativity basically consists of – divergence and convergence. Divergence means the stimulation of new thinking by diversifying and exploring, while convergence is the process in choosing best from the ideas generated by divergence. Remember, the two processes are different, so trying to do them at once won’t give you the kind of results you’d be hoping for. Here are some tips to break your thought pattern in order to come up with something new:

Challenge assumptions

The definition of an assumption is ‘assumed truth that is not questioned.’ The saying “you can’t teach an old dog new tricks” is relevant in the sense that sometimes thinking patterns are hard to change. Here assumption-busting can prove useful. For a given situation, try to look at the assumptions you are making about it. Then list out them. In this list you can probably find the assumptions that are stopping you and challenge these.

Typical assumptions include:

• It is difficult or impossible to create a best-selling app in the competitive marketplace

• Only those with money and resources can succeed in this environment

• Something works because of certain rules or conditions

As you start busting your assumptions, assume that you can overcome them by asking these questions:

Re-state the assumption in the positive. See if it still makes sense?

Pretend you are a complete outsider and ask questions like ‘why do we do it this way at all?’

Think in reverse

Creative thinking often involves trying an opposite idea of what generally people would follow. In case you feel getting stuck and are not coming up with anything new, try turning things upside-down. Rather than focusing on how you could solve a problem, think about how you could create the problem. Once you start getting ideas, reverse them again – as possible solutions for the original challenge.

Try these:

List three features that a user WOULD NOT find in a popular app

List three ways of drinking soft drink WITHOUT holding the glass with your hands

Do parallel thinking

This thinking method was popularized by Edward de Bono. The objective of this technique is to view issues from various angles. It is based on the fact that the way we think is a bit disorganized since it is free-flowing. Parallel thinking can improve a person’s imagination and creativeness, since it encourages an individual to view things from a new perspective and in turn discover new ways. Parallel thinking facilitates a great behavioral change beyond the usual way of thinking.

Do mind mapping to get creative ideas

Mind maps are a classic way to explore ideas quickly and effectively. In order to make a mind map, you need to take one idea and branch it out into various related ideas and then break them off into even smaller ideas. This method proves to be effective since it allows you to do a lot of things at once. This process can make your project a lot easier since it helps you break down barriers to ideas that you wouldn’t have possibly thought of earlier.

Conclusion: For any aspiring entrepreneur creative thinking is essential as it helps them to look at opportunities in the marketplace or come with unique solutions to a problem, which is cornerstone of any business. In the process of thinking out of the box, it is important that you go back to the things that are holding you back. The ability to take the knowledge, the knowledge that everyone has access to – and by thinking differently and creatively – can result in innovative and exciting things that will give your business the desired edge.

Posted in Tips | Tagged app building, creative ideas for mobile apps, how to build a successful app, mobile app development, ‘App’reneur | Leave a comment

3 tips to get mobile apps rank higher in search engine results page

Posted on August 31, 2012 by KiwiTech

The explosive growth in the mobile application space has made it tough for users to find interesting and new apps in the crowded App marketplaces. Given the huge supply of apps, the problem is even bigger for app developers to not only make their apps get noticed, but also to drive engagement, retention, and monetization from their users. A study by ABI Research suggests that smartphone users worldwide will download 37 apps on average in 2012 as against 35 apps downloaded per smartphone on average in 2011. Thus, it is not hard to figure out the challenges that an app developer has to face to gain exposure to be among the 37 downloads a user makes a year.

Moreover, when it comes to finding applications on the Apple App Store, things are not pretty straight forward due to limited search and discovery features. The iTunes App Store makes it easy to find the most popular apps or the trending application, but the real problem arises when you’re not able to break the Top 100 or Top 200 lists, as then the chances of your app getting noticed reduces even further. So unless you know the app name, there’s little chance that you can find it. Finding the Where’s My Perry? app, Angry Birds Space app or Camera+ app is easy, but if you’re looking for not something popular, things aren’t as simple. Here we are giving few SEO tips on title, description, and other metadata with keywords, so that you can keep the spotlight on your app and get the revenue and profit momentum going.

Leverage traditional SEO practices

Usually Apple’s App Store is the best place where people search for apps. But it isn’t the only way, as a lot of users now search in Google and other search engines, provided that apps are optimized for that purpose. But you may wonder how to ensure that your app appear on search engine results page. One of the best ways to do it is through back linking, which is similar for both a mobile app and a web page. Back linking is about having inbound links to your web page or iTunes page. The more inbound links you have, the more visible you are in search engines. The tricks involved in promoting your mobile app are to an extent the same you’d use to promote your blog or a digital asset. Remember, the content you would use to describe the app is of great importance in promoting it in the search engine. This may include description, keywords, title and the category. There are three key things about SEO for mobile apps: letting the crawlers know that you exist, optimized content and the credibility you’ll get through social media. Here’s how you can compete with the best of the best:

Optimise name and URL of your app: Choosing a good name for your app will have a positive impact on SEO, both in search engines and mobile app marketplaces. Consider choosing relevant keywords in your app’s name that best describe the app. Keep them short and simple and try considering two-part name like MoneyCounter or PhoneShare. If you have a strong brand, then you should consider including it in the name of the app. Just like the name, the URL is also important for better SEO ranking. Remember, the name of your application will automatically be used as the URL filename by default, so try not to include special characters in the app’s name.

Keywords: These are the terms that a user will be searching for in the App Store. Keywords should be descriptive about your app and should be tailored to your target audience. Given that the keywords hold heavy weightage in the search algorthim after app’s name, try to optimize all your keywords for 100 characters maximum, including spaces. Figure out what combination will people be using to search for your app.

Categorizing your app: Be strategic in choosing the category for your mobile app. Given that categories like games, entertainment and lifestyle are all very competitive categories, take a thoughtful approach on how to choose the best category which will make your app reach the intended audience.

Optimizing the app description: On the iTunes side, the app description doesn’t hold too much of importance but it really matters when it comes to Google rankings. In order to achieve a better rank in Google, you need to optimize the description of the app that you submit. You need to lay a lot of focus on the first two sentences because most people are only going to see the first few sentences. These should depict what your app does and why the users should download it. Thereafter you can include a long description which should showcase to users what they’re going to see.

Display screenshots and icons: The first thing people see when they search for the app is the icon and name. Thus, having a great icon is crucial since it influences a lot of people to decide whether or not to download the app. Similarly, your app should include great screenshots – that depicts the inside of the app and something which convinces potential users to buy your app. The current trend is of writing some explanations on your screenshot to make sure that people can figure out their functionality instantly. Moreover, if your app is available in several languages, upload screenshots for each of them.

Build links for mobile app pages

Create links between the brand’s webpage and the App Store download page. On the home page of your website consider building a section dedicated to your apps with reviews, features, screenshots and the download links. While creating a dedicated page on your website, don’t make the classic “click here” SEO mistake without mentioning the name of the brand in the link. Consider using, “Download the Weather+ Touch HD iPad app.”

Link equity is a key factor so use all options possible to build links to make your content more authoritative and visible in search. Reach out to review sites to generate buzz around your app. To generate more exposure for your apps, you can give them free promo codes. Leverage the power of social media by posting updates about your mobile app on your Facebok and Twitter profile pages. Besides you can also create a demo video to host on YouTube and embed it in social media (blogs, Facebook, Twitter etc) that replicates the user experience. The primary aim of link building for mobile app pages is to improve the organic search popularity so that a large number of people can download the app.

Get user reviews

Mobile marketplaces take into account user reviews to rank your app. The more positive reviews your app can garner, the better it is for you. In case your app is lacking some, then you can invite users to leave positive feedbacks.

Conclusion: The best way to bring traffic to your app is by perfectly mixing these tips. As with any project, if you want to reap benefits from your mobile app, it is essential that you devise a near perfect mobile marketing plan and take an wholistic approach towards your promotional efforts. In case of any assistance, please contact our marketing department.

Posted in Tips | Tagged app URL, mobile app backlinks, Mobile app discoverability, mobile app downloads, mobile app marketing, mobile app name, SEO for apps | Leave a comment

How to reach your customers through a mobile app

Posted on August 27, 2012 by KiwiTech

Spreading your business in a tough economic environment is never easy. Being a business owner one has to deal with multiple tasks like keeping up with products, services, and competition, besides maintaining a two-way communication with customers. Current trends indicate that users are increasingly going mobile and one of the best ways to connect with them is through mobile apps.

A report by Flurry suggests that consumers are spending more time on mobile apps than on the web. Flurry found that in June, consumers spent 81 minutes per day using mobile apps, compared to 74 minutes of web surfing. The shift comes because of a large number of users purchasing smartphones and tablets. Similarly, a February 2012 Forrester research entitled, “Mobile Marketing: Three Principles for Success,” said the number of consumers researching products for purchase using their mobile device has nearly doubled from last year. This indeed makes a mobile marketing strategy crucial for any interactive marketer.

Organizations of all sizes and nature are now embracing the revolution called mobile apps. A clear and intuitive app, designed intelligently, can do wonders for a company if the approach is correct. Here are some ways that you need to keep in mind while delivering a powerful app experience that could be a game changer for your business.

Connect your customers to remarkable content and mobile experience

Today, no consumer business can ignore the potential of reaching out to customers through mobile applications for customer service, marketing and now payments. But before you start, you need to remember that great user experiences doesn’t just happen overnight. It takes a conscious effort throughout every stage of the design and development process to get it right.

Guidelines

• Prioritize and present core features of your app. For a pizza chain like Domino’s, which already has apps on both iOS and Android, it could be convenience and delivery. The Domino’s Pizza app allows you to place an order for delivery or carry-out. You can also choose to select from its specialty pizzas or build your own. A striking feature of the app is the pizza tracker, which allows users to check whether your order is in the delivery process or not.

• You can opt for geo-location feature. The feature provides a rich experience to a user since it gives relevant data based on your location. One such example is Shopkick, an advanced geo-location social shopping application. A recent survey of 5,000 Android and iPhone users conducted by consumer insight group Nielsen, placed Shopkick at top of the list in the category that engages shoppers the longest, being used by consumers for three hours on average. Shopkick is a free location-based rewards application that offers its users “kickbucks” (rewards) when they check-in at participating businesses, and when they scan the barcodes on specific products. These kickbucks can be redeemed for restaurant vouchers, retail gift cards, movie tickets, and more.

• Make sure that your app contains all the features relevant to your category (retail, shopping, productivity, location-planning, paperless ticketing, music, games, etc.)

• Besides functionality, you also have to focus on providing the right type of content to your users. Apple’s own User Interface Guidelines suggest that to make an app that people will care about, one need to focus on content. For this you need to first draft a statement of intent for your content. Identify how will your content promote your business objectives and meet the customer needs. Remember the objective of this exercise is to demonstrate to your audience why you matter.

(Read: 7 pre-launch tips to deliver a successful mobile app)

Integrate your app seamlessly with social networks

Social media Integration on your mobile app is a good way to help users interact with social networks. Besides Facebook and Twitter, there are other options too like Tumblr, Pinterest, Instagram and Flickr, that can improve engagement with your existing and potential customers. Here’s how social media can help you in increasing brand loyalty:

- Identify customer needs and engage them through social media marketing contests, surveys, and opinion polls

- Use feedback to gain insight and improve performance

- Encourage customers to share their experience on the company website

Grilling app, iGrill, is a good example of winning combination of mobile apps and social media. The app recently rose to limelight when Mark Zuckerberg, founder and CEO of Facebook, praised the app on his Facebook page saying, “I updated my grilling app, iGrill, today and it now has Facebook integration that lets you see what other people are grilling right now around the world. Awesome. I’m making a Fred’s steak.”

Also, if you want to run a social media contest to promote your app, make sure you market your campaign or contest across multiple platforms like: social media accounts, your website, your partners, all of your e-mail list, related forums, etc.

(Read: Learn more about how to launch your app effectively here)

Build buzz around your new product or event

A mobile app is probably one of the best ways to inform your customers about new products and services that you have already launched or about to launch in the market. In this era of cut-throat competition, a key element of an effective marketing strategy is to create the buzz around your product. Offering users discounts and offers will prompt them to visit you more often and spread the good word as well.

Make sure you customers can find your app easily

No doubt an app is a wonderful way to connect with your customers, but the idea won’t work unless it is visible to masses. The usual trend is that developers only submit their app to their respective marketplace. To make it more visible you can create a dedicated website, build a splash page, Facebook fan page, Twitter account, get a blog, do a sneak peak, or create teaser videos. For further assistance on mobile app marketing, you can contact us.

Posted in Tips | Tagged custom app development, in-app advertising, mobile app for business, mobile app launch, mobile app marketing, Mobile apps, social media integration | Leave a comment

Apps Rush: Pitfall, AppZilla 3: 150 in 1!, MotionX GPS Drive, Mad Skills BMX, Stickman Snowboarder

Posted on August 23, 2012 by KiwiTech

Pitfall

Activision is celebrating Pitfall’s 30th anniversary by releasing a new Pitfall title for iPad, iPhone, iPod Touch. The new game is a Temple Run-style endless runner that is all about running, jumping, and swinging — just like the original version. Pitfall is designed to give gamers of all age groups a taste of what it was like to run through a jungle filled with dangers or to perform wobbly leaps. Pitfall stars the adventurer Pitfall Harry, who in search of rare treasures scattered across the game world, move through fast-paced action pathways and a host of obstacles and challenges. Here the players run, jump and slide through a terrain to get as far as possible from the thing chasing them. However, the jungle is no walk in the park. Every level is fraught with hazards ranging from branching paths, falling trees, rolling logs, erupting volcano, mine carts, vehicles, crocodiles, rope swings, cobras, and more. Players need to remember that a single mistake can lead them to start it over. The game appears quite appealing with its retro, high-definition graphics and controls that are similar to Temple Run. Overall, the game offers a good retake on the free running adventure and has enough personality to make it a must-have app. There app also includes a dual in-game economy which means while running you’ll earn coins that you can cash in for upgrades and single-use items. Moreover, you can also buy these currencies as an in-app purchase.

AppZilla 3: 150 in 1!

It can’t get better than this – AppZilla is now offering 150 distinct apps in one single app. This huge library of apps is the third installments in the series and offers applications that vary in value, appeal and usefulness. AppZilla 3 is designed to resemble a series of icons across many swipable pages, that offer apps in communication (Word List, Morse Code Flasher, Language Translator), everyday use (GPS locator, Price Calculator, Book Lamp, Meditation), iPhone apps (Auto camera, Full Camera, Battery Life), online (Google Apps, Download Speed Test) and entertainment (Age Calc, Movie Timer, Loud Mouth, Heat Vision, On This Day, Sports Radio). The third version comes with features such as dot-lock protection which helps you make some apps private, a category view, live wallpaper and an auto-launch app system. Although the apps come in an alphabetical order, you can reorder them, add them to favourites, and even hide them from view. Further, to distinguish the new apps from the old apps, the new apps come with a yellow “new” caption. Some of the new apps include: Blackjack, Solitaire, War, Video Poker, Interval Timer, Meditation, Recall, Spin Pick, MaxRep Calc, Lottery, Age Calc, Synthesizer, Census, and ZIP Code. For a new user, it may come as a pack of app-goodies but it may come as a disappointment for users who own the previous two versions of this app since this wasn’t offered as an update. Overall, it delivers a whole lot of goodies for just $0.99.

MotionX GPS Drive

MotionX-GPS Drive is a cost effective alternative to the more well-known turn-by-turn navigation apps. The app offers users turn-by-turn directions of a GPS car unit, plus up-to-date map data and integration with your address book and music app. The company has recently released an update in which it has added several new features to make driving a lot easier. GPS Drive now provides better lane assistance, a true full-screen viewing mode, a new speed limit that displays your current speed, along with a visual warning when you exceed the speed limit and an option for Facebook check-in when you arrive at your destination, and more. MotionX GPS Drive is a universal app compatible with iPhone and iPad running iOS 3.0 or later, and available in the App Store for $0.99. The app offers outstanding value for money due to its accurate directions, clearly spoken voice prompts, and an intuitive interface.

Mad Skills BMX

Based on BMX racing, Mad Skills BMX is sure to impress you with its unique arcade based action. Mad Skills BMX is an action-packed game that is addictive and fun to play. Here bikers are pitted against each other in 40 different levels in four classes: Novice, Intermediate, Expert and Pro, with each testing their ability to maneuver over hills, make impressive jumps, and defeating the opponent. Besides excellent graphics, Mad Skills BMX offers simple control options: you keep a finger down on the left hand side of the screen to make your player accelerate, while swiping on the right side can make you flip, or lean forward. The game also offers the punk rock tunes by Strungout to get you pumped up for extreme racing. You can also connect to Facebook to race against your friend’s best times on every track, and climb up the leaderboards. Overall, the game is designed to test your BMX skills – to really know just how ‘extreme’ you are.

Stickman Snowboarder

Stickman Snowboarder is third in the series of games developed by Traction Games. In this new title players can now spin, slide, grind and grab their way through 60 levels spread across four different locations. The objective is to ride along the snowy slopes, over the cable cars, handrails, rooftops, and many other rideable objects, by performing as many tricks as possible. The players control the stickman through two buttons given on the bottom left and right sides of the screen. The left side button is used to move the snowboarder and the button on the right is for performing tricks. During the gameplay, the more tricks you perform the more points you’ll earn. Some of the obstacles that the snowboarder may have to face include pines, rocks, cliffs, saws, and whales, which you can overcome by jumping higher and further. If a player makes a mistake and falls off the track, they are automatically placed back at the last check point. Each level requires users to complete three goals: collect the stars, tokens and complete a level without crashing. Overall, it is a nice game to play, but what makes it a bit dull is the lack of power-ups.

Posted in Best Apps | Tagged AppZilla 3: 150 in 1!, iOS apps, Mad Skills BMX, MotionX GPS Drive, Pitfall, Stickman Snowboarder | Leave a comment

Starbucks partners with Square for mobile payments, invests $25 million

Posted on August 9, 2012 by KiwiTech

You could soon pay for a Cappuccino at Starbucks simply by walking into the store with your smartphone and say your name at the counter. The cashier can verify it’s you by looking at the picture you uploaded in your Square profile.

Global coffee shop chain Starbucks has invested $25 million in mobile payments processor Square in an effort to take mobile payments mainstream. Starbucks will begin rolling out mobile payment service this Fall at its 7000 stores across the United States. The alliance comes at a time when Square is facing increased competition from rivals like eBay, Google, Intuit, PayPal, Sprint and Microsoft and start-ups like Scvngr/LevelUp and GoPago.

What the deal means

Essentially, consumers would be using Square’s credit card reader application for smartphones, including the iPhone, iPad and Android, to process the transaction. Customer wishing to make a purchase with their smartphone, need to open the ‘Pay with Square’ application and when the app is opened, they need to touch a tab, and a two-dimensional barcode will appear that can be scanned at the Starbucks counter.

Square also said the partnership will have the company processing all of the coffee giant’s credit and debit transactions, which will expand Square’s scale and expedite the benefits to businesses on the Square platform, while reducing payment processing costs. As part of the deal, Starbucks will also participate in the Square directory, a mobile guide to nearby merchants that accept Square payments. Besides hoping for an influx of new merchants, according to Square, the directory can be easily become the best tool to find the nearest Starbucks.

Starbuck also said that in future it plans to roll out some advanced Square products, like one that allows stores to use proximity sensors to know when a customer carrying a smartphone loaded with Square’s app has entered inside the store. Thus, the cashier then only needs to announce the customer’s name to collect the payment.

Square CEO and founder Jack Dorsey sent along the following e-mail to the company’s customers:

Square began with a really simple idea: everyone should be able to accept credit cards. It should be easy and free to get set up, it should use simple technology people already own, and, most importantly, it should instantly adapt to any size business. By embracing Square, Starbucks has validated these ideas as powerful tools.

The partnership between Starbuck and Square holds tremendous value for both the companies and for the fast growing field of mobile payments. Nearly two-thirds of 27 million small businesses in the US do not accept credit or debit cards since it make them pay high interchange fees associated with credit card payment processing, apart from credit checks, and static location credit card transaction processing. Mobile payments are growing in popularity as a new alternative payment method that has proved their usefulness and are widening the way the world determines and trades value.

Mobile payment transactions to hit $171 billion in 2012

Earlier this year, Gartner predicted that worldwide mobile payment transaction values will surpass $171.5 billion in 2012, a 61.9 per cent increase from 2011′s $105.9 billion. It also said that 50 million additional people will use their mobile phone to make a payment in one form or another this year, taking the total number of global mobile payment users to 212.2 million in 2012 — up from 160.5 million in 2011.

At the same time, Gartner also predicted that NFC payments won’t hit the mass market until 2015. The firm also expected web/WAP access, currently the preferred access technology in North America and western Europe, to account for 88 per cent of total transactions in North America and about 80 per cent in western Europe by 2016. Indeed the prospects of the technology growing leaps and bounds are tremendous and a lot of firms are on the lookout to take advantage of this platform.

While mobile payments seem incredibly compelling as an idea, there has to be uniformity for it to be adopted on a mass scale. Like a consumer going to a vendor has to use a particular method to make payment and something different for another. Gaining market share will depend on convincing the entire payment network is and what benefits it can offer to the users.

Although the deal may come as a booster dose for Sqaure, it has a long way to go before going on a wide scale. There are also some consumers who have expressed concern over data security but Square has assured the public that that all transactions are securely encrypted.

Posted in What's New | Tagged Mobile app as credit card, Mobile apps for payments, Mobile payments, Mobile Wallet, Square, Starbucks | Leave a comment

Mobile applications: Five reasons you need them to grow your business

Posted on August 6, 2012 by KiwiTech

Thanks to ubiquitous smartphones, there’s lot of buzz among businesses to go mobile. A large number of companies are now expressing the willingness to become accessible to consumers using mobile phones. And as a smart business owner, you know you need a mobile app to compete in the fiercely competitive environment. An app can be a great engagement medium, and can easily connect businesses with prospects, clients and customers, share relevant news, and offer information and programs to on-the-go consumers who want flexibility and convenience at any given point in time. The good part is with mobile apps the companies can get more quick and genuine feedback as compared to traditional survey methods of emails and questionnaires. Here we are giving top five reasons why your business need a mobile app.

Brand presence and recall

Mobile apps offer brands a more integrated presence which translates into stronger results. They form a critical part of an overall brand experience and helps in boosting brand recall. In a recent study, Google uncovered that customers have a brand recall of 74 per cent when the marketers’ integrated strategy is implemented across TV, online and mobile mediums. For instance, mobilemarketer.com reported that L’Oreal’s Vichy beauty line saw good results when it ran a one-day in-store mobile promotion. Vichy used the timeRAZOR application to let women schedule one-on-one beauty consultations and even find Duane Reade locations in New York. The mobile app enabled the company to reach the target audience and in turned promoted the brand’s ability to drive awareness and engagement in a whole new way. timeRAZOR attributed the rise in sales and attendance to the spontaneous and impulsive qualities of mobile.

User experience

Mobile is no more an advertising channel, rather it’s an engagement channel. A well designed native app which offers great functionality, is easy to use, and offers great content, is bound to enhance the overall user experience of the business.

Here are some guidelines you should incorporate in your app:

- Focus on presenting core features of your business that has relevance to users in the mobile environment

- Give mobile-only functionality (like barcode scanning) and use mobile device’s capabilities to enhance it

- Don’t forget to include features that are relevant to business category e.g. order tracking

Two-way communication

A mobile app has grown in popularity as a powerful two-way communication tool between brands and customers. Companies can use apps to push information about products and services to a large set of customers using smartphones and tablets. The versatility of mobile as a marketing tool gives a newcomer a lot of options and flexibility to operate. For instance, Marks & Spencer reportedly has more than 1 million customers in its opt-in mobile database. Other leading examples include Starbucks Coffee and Domino’s Pizza which have leveraged mobile space to the fullest.

Financial benefits

Just a few taps and the consumer can interact with your business the way he wants to and the time he wants to. There are essentially three ways which a business can utilize to gain financial benefits:

1. Paid apps: Getting users to pay for using your app is a good way of earning money, but choosing the right price point can be tricky. Asking users to pay upfront for a mass market app may not be a good idea; however, if you’re catering to a niche market, you can opt to charge users.

2. The freemium model: It is a great way to introduce customers to your app. But, it works best for games by allowing consumers to advance further in the game.

3. Subscription-based model: This model is used when companies charge users a monthly fee to access premium services e.g. Amazon Instant video, Hulu Plus, Netflix. This works really well with those companies which receive a repeat set of customers.

4. In-app purchases: This model is not just meant for gaming apps, even non-gaming apps can take advantage of it. One such example is retail app SingPet which allows users to purchase pet food and other pet-related items directly from within the app. Others include: daily deal sites like deal.com and Groupon that allow users to browse and purchase their coupons to merchants. A study released earlier this year by ABI Research said that total mobile application revenue could reach $46 billion by 2016, out of which a major portion will come from in-app purchases.

5. In-app ads: With growing mobile usage, marketers are pouring more money into in-app advertising. Selling advertising space within the app can become a good source of revenue for companies. There are various Ad networks which allow a company to integrate third party advertising into the app – thus making you free from worries of selling the advertisements, or filling the inventory.

Building a loyal community

Mobile apps are an easy way to build a community among your customers and to foster loyalty among them. Increased levels of engagement that customers get from applications can be turned into retail customer loyalty. Let’s take the example of coffee retail giant Starbucks which launched mobile apps on both iOS and Android in the US, that allowed customers to pay for drinks and other goods using their smartphones. According to the company, the reason behind this mobile payment initiative was to not just reduce the cost to process purchases, but create a great experience for the customers. The company says the technology is also boosting sales as since the launch, customers have made 45 million mobile payments in the US. When people pay with smartphones they move through lines more quickly. Beyond adding convenience and fewer credit card fees, the chain was able to offer an improved customer experience. The coffee retailer which set out to reduce the waiting time in stores ended up with a large loyal customer base that has affected the company positively.

Posted in Tips | Tagged free apps, in-app advertising, mobile app development, mobile app marketing, Mobile application | Leave a comment