Recipe for success with mobile apps

I'd like to take the opportunity to update you on what's being going on in the mobile space during the past 6 months and some exciting opportunities going forward. I've tried to pick out the areas that are most relevant for you from our massive knowledge base consisting of over 150 mobile apps and services launched in the past 6 months.

1. Why brands should launch branded mobile apps?
2. In mobile fragmentation is forever. Deal with it.
3. How to choose mobile platforms (iPhone, Android, Blackberry, etc)?
4. Why is mobile web not enough?
5. Producing your own apps using Tino Mobile


1. Why brands should launch branded mobile apps?

Over the past year there has been an enormous hype around iPhone applications in particular and mobile applications in general. After 10 years of uphill struggle, mobile marketing and services finally took off with a big bang. Companies ranging from global consumer brands such as Coca Cola, Mercedes, Kraftfood, Nike, Zara and Pizza Hut to small and medium size organisations including festivals, restaurants, local touristboards, hotels and publishers.

An overwhelming 64.8% of marketers and publishers reported planning to invest in mobile apps this year, according to a December 2009 survey conducted by DM2PRO and Quattro Wireless. The most successful from a reach perspective are no doubt those with a great entertainment value (e.g. iPint, Barclays Waterslide, Volkswagen Polo Challenge and Malibu Bowling) while the ones delivering the greatest ROI are applications that provide a relevant
service to customers (North Face Snow Report, Yellow Pages, Timeout sponsored by Smirnoff, Absolut Vodka cocktail guide, etc). 25.000 people using a branded application every week potentially generates a lot more value than half a million people downloading a game which they play ones.

Rory Sutherland, Executive Creative Director at OgilvyOne probably describes it in the best way when talking about "mobile" advertising: "Never dismiss branded utility. It's a lot easier to be repeatedly useful than repeatedly funny."


2. In mobile fragmentation is forever. Deal with it.

A couple of weeks ago TechCrunch had a great article about mobile fragmentation by Richard Wong at Accel Partners. The article (http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/04/mobile-fragmentation-forever/) highlights the fact that there is no long or short term solution to fragmentation and nor is there a simple answer to which platforms companies should invest in. As one of the pioneers in cross-platform development Golden Gekko has invested heavily in R&D and education of customers and partners. We have managed to make it easier and more cost efficient to develop and maintain cross-platform apps but there is still no simple solution. Multiplatform development platforms work for simpler apps but in reality there is no out-of-the-box solution if you want to deliver the best experience for each platform.
Our recommendation is

1. Plan for cross-platform support from day one unless you are absolutely certain that you only want to launch on one platform - fixing it later is very expensive
2. Ensure that your development partner has the experience to develop for multiple platforms and that if an porting tool or multi-platform tool is recommended that you understand the limitations agree on processes and scope for design, testing, acceptance, appstore uploads and other distribution early on for each platform as this will save you a lot of time and effort throughout the project

3. How to choose mobile platforms (iPhone, Android, Blackberry, Java, Widgets, etc)?

The number of mobile OS platforms and development SDKs keep on increasing with new platforms including Samsung Bada, MeeGo, 5+ different widget platforms, Palm Webapps, Windows Mobile 7, etc. Which platforms should I chose?
We think there are 4 key considerations:

1. What is your objective? PR or Mass market reach?
2. Who is your target audience? Markets? Niche segments?
3. Where will you get the most attention for the least money? Many operators and handset manufacturers offer very attractive distribution deals.
4. How much are you willing to spend?

Our platform recommendations vary from case to case but our general advice is:

• PR, communication and experience - iPhone apps
• Innovation & controversial - Android is the first choice as there are few restrictions in terms of APIs and approval
• Youth market - J2ME for non-connected apps
• Mass market reach - Launch on as many platforms as you can afford starting with iPhone and Android
• Business users - Blackberry and J2ME

Android or Java are our preferred base platforms for cross-platform development as there are clear development synergies between J2ME, Blackberry, Android and e.g. widgets whereas iPhone development has limited synergies with anything else. One of the main limitations with J2ME today is that most users won't connect to the network due to issues with settings, data costs, security prompts, etc but the number of downloads for a like for like iPhone and J2ME app is still 5x to the advantage of the J2ME app.

Finally the other key considerations is distribution and media spend. Many of the handset manufacturers and operators are desperate to get new innovative apps on their appstores and will therefore give you all kinds of free promotions and traffic. A free promotion by e.g. Nokia OVI could easily be worth 50-100k Euro in media budget and will give you a lot more reach and downloads than an iPhone app would without putting the same kind of media budget behind it. We are currently getting similar offers from Vodafone, O2, Samsung, RIM/Blackberry and various other partners so it's always worthwhile discussing these opportunities.


4. Why is mobile web not enough? Consumers are disappointed with mobile web experience.

A recent survey of 1001 mobile Web users found that users have high expectations for mobile Web performance. Ultimately, the majority stated they expect Web sites to load as quickly, almost as quickly, or faster on their mobile phone, compared to their home or work computer.

The survey "Why the Mobile Web is Disappointing End-Users" also revealed how unsatisfactory mobile Web experiences can negatively shape a consumer's opinion of an organization. In the survey:

• 60 % of respondents have encountered problems when accessing websites on their mobile phones in the last 12 months
• More than half are unlikely to return to a Web site that they had trouble accessing from their phone, and 40 percent said they'd likely visit a competitor's mobile Web site instead.

What do we think?

The mobile web is great for text based services like news, search, directory, etc but as soon as you want an interactive experience with maps, embedded video & sounds, location, animations or anything more advanced then apps are currently the best solution.

For more information about the survey see a summary here http://www.slideshare.net/Gomez_Inc/gomez-mobile-web-experience-survey-why-the-mobile-web-is-disappointing-end-users


5. Producing your own mobile apps using Tino

Finally we want to give you an update on our self-service tool for mobile apps Tino Mobile. Tino allows you to produce your own mobile apps with more standardized features. This does not replace bespoke development of innovative new apps but allows all kinds of great apps to be produced.

During the past 3 months we've continued to enhance the tool with

• New features including carousels, embedded video and audio, questionnaires, more flexibility for image/text formatting, SVG fonts, banner ads and lots more
• Major UI enhancements for larger screens
• Enhanced device support for Blackberry
• Making the online tool easier to use

During the coming month we will also introduce support for Android and iPhone as well as a myriad of other features.

If you want more information visit http://tinomobile.com or contact us for an online demo.


Magnus Jern, CEO

Vodafone Updates Vodafone McLaren Mercedes application for 2010 season

Vodafone McLaren Mercedes updates the mobile app for the 2010 season for more platforms including iPhone and Android and with new features such as social networking.

The application brings you exclusive news and behind the scene interviews with Hamilton, Button, the pit crew and lots more. Daily team news, Formula 1 news, real time race information, results, championship standings and new videos added throughout the season.

Download application for free or visit mobile site on http://vodafoneracing.mobi/. The application connects to the Internet to download the latest news and results.

For more Vodafone McLaren Mercedes content visit http://www.mclaren.com/ on your computer.

You can also find the application on
* Getjar
* Mobile9
* Mobango
* Mobilerated
* and various other app stores...

In Mobile, Fragmentation is Forever. Deal With It.

TechCrunch has a great article about mobile fragmentation by Richard Wong at Accel Partners. The article highlights the fact that there is no long or short term solution to fragmentation and nor is there a simple answer answer to which platforms companies should invest in. As one of the pioneers in cross-platform development Golden Gekko has invested heavily in R&D and education of customers and partners.

Our platform recommendations vary from case to case but our general advice is:

• PR, communication and experience - go for an iPhone app
• Innovation - Android is the first choice as there are few restrictions
  
• Youth market - J2ME for non-connected apps
  
• Mass market reach - multi-platform is a must
  
• Business users - go for Blackberry and J2ME
  

Java/J2ME is our preferred base platform as there are clear development synergies between J2ME, Blackberry, Android and e.g. widgets whereas iPhone development has limited synergies with anything else.

One of the main limitations with J2ME today is that most users won't connect to the network due to issues with settings, data costs, security prompts, etc but the number of downloads for a like for like iPhone and J2ME app is still 5x to the advantage of the J2ME app.

Read more on
http://techcrunch.com/2010/03/04/mobile-fragmentation-forever/

Anyone Make A Mobile App In Five Easy Steps

Official press release:

Time, and cost to get an app to market gets faster and more affordable

Golden Gekko, a leading developer and technology provider for cross platform mobile applications, today unveils its new service Tino, that will allow anyone to build a mobile application and bring it to market much faster, and more affordably, than has previously been seen in the mobile app marketplace.

To build a mobile app, a customer can visit www.tinomobile.com and follow five easy steps to build an application of choice. Pricing for Golden Gekko’s Tino starts at as low as £100 which is significantly cheaper than the average £5-10,000 price tag of comparable applications.,
“We are offering Tino as a low cost entry to the mobile app marketplace, and can provide anyone with the tools to build a mobile app, with a process that takes less than an hour,” said Magnus Jern, Golden Gekko’s CEO. “Our Tino customers do not need to be technical experts, as they’ll get an easy step-by-step guide that allows them to self-develop a mobile app on the Web.”

Golden Gekko’s Tino invites everyone to create attractive, powerful mobile applications, that will support 90 per cent of the global mobile handset market,
using any content, external feeds, and rich media. The process is simple, requires no programming, and can be completed in as little as 30. Tino will automatically host and track the number of engagements.

Tino customers will get access to the wealth of experience Golden Gekko has in the mobile applications industry, of serving exciting mobile content on billions of phones worldwide, and developing content for 40 leading global brands including Absolut Vodka, Accenture, Bloomberg, Coca Cola, Disney, European Directories Novartis, Paramount, Perfetti, Sara Lee, Unilever, Universal Pictures and Vodafone.

For more visit http://www.tinomobile.com

Tech Media Invest 2009

We presented at the Tech Media Invest 2009 today but also thought we should share some of the insights from the conference. A lot of the discussions were around mobile applications even though Golden Gekko was the only pure mobile development company present. See http://www.e-unlimited.com/events/view.aspx?events_pages_id=1 for more information about the conference.

1. Mobile platform choice is difficult
3-6 months ago everyone was going for the iPhone as the primary platform and then expended to other platforms. More recently developers have started to question the impact of iPhone apps versus other platforms due to increasing competition.

2. iTunes appstore storefront has become a barrier
The difficulty for customers to find the apps they want / relevant apps on iTunes appstore is becoming a barrier. Despite this Apple has reached over 2 Bn downloads so question is whether this is a consumer or publisher issue? We think that it is currently mainly an issue for publishers but that it will become a limited factor for increased consumer activity in the coming months.

3. Openness is key
Media, developers and investors all believe that openness will win. This is somewhat strange considering that
a) The success of the iPhone is much thanks to the fact that it is not an open platform and continues to get the most media attention
b) Android is still far behind other platforms such as iPhone and Blackberry
c) Feedback about Symbian open initiative has not been as positive as Android

4. Business models are uncertain
Rupert Murdoch has made it clear that the time of “free” is over. Therefore it would seem that focus should have shifted to premium revenues. Generally this seems to be the case but consensus points to freemium as the golden answer.

5. Mobile Marketing is going from one hit wonders to a strategic marketing channel
Brands such as BMW, Coca Cola, Barclay’s are now moving from one-off campaigns to developing mobile platforms for future growth.

6. Apps and browsers will become seamless but when?
One interesting point that was made is that the browser is getting more and more functionality and integration with the phone but development is slow. Google has repeatedly stated that they believe browsing and not apps is the future of mobile but at the same time they refer to several of their online services as Google Apps despite the fact that they are being delivered through the browser? The difference will become more and more grey.

7. Branded apps are performing amazingly well
Speakers and panel members referred several times to branded apps as the killer mobile advertising service at the moment. iPint, BMW Z4 app, Barclays app, etc.

All in all an interesting day with lots of great new contacts!

Most mobile marketing startups hedging their bets by developing apps for multiple platforms

Moconews has an interesting article about the challenges of multi-platform mobile development (iPhone, Android, Java, Blackberry, Symbian, Windows Mobile, etc) today.

The trade-off between delivering an amazing user experience to 2-3% of mobile subscribers (e.g. iPhone and Android) or a mass market application for a wide range of devices (50% or more) is a difficult one for everyone. Our general experience is that Java applications delivered across Symbian, Blackberry, Windows Mobile and proprietary operating systems get up to 10x as many downloads as an iPhone app but achieving a similar user experience is very time consuming and costly.

The average cost of an advanced iPhone or Android game/app is in the region 25-50k euro depending on complexity whereas as a mass market app/game with 80% phone penetration (across multiple platforms) is about 200.000-400.000 euro when fully optimized across the devices.

So what about automatic porting services then? There are several companies that claim that they can deliver cross-platform porting at costs starting around 10.000-20.000 USD. Our experience however is that the tweaking and optimisation to make the ported application to look and work nicely on the individual platforms make the cost almost as high as doing proprietary development.

More comments on this to follow...

Mobile app developer headaches continue

One of the main topics with our clients, partners and internally is mobile application fragmentation. Despite all efforts by handset manufacturers and mobile operators to make it go away it is actually getting worse and worse. Java, Symbian, Blackberry Java, Android, iPhone, Brew, Windows Mobile, Palm Pre, Vodafone Widgets (JIL/Opera widgets to be fair), script languages and more.

Or maybe it is for the better as all the new platforms also encourage innovation in new technology and features? Golden Gekko is probably one of the few companies that doesn't mind fragmentation at all as we think the platforms help deliver diversity.

Who knows? Continue reading on
http://mobione.com.au/wordpress/2009/07/mobile-game-developer-headaches-continue/

What is the cost of developing a mobile app (iPhone, Blackberry, Java, Android, etc)?

At Golden Gekko we often get into the debate with clients and partners about what the cost of a mobile app or game should be and even more so with the iPhone SDK. We know that it is possible for a freelance developer to develop a descent looking iPhone app in a couple of weeks for a minimal budget. At the same time developing a market leading app with great design, usability, content and interaction that doesn't crash is not an easy thing. Therefore it was interesting to read what other people have to say about the cost of implementing a mobile app.
"Although iPhone app development can cost as little as $12.000 a well-designed app can cost anywhere from $50,000 to $150,000, take six to eight weeks to develop, and a couple more weeks more to be approved by Apple"

Read more at:
http://apple20.blogs.fortune.cnn.com/2009/05/12/madison-avenue-and-the-app-store/

Now this is still the easy part. Developing an app that works across hundreds or even thousands of devices with different operating systems, screen sizes, navigation input mechanisms and capabilities is a whole different sport. When I worked Vodafone Group a couple of years ago the estimated average cost of developing a mobile game was about 200.000 euro whereof 50% for development and the other 50% porting and testing. Since then life for developer has gotten harder and not easier with more operating systems, screen sizes, touch screens, etc. At the same time budgets for app development have not increased so the only viable solution to deliver great quality apps and games is to make the development process more efficient and this is where Golden Gekko is currently developing all our R&D resources. More to follow...

Friday: Mobile Applications - The Next Big Thing In Mobile Marketing?

Jim Cook at Mobiadnews interviewed Golden Gekko CEO Magnus Jern earlier this week about the mobile application trend. Here's the full article or http://www.mobiadnews.com/?p=3172

Other than giving a great overall overview of mobile applications in marketing the article also highlights the Lynx campaign as a great mobile application making it even more famous!

Brands Love Mobile Apps

Moconews has a great article about how "Brands Love Mobile Apps" but also how there is a risk that the application stores get cluttered with so many apps that it becomes a problem.

http://www.moconews.net/entry/419-Mobile-Applications-A-Hit-With-Brands

This article highlights two trends:
1. The major consumer brands already investing in mobile are now all interested in launching mobile applications, particularly on the iPhone app-stores but also in other places
2. There are already over 10.000 iPhone applications on iTunes and 30.000 applications on Getjar and it is getting more and more difficult to stand out and make your app a hit. Even driving viral video views on Youtube is easier because there are more tools to cross-promote and of course the audience is so much larger.



Over 90% of these applications are however badly designed, full of bugs, not working across most devices and not very relevant or useful which means that there is no abundance of great applications that stand out. Download 10 random applications from the iPhone app-store or Getjar and I can assure you that you will experience this yourself.

The implication is fairly simple. There is an enormous demand for great applications so deliver great applications and you will generate attention, downloads, active users and hopefully meet your objectives!

More about how you deliver great mobile applications tomorrow!

iPhone SDK, Android and Symbian creating more fragmentation

With over 300 million iphone applications downloaded to date and 200m+ applications downloaded every month across all mobile platforms the mobile application market has never been more interesting. But it's not all good. Despite all the positive impact from the iPhone and Android in the last year this is also causing majors headaches for the mobile services industry. Fragmentation is constantly increasing with more OS (iPhone, Symbian, Android, Windows Mobile, Moblin Linux, Blackberry, etc), mobile browsers (Opera, Safari, Chrome, etc), application standards (Java, iPhone SDK, Symbian, Android SDK, Brew, 5+ different widget standards, etc). This will increase technical complexity, time to market, costs and potentially kill the chances of the industry really taking off. Imagine having to developing different versions of every software program for Dell, HP, Lenova, Toshiba, Asus, etc.

Developing 4 different OS versions of an application is possible although costly for most mobile services companies. Mobile game developers have dealt with this issue for some time with porting and testing costs making up as much as 80% of the total budgets which is bearable but certainly not profitable. The even bigger challenge however is maintaining, upgrading and supporting 5 different OS versions of an application that is in need of constant change. Unless you are Google, Facebook, MySpace or another business with 100m+ users this is simple not an option if you want to have a profitable business.

What are the options then unless you have unlimited resources for mobile application development?

A) Browser based solution only
Stick to a browser based solution and do everything you can to optimise the service over time and leverage new functionality such as script languages on the devices where this is possible. The negative side of this is that the user experience is always a little bit slow and the design and interaction capabilities very limited. It will very seldom give the user a WOW experience.

B) Automatic porting tools to support all platforms
There are a various porting tools available for porting from Java to Brew, iPhone, Windows Mobile, Android etc. These reduce the development efforts but not the optimising and Q&A work. However, they also substantially limit the use of native APIs and functionality across the platforms which means that the ported version is usually based on the most common denominator between the platforms, i.e. a bad compromise.

C) Java and iPhone versions
The only application development standard that works on a majority of handsets is Java Mobile Edition (J2ME). Java is currently available on over 90% of all devices in Europe, 80% in North America (includes packaging for Brew) and about 75% worldwide according to Strategy Analytics. The only multimedia enabled device that does not support Java today is the iPhone. Java definitely has its limitations but in terms of cost efficiency it is the only platform of choice.

In conclusion although the new platforms provide great new capabilities it is very unlikely that the development community will be able to support all of them. The decision on which platforms are used for development must be made on a case by case basis but in most instances Java is the only viable solution for downloadable applications in combination with standard XHTML for browser based services. Despite the competition from new and exciting platforms Java has a good chance to continue to be the platform of choice in the future.

We look forward to further debate on this subject!