n1 how to guide: use iphone apps for business

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Mobile marketing and smart phones... NATION1 CASE STUDY 2009

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MOBILE MARKETING AND SMART PHONES 2009...

Nation1 started life in 2000 as a music publicity and marketing company that distributed promotional material for nightclubs and bars in Glasgow.

Over the years, the agency evolved to focus on youth and guerilla marketing, before finding its own niche in 2006 when it made the leap to digital. Since then the Directors have further refined the positioning to deliver niche strategies online to growth-focused clients.

We opened our London office in 2009 and have plans to expand into Mumbai in the near future. Our objective is to build a next generation communications company of substance, and to be the number one choice in niche digital marketing.

Our focus is strategy; we are trusted advisors. We care and show concern for our clients.

We ensure that our clients confidently put digital at the heart of their communications and in the best measure.

What is Nation1?What do we sell?

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For some time now marketers have been wrestling with the problem of how to use mobile phones to sell products. We recognised that mobile phones were going to change the world forever some years ago, however we never quite managed to exploit them to sell stuff. Today they are used for everything from arranging a trip to the cinema in Inverness to setting off a bomb in Afghanistan.

People saw these devices as part of their personal space, so sending a text message saying “buy this now” or “special offer here” was often seen as more damaging than if it hadn’t been sent at all. WAP never really took off and Bluetooth was only used by a small number of people to send files.

Then along came the iPhone; and all of us in the marketing world stood up and cheered. At last a devise that allows us to market to the user without invading their private space.

Mobile marketing and smart phones...

Add value. The cheesy buzz word of a million sales pitches, but its true. If you want people to engage with your brand then you need to give them a reason and make it worth their while. Smart phones allowed us to use extra bandwidth and memory intensive programs to engage with our audience on a social level and add value to their lives.

How to sell without invading?

What’s the fuss about?


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Apple are by far the market leaders in the smart phone app world (although Blackberry are catching up as are windows enabled handsets thanks to Google’s Android platform). But for now lets concentrate on the Apple iPhone.

An application (app) is something that you download onto your phone from the web based apple app store. Most are free, some you have to pay for. There are literally hundreds of thousands of apps and the success of the iPhone is largely down to the fact Apple allows any old developer to have access to their code to develop an application to run on the phone (however you still need to submit the app to Apple for approval). This meant that there was an exposition of developers creating apps for the phone therefore increasing the number of uses of the iPhone and the value of the handset to the owner.

There are so many great (and famous) examples of apps and they are split into the following categories

Calculate• Entertainment• Games• News• Productivity• Search Tools• Social Networking• Sports • Travel• Utility• Weather•

What is an app?

There is one thing above all else that makes a successful app – USEFULNESS. If the user finds it useful then it’s a good app and the more people that can find a use for your app, the closer to app utopia you get.

It should be well suited to be used on an iPhone or iPod touch, • considering the touch screen, the interface, the small device factor, and more

It should auto-rotate in situations where it makes sense and • the user expects it

It should be quick and easy to use• It should also be quick to load and fast to perform its main •

functionsIt should offer something a web site or desktop app doesn’t, •

in accessibility, functionality, or in some other aspect.

Get a whiff of this. Some iPhone developers are still raking in large piles of cash with their apps, and recently a fart application made nearly $10,000 in a single day.

Joel Comm, developer of iFart Mobile, published download statistics of his app, and this week it stood at No. 1 overall with over 13,000 downloads.

The app costs a dollar, and Apple takes 30 percent of the pie. So that amounts to about $9,200 in profit for the developer.

That’s pretty impressive, considering Apple previously didn’t believe fart applications met the standards of the App Store. In September, Apple rejected a similar novelty app called Pull My Finger on the grounds that it had “limited utility.” Just recently Apple reversed that decision and approved a number of other fart apps as well.

What makes a great app?


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(free): Brings a touch of old-school glamour to the cutting-edge iPhone. Use the virtual rotary-style dialler instead of the numeric keypad to make calls.

(free): A must for Twitter addicts, this simple but beautifully-rendered application provides a rich user experience and elegant layout.

(£6.99): Astronomers and space nuts will love this - a stargazing guide that provides information about constellations, planets and even shooting stars, plus oodles of scientific details.

Some of the top apps (as judged by Telegraph Newspaper)... (free): Utterly pointless, but thoroughly cool, this app

turns your iPhone into a light saber, complete with sound effects.

(free): Can’t decide where to eat? Shake your iPhone to pick a good restaurant. You can use GPS to find nearby eateries, or filter results by cuisine or price. Covers most US cities, as well as London.

(£2.99): Twiddle the virtual dials to start a sketch, or draw directly on screen using your finger. “Tilt technology” will be added soon to enable you to move the iPhone itself to create a drawing.

PhoneSaber

UrbanSpoon

Etch-a-Sketch

Rotary Dialer

Twitterific

Starmap Planetarium £4.99): There will be no need to squabble over restaurant bills with this application, which precisely calculates what each diner owes based on the cost of the meal. Okay, so the iPhone’s in-built calculator could do pretty much the same thing, but this takes the pain out of the entire process; it will even work out how much the non-drinkers should pay compared to the drinkers.

Meal Splitter

(free): Turns your iPhone or iPod touch into a remote control for your Mac or Apple TV. It works with your wi-fi network so you can control playback and shuffle tracks from anywhere in your home.

Remote

(free): Keep track of live, local weather information in up to three cities. Includes satellite maps and radar forecasts as well as severe weather alerts.

WeatherBug


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(£1.79): Takes advantage of the iPhone 3G’s GPS to provide one-tap access to information about local services and amenities. It will even pull in relevant Wikipedia entries and Flickr photos.

(£5.99): Compose your own music using the collection of virtual instruments.

(free): A location-based application that will recommend the best restaurants, the nearest Starbucks, and even the location of friends in your network.

(free): A quick and easy way to access your Flickr photo stream, as well as all your photosets, tags and contacts. An advertising-free version is available for £5.99.

(free): The simple interface allows you to chat with friends using Facebook messenger, post pictures to your profile, and check on your friends’ status updates. (free): If you’ve got a TypePad blog, download this

application to instantly update your blog from your iPhone.

(£5.99): The pick of the bunch of new games for the iPhone and iPod touch. Tilt the device itself to control the progress of a monkey inside a transparent bubble. The graphics are first-rate, and the gameplay is highly addictive.

(free): This currency converter provides up-to-the-minute exchange rate information for over 50 currencies and 70 countries.

(£4.99): Control your Apple Keynote presentations using your iPhone or iPod touch, and read and review slides on its screen.

Exposure

Facebook

TypePad

Super Monkey Ball Currency

Stage Hand

Vicinity

Where?

Band


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Smart phones are changing the way we run our lives...

34% of the UK population use smart • phones today

47.5m unique mobile users in UK today• 71% of UK mobile users are under 54• 43% earn more than £30,000 a year•

By age...


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By income...

Operator Mobile unique users

02VodafoneOrangeT-MobileVirgin Mobile3Tesco Other

12 896 38210 592 32410 416 878 5 612 985 3 396 499 2 680 575 1 244 528 659 827


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Traditionally the iPhone has been seen as the trendy tool for young guns with the Blackberry the more serious solution for the business world. However in the last few years, mainly due to the development of the ‘app’ we have seen the iPhone explode. In enterprise (businesses with employees of 100 or more) iPhone usage has grown from 0% to 17% in the last three years. More and more companies are adopting the iPhone for work.

Smart phones allow users to connect to the internet anywhere they go allowing you to work anywhere. The main benefit to the Blackberry is the keyboard, ‘push’ email and calendar synchronisation. Which means users find it easy to email, check appointments and type notes. IPhones keyboard is a little more difficult to use which is why their take up in the work place was slower, however the ‘app’ is about to change all that.

The rise of the smartphone in business?

Have you ever considered getting an app developed to run some of your firms key functions? We all spend a fortune on IT to support our office based activity – but what about developing a mobile office tool that allows our employees to work on the go.

What’s more most employees are happy to buy their own iPhone (and data is free with most contracts) which means it costs you nothing to get them to run your app on their phone. And what better employee engagement that having your logo on their home screen.

Kraft Foods who employ over 100,000 employees worldwide and turn over more than $42billion recently developed an app (to run on the personal iPhones of their employees) that helped them manage internal communications, and reinforce company culture and values. Due to the online and real time nature of the smartphone Kraft HR boffins were able to engage with a massive proportion of the company all at the same time, making sure they all got the message delivered in a method that was suitable to them.

Since then Kraft have developed specific department based apps – for example sales forecasting, reporting and tracking for global sales teams, real time management meetings and virtual office applications (using Google.docs and the Cloud).

Some important (if not obvious) info we manage to get from MediaVest one of the UK’s leading digital media agencies:

Mobiles are only used by ONE person making them a dream for targeting and measurement.

33% of consumers are tempted to buy products advertised through mobile media (v. 26% -29% for other media)*.

56% of mobile internet users are aged 18-34 (index 193 v general population).

Response mechanics such as click to call, click to receive coupon, click to locate ensures high brand/consumer interaction.

Advanced targeting (behavioural, demographic and contextual) ensures relevancy of advertising messages.

So why is the smartphone going to change the business world?

Smartphone media and marketing facts...


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Android is an operating system that Google have developed which is designed to run on any smartphone and has been created to give Apple a run for their money. It’s a slow burner given the massive head start Apple has had with the iPhone, however watch this space. Companies that just focus on the iPhone are missing a trick.

Whilst there are 100,000 + iPhone apps, there are less than 1000 Blackberry apps on their ‘App world’ and users are restricted to how many apps they can have due to the limited memory on the Blackberry handsets.

In a recent Mashable online poll (the social media blog) Google Android is the winning platform by a more than 2:1 margin. Out of 5045 total votes, Android walked away with 3323 of them or 66%, while the iPhone platform only netted 1494 or 30%. The tie vote included 228 or 5% who just couldn’t choose between them. Many people cited the openness of the platform and third-party development process as well as Android’s versatility, being able to be put to use not just on phones but also netbooks, tablet devices, eReaders and more.

What is Google Android?


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Glasgow Marketing Bureau iPhone – where next?

We have successfully build an iPhone app for Glasgow’s Style Mile that helps visitors and residents alike negotiate their way along the Style Mile advertising our retail partners and providing special real time offers and discounts. The app also has GPRS which enables location function so you can see where you are in relation to where you want to be.

We are also able to track downloads and usage of the app providing measurement on the return on investment.


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The user the ability to browse shops by means of a series of categories and sub categories making it easy for the tourist and local alike to find information they want without knowing the name of the shop they need to visit. Based on Geo location, they can see where they are in relationship to the shop and directions on how to get there. Shop details are shown on the map as well as an information page detailing:

Company logo• Promotional offer• Description of what shop is & sells• Multiple images (mini gallery)• Multiple addresses and contact details •

The Style Mile app will be populated by the shop/companies themselves, they receive login details where they can change the offer of the shop and upload new pictures, amend contact details etc all of which once saved, will update on the website instantly and the next time the user connects to the Style Mile app. Although currently the app only contains shops it has been built with scaleability in mind. All the categories and shop pages are feed based allowing Glasgow City Marketing Bureauto incorporate other areas of interest such as music, food and drink.

iPhone Style Mile future development ideas…

This could be added to the about section or have it’s own unique category and highlights the ‘must sees’ in the Style Mile. This would not only work for key retail sites but could open out to key landmarks and include videos and comments/images on Glasgow and the Style Mile (basically a cross promotion of the rest of Glasgow and the tourist stuff).

Simple section that incorporates a news feed of all the lastest news from the Style Mile, which could provide information on new shop openings, what celebrities are going to be town, upcoming events and new promotions. This would be based on a live feed with the options to reload/refresh at any time.

As the app grows and introduces more categories, such as sights to see and places to stay, we would look to add in a ‘Nearby’ button. This would allow the user to view the entire Style Mile database filtered by points of interest and their distance in relation to you. These would be displayed in a list with relevant icons distigushing their category types.

As more and more travel information is added to the map and the app, a filter could be added that would allow the user to browse the information in a much more user friendly manner.

This would allow the users bookmark their favourite shops/restaurants etc and enable them to be kept up to date very quickly on new offers.

A select list of featured stores would appear here. This would be a paid premium service which would provide advertising revenue for Glasgow City Marketing Bureau.

Must See...

News ...

Places nearby...

Travel filter...

Favourites option...

Featured...

Current Style Mile offers...


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We would suggest an app that everyone can use to get information on key ways to travel around Glasgow from buses to taxi and rail routes with links to all key websites, this app could also link with the city’s bus timetable and ‘real time update displays at bus stops’ telling you which bus to get and when the next one is due (and where to get it).

We could further develop this app to tell people what public transport solution is best to get them from A-B (i.e. get from GSA to SECC).

Using the phones camera and geo location tools, it would be possible for users to look through the camera and view the real footage of what they are seeing on their phone’s screen. The GPS feature would then superimpose details of what was planned to be there in Glasgow’s future.

I.e. you could stand in on London Road and view an area of the East End and your phone would tell you this is where the new Velodrome will be.

More apps for Glasgow City Marketing Bureau...

Bring the Diary online with an iPhone app. Creation of an events category controlled section, promoting all the key events in the Glasgow Style Mile with a link to an online ticket booking system, which could in turn generate commission for GCMB. You could also link this to a map where people can see what events are taking place and where, view events by date or type and link this to the travel planner.

We see each working much like the ‘list magazine’ website with reviews, podcasts, even video clips being pushed to your phone, the user can have the ability to filter the content that is showed to them, add to favourites, send to friends and even send reminders to prompt buying tickets or tell you that the show starts in 10 mins...

A listing of all the city’s entertainment spots, with map location, directions from where you are and reviews posted by visitors and locals. Special offers, guest lists and competitions.

About core info about the events review /gallery of last years highlightsIndex A-Z of artists/gigs etc.Calendar calendar with filter options to show what’s on/where.Map location based finder/guide – where the gig is etc, in relation to you.Reviews news feeds that can be filtered to your preferred category/topic etc.Featured biggest/most popular gig/artist etc showing (possibly paid advertising).Favs add artist/gig/location to your fav list for quick reference.

Events...

Restaurants, bars and clubs...

Some core pages and features could include...

Travel module...

The future of Glasgow...


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Probably the most exciting of all, this feature brings the social element to the app and gets Glaswegians from the world over involved in developing a unique and headline grabbing library, charting Glasgow’s history. People are encouraged to upload pictures they have of Glasgow (this could be a family photo down at the Clyde during the Garden Festival, an old pic of Gran outside her tenement or a press cutting of the opening of a Sir Basil Spense tower block).

These are uploaded to the app and geo targeted so that when visitors walk around the city they can engage this app to show them real insight as to what that exact chunk of the city they are looking at was like in the past, using real footage from real people. This will bring a never before seen, real dimension to the history of the city, positioning Glasgow’s at the cutting edge of tourism and technology.

Using cloud tagging technology to create a tourist gallery based on your geo location that users can view actual tourist pictures/videos and read their comments as well as have the facility to upload their own and add their own comments too. This of course would have to be moderated and not live.

We see this as a separate app that probably runs on Blackberry. With a calendar of all conferences taking place throughout the year, with details on venues for each, and what hotels are closest (viewed on map) to those venues, with link to real time rates and booking. We could provide an area where event organisers could upload maps of the exhibition or a diary of events and we could integrate a delegate planner allowing delegates to visit nearby tourist attractions and schedule the correct amount of time in to see them. This would then link to the journey planner.

There would also be the restaurant and bar guide with reviews posted by other delegates as well as the Style Mile real time offers app (to encourage them to go and spend money during their stay). We could even integrate a directory of Glasgow businesses, incase they wanted to meet local companies whilst they were in the city.

Tourist generated guide to Glasgow...

Delegates...

The Retroscope...


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Nation1 specialises in helping our customers target niche audiences online. Using all the latest digital stuff wrapped in cutting edge creativity our approach allows clients to trial new ideas at a low cost with a focused end game and measurable objective.

Nation1...

To find out more email [email protected]


n1 how to guide: use iphone apps for business

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