Developing an App Requires More Than Technical Know-how
Apps are hot items. With the transition to mobile for every kind of need possible, apps are becoming critical to success.
Some of my favorite apps are distributed by companies at trade shows. These apps carry specific specs that would have required piles of papers or sales sheets to disseminate to prospective buyers of products and services. It also saves your back because you are not having to lug large sales booklets to the show. The other advantage is you can update specs and pricing for all the potential buyers who have downloaded your app. You don’t have to send new spec sheets and hope the potential client changes out the old specs. The problem is that it is easier to hand someone a brochure than it is to get them to download your app.
And there is the rub. You can make an app, but the real work is getting it downloaded and used. As of June 2019, there are nearly 2 million apps in the Apple App Store and 3 million in the Google Play Store. The clutter in the app world is high.
The competition should not dissuade you from creating and marketing an app. Just don’t get so caught up in curating the app that you forget you must distribute it to be effective. There is high competition for space on the phone.
User acquisition strategies should be high on the app-meeting agenda from the start.
Mark Mathis
Mark wrote his first direct-mail fundraising letter in 1981 for the University of Iowa Center for Advancement. The effort raised a few million dollars in undiscovered wills and legacy gifts. From that day forward Mark discovered a love of the big idea that moves the needle. After 12 years at KWWL, Mark became a business owner as a co-founder of ME&V — rebranded as AMPERAGE in 2015. After 25 years of leading creative teams in video production, graphic design, PR, writing and web development, Mark transitioned out of ownership in 2021. Today he serves in an employee role as special projects consultant. He is creatively ambidextrous — son of an artist and engineer — and famous for distilling complex ideas down to a few words and a few visuals. Mark is a writer. When he found that many nonprofits struggled with complex branding puzzles, he wrote the book, “NonProfit-NonMarketing .” He also wrote a novel called “Reenactment.” Mark is an active blogger OneMinuteMarketer® with nearly 1,000 readers each week on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. One of his most popular YouTube videos is on “How to Look Good on Zoom.” One of Mark’s fondest business memories was being named to INC 500 two times and attending the INC 500 conference with other winners. Mark is considered by some a Civil War expert (and that explains his novel). Mark also served as an adjunct professor in the business and in the communications departments at Wartburg College. Mark is a graduate of the University of Iowa and is currently vice president of the University of Iowa Journalism and Mass Communications Advisory Board. Mark is married to state Sen. Liz Mathis, and the two love to travel, even when it means being trapped by a volcano in the Czech Republic for three weeks.
