Apps/Applications
Apps - short for applications - are software programs installed on smartphones and tablet PC’s. Since the iPhone® was introduced, apps have boomed. In fact, you may not realize that many old mobile phones contained apps – a calculator, a stopwatch or an integrated calendar. Nowadays, different apps for mobile terminals can be downloaded from the Internet – games, news- and service apps, complex office-applications or fun apps such as Angry Birds or Fruit Ninjas, to name two. Some apps are an alternative for websites – they deliver the entire content of the websites and they are understood as mobile versions of these pages.
From idea to app
Does your corporation need an app? Creating an application requires thinking about some basic aspects. The main questions you have to answer first are: what kind of products and services do you offer? Which added value can you provide to the users of your app? For example, airlines create apps for checking in to the airport, or looking up the flight timetable. Travel agencies make smartphones become a guide of sorts via special applications and food production chains provide apps which replace the classic cookbook. Of course, you must not only keep the service idea in mind when creating an app– a lot of brands offer software which functions primarily as an entertainment tool.
Apps are being developed for a specific operating system – usually for iOS® and Android™, because they are most common. Each operating system makes different demands on the programming of apps, so it is important to remember that an app must be adapted to each new system or even be reprogrammed.
In order to make your app popular in the market, you must call attention to yourself. This can be done on- and offline. Working online, not only the typical Internet Marketing measures are important, but also the Word-of-Mouth-Marketing. If you don’t want to get lost among thousands of apps - there are about 350,000 apps currently available in the App StoreSM of Apple® - you need a good idea, a good implementation, and good marketing.
