the appfarm

“There are so many new apps a day, it is hard for any human being to consume the amount of change that is going on in the space”

- Raven Zachary, Founder Small Society

The 2009 Creativity and Technology event featured an excellent panel discussion on “What’s Now and What’s Next in Mobile” (for video see here).  While the title should have been what’s now and next for the iPhone, the truth is that this year mobile as been almost all about the iPhone.  And for good reason, the statistics are astonishing – with over 40+MM devices sold, 1.5Bn apps downloaded and a feverish growth rate that does not seem to be slowing down.

The most interesting part of the panel occurs when Raven Zachary, founder of the iPhone strategy firm Small Society begins to talk about the general trends in the app market (go to minute 12 in the video here).  His conclusions are bold and bright, pointing to the accelerating trend of brands and companies coming into the app store.  Zachary wisely suggests that brands though should be less concerned about speed to market and more concerned about a clean, quality 1.0 user experience as it ultimately ends up being far more impactful.  The balance of delivering utility or entertainment with branding, takes time to get right and too often the rush to be first is at the cost of a quality experience (see my rant about the prematurely launched Dunkin’ Run app here).

Perhaps the most insightful comment Zachary makes is that the “the app store is not a marketing vehicle but a distribution vehicle.”  Companies should approach the App store “as you would approach any product or marketing effort” and “drive people to the app in the same way you would drive people to anything you create in the company”.  The idea that applications can be developed overnight and with little additional marketing, product launch or strategic thought is outdated because the size of the app store makes organic discovery difficult.  And as the novelty effect of the iPhone wears off (where blowing and pouring are enough to drive downloads) the utility and entertainment components of apps will come to the fore.

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