In 2015 the Apps Alliance will produce 15 App Strategy Workshop – Fundamentals events across North America and Europe. Every event will include focused discussion about three key requirements of successful consumer-facing apps: discovery, user engagement and monetization. These topics have all been the subject of Apps Alliance White Papers and of discussion at many prior Alliance events.
In April 2013 the Alliance published Discoverability: How to Get Noticed in a Marketplace Overflowing With Apps. More than two years later, it seems timely to focus on new discoverability options at our upcoming ASW-Fundamentals events (tomorrow in Berlin and the next week in Denver), including a relatively new app-promotion feature that has been available in the Google Play store since March.
In-store promotion and advertising are staples of traditional retail – think about food-sampling stations and aisle-end-cap displays in grocery stores. In-store advertising is valuable because the ad reaches consumers who are in the store and presumably ready to purchase at that very moment. General Mills “rents” end-cap real estate in supermarket chains at the end of the cereal aisle when it is promoting Cheerios, and small organic food companies set up food sampling stations at Whole Food and Costco.
For many years, online marketers and retailers, including Amazon.com and eBay, have done similar in-store promotions. Now app publishers have the opportunity to use this traditional form of marketing and advertising to promote their apps in Google Play or in other app stores. The availability of this new and different advertising inventory could be a great opportunity for small app publishers to make very targeted buys and test new markets.
In its short history the app industry has evolved in many ways – from paid apps to advertiser-supported apps to freemium apps with paid upgrades and in-app purchases. With in-store advertising the app marketing model is evolving as well. At our upcoming App Strategy Workshops we’ll discuss these changes, and others, and how they can best work for your company and your apps.
Maggie Jordan
Marketing and Events Coordinator
