Five Killer Marketing And Distribution Strategies For Your App (forbes.com)

Your app is not alone. Right now, there are more than 1 million apps in the App Store, vying for users’ attention in nearly every category.

Building a great product isn’t enough to make your app the next Angry Birds, and Apple knows it. Just last month, it introduced a “Best New Updates” section to improve the discoverability of apps long after their initial release. But to create a sustainable app, you need to build in solid marketing and distribution strategies to get your app into the hands of the people who need it most.

Take Everpix, for example. When the photo storage company closed its doors, it came as a total surprise to users. It was an excellent product that sorted photos with ease and stored an unlimited number of images for a small yearly fee.

Everpix had the potential to overturn companies like Dropbox and Flickr, but it made one major mistake: It put all of its budget into product development, leaving little money to sustain the company as it tried to grow its user base. While it seems unfair, the fact is a great product isn’t enough to succeed in the app marketplace. It’s important to strike a healthy balance between development and marketing to ensure sustainability.

Grow Users and Keep the Lights On

Here are five strategies to capitalize on the marketing and distribution of your new app:

1. Release early and release often. You may have heard this refrain before, but it’s vital for growing your user base and attracting investors’ attention. Release core features, then leverage communities such as Hacker News and Product Hunt to grab early adopters before building out the kitchen sink. Look at it this way: If you don’t have a user base, how can you be sure you’re building something people want?
2. Find your niche. You can differentiate your app in a crowded market in two ways: Introduce features that no one else has, or target a specific niche. These strategies aren’t mutually exclusive. Take QUAD, for instance — yet another entrant in the crowded mobile messaging market. QUAD focused on its unique ability to message more than 50 people and has heavily marketed its app to college groups like fraternities and sororities that have a real need for a bulk messaging system. By doing so, it’s enabled itself to live alongside other messaging juggernauts like WhatsApp and GroupMe, rather than compete with them.
3. Be exclusive. Nowadays, it seems like everyone uses Spotify, but it wasn’t long ago that the company was just starting out in the U.S. and only available by invitation. While Spotify used invitations to make it easier to scale in a new country, it also had the added benefit of creating buzz around this exclusive new app. By capitalizing on word-of-mouth marketing, Spotify helped itself stand out in an arena that companies like Rdio and Rhapsody had been occupying for years.
4. Optimize for the App Store. Much like the need to optimize your website for search engines, it’s important to make sure your app has the right keywords in its title and description so users can find you. It sounds minor, but if your app doesn’t come up when users type relevant keywords into the search bar, then it might as well not exist. That’s why app design and development companies like Fueled have started making App Store optimization an integral part of their development process.
5. Build in social calls to action. Social word of mouth is one of the best ways to grow your user base. Build in social sharing so users can brag about what they’ve just accomplished, whether that’s leveling up in a game or logging miles in a running app.

It’s easy to assume your app can become the next Snapchat as long as you build a solid product, but what makes that app successful isn’t the fact that it exists — it’s the efficiencies it creates. By focusing on marketing strategies alongside product development, you can create an app that not only makes life better for your users, but also makes a profit for your startup.

New start-ups can find inexpensive, but effective, marketing solutions (globes.co.il)

With little money in the bank, a new start-up must improvise, especially when it comes to service providers, when it continues to work from a new location to finance the new dream, and when they want to mass market the product. Whether an app or a physical product, the ability to present and offer it to the world is quite limited when you lack a pile of cash on the table. It is much easier to pour out money advertising on Google, Facebook, or Twitter, or to promote banners on leading ad networks, but in the case of a new start-up, the options are limited. Moreover, competition at app stores and for consumers’ disposable income is becoming harder.

What are the options when the budget is limited. We asked the three incubators participating in the “Globes” and Bank Hapoalim (TASE: POLI) Smartup2 program for tips for the start-ups they are assisting.

Explore.Dream.Discover. COO Nimrod Cohen is advising GreenIQ Ltd., which has developed a water and money-saving app for watering lawns, about marketing. He says that GreenIQ’s team must know how to stand out outside traditional advertising methods. “Today’s consumers carry out in-depth online research on their own before contacting a supplier. They have basically made the final decision about the purchase before any interaction with the supplier. The customer often never meets the supplier, or meets it after having made up his mind and does not give the supplier the chance to persuade him of the advantages of its product, he says, adding that consumer research is conducted through various information channels, including expert blogs and discussion groups on social networks. He argues that in order to adapt the company’s online sales to this reality, it must undertake several activities to stand out from the crowd.

Cohen advises focusing on building GreenIQ’s brand. “It’s necessary to build a brand that will be associated with water conservation and environmental quality and to be known as alert to the subject. Take care not to push the company’s product at every opportunity, but to be known as an objective party as much as possible,” he says.

Cohen advises GeenIQ to prepare studies on water wastage, the smart home, and so forth, and to repeatedly emphasize that the company’s product should stay out of advertisements in order to create brand awareness and values and not to try direct sales to users. He says that the company should concentrate on countries with high conservation awareness and water shortages.

Another way for the company to stand out against the competition in the field and to create awareness is for the products to go viral online. “The public barely knows Internet of Things, where GreenIQ operates. In this reality, the first products attract a lot of attention, and people often like to brag about the innovative product they just bought. The message should be adapted to this spirit,” he says. “In this case, you should make viral video clips to highlight the product’s advantages, its usefulness, and need to the general public.”

The viral engine

Nielsen Innovate VP business development Dov Yarkoni, who is advising Zeekit Ltd., says that the developer of a technology for fitting clothes with a simple photograph is using two different product promotion models. The first is development of a consumer app to take the pictures, upload them, and choose the clothes after seeing how they look on the app. The other model is to work directly with e-commerce fashion designers, in which Zeekit will have technology vendors.

Naturally, the first model, based on B2C, targets a wider clientele and is therefore more challenging, but also quite interesting. Yarkoni says that before starting penetration tactics and creating a wave of downloads and users of the app, “it is important that every service which targets consumers to have an organized tracking system so the entrepreneurs can monitor via which channel users arrive, and on the other hand how much revenue the user generates.”

Yarkoni adds, “The basis for marketing in this field is the announcement that costs me X dollars to bring users to the app and to ensure that it generates X-plus revenue so that the business will be profitable over time.” He says that before spending money on active marketing, it is desirable to create organic growth engines that will be a solid foundation for success. “One of them is the viral engine. Since Zeekit is an app that lets people see how they look when they upload the picture. It creates an opportunity for dialogue between friends, a husband and wife, or anyone who can provide feedback about how the clothes look on them and whether they should buy the item.”

Yarkoni says that the addition of social network tools, which make it possible to upload pictures to Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and so on, creates a viral effect for the app. Another direction that he suggests is to create fashion content on social networks. “It’s possible to upload interesting content to Instagram or to create a group on Pinterest with different collections,” he says.

A third channel that can create an organic growth engine for a social app is collaboration with fashion bloggers or leading celebrities. “If they can create relationships with leading fashion opinion-setters, they will basically want them to praise this service and create free publicity,” he says.

Yarkoni also points to the fact that the app itself is compensated for success and going viral. It is important to promote feedback for the app at relevant stores to facilitate sales at App Store or Google Play. “This is very important for the app’s usability and appearance. Positive feedback from users can give Zeekit greater presence in the app stores,” he says. Furthermore, the app’s presentation at the stores should be optimized by creating video clips to show users the app’s essence and how to use it.

“Only after this work, when there is a user base and they start to see the app’s use and value to them, and there are repeat users, is it possible to begin using paid advertising growth engines,” Yarkoni concludes. One way to promote downloads of the app is by targeted ads for installing it, which are found on Facebook, Twitter, and Google. He also suggests using app advertising systems, such as ironSource and Matomy Media Group (LSE:MTMY) ( “As I said, it’s important to activate tracking systems in this case in order to know whether users find the app on Facebook ads or somewhere else.”

Use the experts

8200 EISP founder Inbal Arieli, who advises HopOn Ltd. says that the start-up, which is developing an app for paying bus fares via smartphones, should use two marketing channels: a B2B model with bus and train operators, and a B2C model for consumers.

Arieli says that conversations with HopOn’s founder suggested marketing to end users through full collaboration with public transportation companies, because of the direct incentive of the companies’ cost savings by switching passengers from current fare payment methods to HopOn’s method.

“HopOn has a major edge in the position given them at the friction points between potential users of the app and public transport, such as ads at bus stops or on trains and buses. We therefore advise them to focus their efforts on this channel,” says Arieli. “In addition, because most passengers pass the time surfing on their smartphones, it is worthwhile advertising on popular apps, such as Facebook.”

She adds that, in addition to the initial brand foothold campaign, the growth rate will likely be based on going viral and from word of mouth.

For B2B marketing, Arieli says, “An analysis by HopOn and its familiarity with the market found that public transportation operators are conservative, with long decision-making processes, and that each is focused on a different geographical area. The company should therefore adapt and focus its messages to each region separately in terms of language, tangible examples, such as maps for that region or local bus lines, and user interface.”

She says that it is also worthwhile for the company’s entrepreneurs to use their financial experience as accountants to emphasize their management capability, in addition to the product, which has already been implemented in full in its first market and is gaining footholds in more markets.

Tell the story

If the three startups in the Smartup2 program are put to one side, it is worthwhile to try and look at the big picture to see how to connect the market to the product and how to promote the company. “A major part of marketing is how to tell your story, or storytelling,” says Zula CMO Hillel Fuld, a mentor and advisor to entrepreneurs. “You have to know how to tell your story to your users, your investors, and to journalists who want to cover your start-up.”

“Marketing is something that goes hand in hand with sales. Ultimately, both try the same message,” he says. “For example, I sell you my pen. Sales are to say, ‘My pen is the most recommended. Buy it.’ Marketing is to talk about what is trendy in the pen market, what was trendy last year, and, by the way, to mention that I sell pens. It doesn’t matter if this happens on Facebook or Twitter; the idea is to tell your story, but not to sell it directly.”

A good example of this is that it is not necessary to have direct sales. Fuld says that Apple Inc. (Nasdaq: AAPL) recently acquired a competitor to a start-up that he advises, and that thousands of Android developers can no longer use the competitor’s services. “The start-up’s CEO asked me what to do. He said that these Android developers were tweeting to find another company in the field. He asked whether to respond to them and write about his company. I told him, ‘Heaven forbid. Be quiet. Just mark their tweets as favorites.’ He thought that I had gone crazy, but later all these users received alerts that the company had made them favorites, checked the company out, and they tweeted, ‘Hey guys, this company knows how to listen and not just to sell.’ The company now has new users and ambassadors,” he relates.

“This does not mean that this method always works, but in any case, part of marketing is to listen to customers and potential customers,” says Fuld, citing a classic marketing example of Internet marketing expert Gary Vaynerchuk. “Early in his career in the business, when he managed his wine store, a customer came in and bought expensive wine. Gary went to the customer’s Twitter, saw that he a fan of a particular football team, bought a shirt on eBay and sent it the customer’s home. That customer returned with tears in his eyes and promised that he would never buy wine at any other company. What happened here is that Gary thought, listened, studied the person and understood him.”

Fuld concludes, “With every start-up that provides value, you get real engagement. If you market content in the most natural way possible, then people will want to join you. You won’t see a return on investment tomorrow, but your brand will rise above the noise, where everyone promotes and sell themselves. If a start-up writes a valuable blog, you’ll build greater ROI than an immediate sale.”

Users Are People Too: The Key to a Successful App is Knowing Your Users (developereconomics.com)

Given the staggering odds against the success of any app in the marketplace, it is surprising that so much effort is devoted to the creation of apps, many of which never see the light of day.

Today, there are over 1.2 million apps in both Apple’s App Store and Google Play, of which just 500,000 are ever downloaded. Out of the 500,000, 20 percent are only opened once in the first 6 months after download, and almost 50% are used no more than 5 times.

Growth hacking relies on incomplete data

With very few exceptions, pure word-of-mouth and organic growth without additional effort on the developer’s part is not enough for an app to surface above the noise. As a result, an entire cottage industry of “growth hackers” has emerged, one which takes traditional marketing approaches and combines them with rigorous metrics to make sure that every step of the process is measurable and actionable. For example, Quora closely monitored the behavior of their most active users. They found patterns that were used to stimulate other users to behave in the same way.

One of the limitations of the growth-hacking approach today is that the mobile ecosystem is still a Wild West, similar to where the desktop software industry was some 10-15 years ago. The most established mobile tools, such as Flurry and Google Analytics are really good at telling developers how users are using the app… which version, operating system, for how long a user engages in the app, which buttons are being pressed, etc… but do little to tell you anything about the wants and needs of the people using the apps.

While these descriptive analytics are critical, there is another piece of the puzzle for creating a successful app, which has been undiscovered by developers today: human understanding.

Human understanding is defined as the knowledge about a user’s demographics, interests, and intents. While tools like Flurry and Google Analytics are starting to provide more of these user insights, they are typically presented in aggregate form, which makes a user hard to understand on an individual level.

Understanding your users

So what can be seen as an improvement? How do you know if you are providing more value to a user or if you’re slapping on features your users don’t care about? The answer lies in understanding your users.

A good place to start in trying to understand your users is to use analytics tools. This seems obvious but only 21% of app developers use these. The most basic information that could provide significant value is to know the demographics of your users. Are they mostly male or female? What is the age distribution? What is their income distribution? Also, from what countries are your users and what languages do they speak? With this data it is possible to make broad categorizations of users. For example, data can show that your app is popular in France among middle aged women. Without being prejudiced, one can assume their English is not great. Translating your app can boost its popularity even more and increase overall satisfaction with your app among these group of users.

The subsequent step is to find out what interests your users have. Integrating social media login possibilities in your app and asking for the right permissions can provide you with all the self-declared interests of the user. Combining this with their demographic data gives you improved segmentation options, which is another step towards a true understanding of your users.

Contextual information is important to consider as well. Where are people using your app; at home, while commuting, at work or in the gym? When are they using it? Only at night? Several times a day? How does this correlate to other users and what conclusions can you make from this? Also, on which devices/operating systems are they using your app at home and which ones while travelling? Figuring this out can direct your creativity and efforts to build features that cater to the context in which your app is used.

Given the vast amount of apps that are offered, no matter how unique your app is, your app hascompetition. To understand your user isn’t limited by figuring out who they are and how they behave in relation to your app, it’s about the competition as well! How often and how much do your users log in to competitive apps? What are the unique features of the most used competitive apps? Knowing this provides valuable information of what users appreciate in competitive apps.

When all these questions are addressed there is a huge opportunity to grasp. Combine the segmentation information with the usage data from your app – sessions, time in app, ads clicked, screen flow, transactions, returning user, etc.- to identify your most valuable, most engaged and/or most loyal users. Who are they? How are they using your app? If you find answers to these questions, you’ll have identified the people who value your app the most, as well as how they use it and which features create value for them. Having this insight can mean the difference between the life or death of an app. However, it’s important to consider that ultimately the actions that are taken based on these insights decide the future of the app.

What to do next

When you know who are your most valuable (whether this means most loyal, engaged, contributing to revenue, etc.) users you can start targeting and catering to the needs of those users. For example, when implementing changes in the user interface, most developers use some form of A/B testing to figure out what the effects are. This acclaimed method of improving your product can be even more effective when you filter out the effects of those users that are of little value to you. For example, you can be A/B testing an ad in order to optimise clickrate, but seeing very small differences between the two groups. However, if you segment your audience you may see vastly different results; your target group of ‘valuable’ users might be much more engaged with the content than other user groups. The same technique can be implemented for building new features, expanding your offering of in-app purchasable items and personalizing content.By knowing your users you are able to make better and more timely decisions to improve your app. Over time, your most valuable users are perfectly catered to which makes them love your app even more. This results in a higher retention rate, more engagement and a higher chance of getting recommended to their peers.

Financially, knowing your users makes sense as well. You can offer your ad space to advertisers that are targeting the segments you identified to be your most loyal and engaged users, which raises the eCPM and lowers idle time of your ad space. Additionally, marketing efforts to obtain new users yourself can also behighly targeted. Most developers greatly underestimate and are dissatisfied with the cost of acquiring new (valuable) users. With true user understanding it is possible to specify efforts and use your marketing budget efficiently and effectively, simply getting more bang for your buck. This is especially relevant for developers who are trying to make a decent living from their apps. These findings correspond with those of advisory company Gartner. They concluded that in order to make an app profitable, developers need to win customer’s loyalty and satisfaction by delivering a well designed and top-performing product.

Building your next app

Success is a concept that can mean different things to different people and different kinds of apps. Some developers don’t like to discuss marketing and the business side of developing and maintaining an app, but it’s an indispensable part of making an app successful. For the people that are in it to make a living, knowing your users is crucial. Raising your ads’ eCPM, lowering its idle time, getting a higher return on marketing investments and a higher Life Time Value (LTV) is worth taking the time to get to know your users. Your efforts will be focused to cater to your most valuable users which greatly improves effectiveness across all your activities, from building new features to marketing your app.

Having these insights doesn’t have to be limited to just one app. Building your next app based on this vital information can give you a head start. You can use it to answer questions such as: What platform should I focus on? iOS, Android, both or try other platforms with less competition? Optimize for smartphones, tablets or both? What sort of features were most appreciated by the most valuable users in your other app? Who were the users that did not show any improvements in usage after an update? What can you do to turn the least valuable users of your other app into the most valuable for your next one?

Having a successful app is every developer’s dream when they push their app live. However, given current statistics on overall user retention in the app stores, there is a lot of room for improvement. The old saying “to measure is to know” is very applicable in this matter, but it’s only half the work. Turning what you know into actionable information is when the real magic happens. Only then you are on the right track towards systematic improvements to your app and getting that elusive success you are dreaming of.

How to Maximize Your Mobile App Marketing with Social Media (business2community.com)

Long days. Even longer nights are behind you. You and your development partners have created the app of your dreams and one that you hope will be a smash hit on Google Play and the Apple App store.

You’ve done your homework. You’ve studied your target audience. You’ve created what you feel is the ultimate onboarding experience. You’ve beta tested and feel your app is finally ready to launch. What next? Your work is not done yet! Now for the fun part.

You want to create a demand for your app and drive people to download. Most app developers and your typical “appreneur” think that mobile advertising such as in-app ads are the way to go in order to build that audience. But, there are other ways to drive app demand.

Cut through all the noise on the app stores by utilizing social media, which are for the most part free and open up the playing field to everyone, even those with minimal budgets and resources.

Below, I discuss two things I recommend in preparation for your social media push to maximize your mobile app marketing.

Don’t forget content

In preparing your Social Media campaign to bring visibility to your app, first you must create good content. And I’m talking a lot of it!

Develop content that will keep your target audience engaged. If you are promoting your cooking app, then perhaps you can write posts on some of the best recipes out of Europe, tips by the best chefs, an announcement of a contest inviting the best organic pizza recipes.

Time to get creative!

You might create a cool video or videos like Evernote did. This very popular note-taking app created a bunch of videos that shows how Evernote can bring value into the lives of users in a slew of real life situations. The videos make you want to download the app and try it for yourself.

Make one that describes your app. Make it funny, quirky. The idea is to get people excited about your app without pushing it so hard, and then with the right call to action, get them to download. Promote this video content via the most popular channels like Facebook, Twitter, and Google plus.

Make your video viral by tying it into a video that touches the masses. Take a video like Pharrell Williams’ Happy which has over 310M views . Perhaps you can make a Parody of it and tie it into your app. Or a video like Gangnam Style. This video for example has over 2B views.

The core of making a video go viral is to keep it simple, and to have people say WOW and inspire them to just imagine, share with their contacts, who’ll share with their contacts and so on and so on. This will hopefully lead the masses to download your app. The same goes for a great blog post.

Get influencers to spread the word

Going further on developing content, People love to hear about apps from friends and family. However, getting a review of your app on a prominent YouTube channel like the Daily App Show or on top app review sites will also bring your app huge visibility. This a valuable piece of content.

Going back to Evernote, see here how an influencer in Hollywood uses the app to collaborate when producing films. Don’t you think someone like this can heighten the exposure of your app? After all, it’s Hollywood!

A video of two Research Triangle, North Carolina school administrators letting students know class was canceled due to a snowstorm, first garnered 3 million views and it rose steadily. It was also picked up by Gawker as well as the Washington post.

The video mentioned Evernote. It was catchy and in context, done to the tune of “Ice Ice Baby”. Check it out here.

Don’t just market on Facebook

Get started on the social channels by first setting up a profile and post statuses that are neutral and interesting, as well as connecting with key influencers in your app’s niche.

Google +

It might have taken some time with Facebook breaking the user barrier, but Google + is finally starting to come around. Being the brainchild of Google has its benefits. One of those as I’m sure you know is the built-in power of having your app come up in organic search results.

At first glance, utilizing hashtags on Google + is just like using them on Twitter or Instagram. You start off with a # and type in your one word hashtag. What sets Google + hashtag creation apart, is the ability to auto-create hashtags. Check out this post for an in-depth review of this vibrant feature specifically and Google + hashtag use in general.

Utilize Hashtags to optimize your SEO power, but don’t overdo it. Google doesn’t appreciate overstuffing keywords in content and the same goes for hashtags.

Twitter

A great source for networking, Twitter allows you to reach influencers by mentioning them in your tweets. It does take some work and there is a limited number of characters in your messages, but if you have influencers retweeting you, it is a great driver for downloads.

A new feature released just last year allows you to use content marketing and “Twitter Cards” to boost visibility of your app, thereby increasing downloads. Here is a great post about it from Econsultancy I suggest you check out.

Facebook

With hundreds of millions of users, Facebook is the perfect social media channel to promote content. I highly suggest setting up a Facebook page for your app. This gives you a presence in the social media world and is a great way to gain feedback about your app, gain credibility and create a buzz. The idea here is to post content that is related to your app, but not about the app itself.

Encourage users to share your content.

Your page might not have a lot of followers to start off, and that’s OK. Gain them by following others and having them follow you. Get in on the conversations that users are having with valuable information. They will respect and follow you.

Instagram

Go visual with your marketing! This was a huge trend in 2013 with such sites as Pinterest and it is something that is sure to continue. There are over seventy five million active users on Instagram. Having a presence here is something you should look into and see what you can do to follow the success with your app (See Starbucks example below). Talk about the people who will use your app, show pictures and videos without talking about the product itself.

Here’s a great post on how to market using Instagram.

More social tips

1. Incentivize: Give your users a reason to share! See how Dropbox does it and has become a 4 Billion dollar company.

2. Using sharing within your app:. Give them lots of options to share! As the app Glmps shows below. People can share to many sites at once with just a single tap!

3. Show appreciation to your followers: This can be done by sharing their photos on your social media channels, embed them on your website, tweet their photos, mention them. Let them know!

Starbucks does this the best and is one of the top users of Instagram. With well over 2.5 Million followers on Instagram for example, I suggest you check out their profile here.

4. Schedule your posts: Utilize a social media tool such as Hootsuite to schedule your posts and measure engagement across the Social Media spectrum.

5. Use Hashtags: Be sure to use Hashtags to maximize your reach with your target audience. See here for a great post on how to use Hashtags in your posts on Twitter, Instagram and Facebook.

Keeping users on the app highway

Bringing users back again and again is what the mission of your onboarding experience should be. You can compare the onboarding experience to an entry ramp on a highway for your first time users. Succeeding in this phase is imperative to having them come back. This is called user retention.

Downloads do not equal active users. It just means people downloaded your app because they took some interest in it. This final phase can spell glory or disaster for your app. Here is where you need to monitor the user experience and behavior, see where they spend the most time, see where they drop out, see where they engage by tapping, pinching and swiping. See what they like. What they don’t.

Optimizing the user experience

You can refine the user experience during the onboarding phase and thereafter by using a visual mobile analytics tool. This will explain the why behind your users’ actions. Such a tool goes above and beyond a traditional analytics tool and allows you to monitor user experience, analyze and optimize. This is a constant process and before you know it, it’ll be like a walk on the beach.

Square rounds into form with an EMV mPOS reader (mobilepayments.com)

Square's announcement Wednesday that it will finally release an EMV reader into the wild can be viewed one of two ways: Either it is too little, too late or perfect timing.

For the United States, it is perfect timing since the infrastructure for EMV merchant acceptance is still in the early stages as the liability shift deadline is October 2015. Once that passes, merchants will be on the hook for purchases made with stolen cards.

Square, however, could run into issues expanding its business overseas as it will face stiff competition from established companies such as ROAM, iZettle and payleven.

Meanwhile, Square is preparing U.S. merchants for the transition to its EMV reader on the website https://squareup.com/emv and will make periodic updates on the official company blog at https://blog.squareup.com.

"Square saw the writing on the wall [with EMV]," Thad Peterson, a senior analyst for Boston-based Aite Group, told Mobile Payments Today. "They couldn't have a device-driven payments business without an EMV-capable device, particularly since they're trying to move up from micromerchants."

Square will not change the form factor of its very recognizable dongle for EMV acceptance.

Merchants will "dip" the card into the reader chip-first and it will remain there for the transaction's duration. Consumers confirm their purchase with a signature on either the smartphone or tablet screen. The dongle will still accept mag-stripe cards.

Square's chip-and-signature approach is fine for the U.S. where that will be the standard, but chip-and-PIN is the standard elsewhere as companies in this market offer merchants devices with a built-in PIN pad.

"Right now, we're focused on building a chip-card reader for U.S. merchants," a Square spokesperson wrote in an email to Mobile Payments Today. "That said, the EMV technology that we're designing is definitely a step toward building the solution for other international markets."

Up until this point, Square's lack of EMV support was an issue it dodged whenever industry analysts and reporters broached the subject with the company.

Earlier this year, ABI Research ranked the expanding mobile point-of-sale market based on a number of categories in implementation and innovation. Square did not place in the top 10 based on missing EMV support, which limits its growth potential worldwide.

"In terms of market share, they have that going for them," Phil Sealy, the report's author, told Mobile Payments Today in April. "They are doing very well in the States, which is a hotbed for mPOS deployments at the moment. But they fall short in EMV support. That has limited their potential, and that will have to be addressed."

Sealy Wednesday was whistling a different tune about Square.

Square's EMV reader will prevent other vendors from swooping in to try and steal the company's current business, he said.

"It will help them protect the legacy business that they've already established," Sealy said. "The other vendors out there would have been potentially targeting that business as the U.S. migrated to EMV. This a way of protecting their base, particular in the States where they have a strong foothold."

Square vowed in its press release to release the reader at a price that is much cheaper than its competitors. The company now offers its mag-stripe reader free to merchants that order it online. Apple and other retailers sell Square for $10, but there is a $10 rebate.

A heftier price for a Square EMV dongle is not necessarily a bad thing, Sealy said.

"If they charge per unit, it gives people a reason to reuse it instead of using it once and putting it in a drawer," he said. "That might help them get more consistent business from each device.

5 Great Mobile App Marketing Strategies (business2community.com)

Did you know that there are over a million mobile apps in the app stores stores? With so many mobile apps out there, app-developers really need to have a strong marketing strategy to make sure their app is a success and is used by their customers. So what can you do to market your app, and ensure that users are finding and utilizing your unique app?

We’ve listed five great marketing strategies to propel your app forward below.

1. Early Releases and Regular Releases
This is a really important to do if you want to keep a loyal user base. Release features and upgrades to your app often. Word of mouth is the best way to market your app, hands down, so don’t be afraid to tell your customers about it!

2. Create A Unique Mobile Offering
What does that mean to you? It could mean targeting a specific group of people or customers, or it could mean offering features that no other app offers. In some cases, it could mean both. Make sure your app has something to offer that your competitor’s mobile solutions do not, and you’ll guarantee a user base. Make your mobile offering unique to your customers.

3. Optimize for the App Store
This one is really important. Just like search engines, you want to be able to be found when users look for apps like yours. You want to be the top result. You do this by utilizing the right keywords, titles and descriptions. Make sure your app comes up when relevant search topics are searched for. App store optimization is super important, because without it, users may not ever know you exist.

4. Make Your App Desirable

For small businesses, the name of the game is implementing functionality into your mobile app that your customers will actually benefit from. Avoid creating an app just to have a billboard of your company in the app store and instead create an app that will show real utility to your customers.

5. Share Across Social Media
Engaging in social media and using calls to action is also a really smart idea when marketing your app. Focus on letting your existing audiences know that you’ve developed a mobile app with real useful functionality or content and they will surely check it out. They will also share the app on social media sites like twitter and Facebook to help further downloads for your business.

All of these things can mean big profits for your app, and the user is the one doing all the marketing for you! Implementing these simple marketing strategies can really grow your app and help you achieve mobile success.

State of the Developer Nation: The App Economy Consolidates Before the Next Gold Rush (developereconomics.com)

Our 7th Developer Economics survey broke all records again, reaching more than 10,000 app developers from 137 different countries. The full report with the survey findings has just been published and is available for free download!

The view of the app economy that they collectively provide is one of consolidation. Developers are focusing their attention on fewer platforms and app revenues are becoming increasingly concentrated amongst the top publishers. Consolidation in the developers tools sector may also be partly responsible for the decline we see in tools usage. This is also reflected by the platforms, with BlackBerry moving their focus away from consumer smartphones and Microsoft killing their recently acquired Asha and Nokia X platforms to double down on Windows Phone. Fortunately there are several indicators that the next gold rush is just getting started.

Platform Wars

On a global level the platform wars are ending with iOS claiming the majority of the high-end device market and Android winning almost everywhere else. This results in Android leading in developer mindshare at 70% with iOS a clear second with 51% of developers targeting the platform. However, we’ve been tracking this metric since 2010 and there is a new pattern. Windows Phone was the only platform to gain developer mindshare, rising steadily to 28%, despite failing to gain device market share. Although Android and iOS lost developer mindshare, this was not fewer developers prioritising either platform, rather more developers are now choosing sides. The average number of platforms a developer targets has fallen from 2.9 to 2.2 over the last 12 months, with more than 40% only targeting a single platform.

BlackBerry 10 is rapidly leaking developer mindshare, down to 11%, having failed to gain traction with consumers. Meanwhile, it’s now becoming increasingly clear that the future of HTML5 lies beyond the browser. Although HTML5 is used by 42% of developers as a technology for app development, only 15% still target mobile browsers as a distribution platform.

A surprisingly high 47% of iOS developers and 42% of Android developers are using something other than the native language on their platforms. While hybrid apps are the most popular non-native option for building Android and iOS apps, they’re only used by 13% of developers. Hybrid apps are HTML5 apps with a native wrapper, typically created by tools such as Cordova.

App Revenues

The majority of app businesses are not sustainable at current revenue levels. 50% of iOS developers and 64% of Android developers are below the “app poverty line” of $500 per app per month. 24% of developers interested in making money earn nothing at all. A further 23% make less than $100 per app per month. The overall app economy, including all revenue sources not just the app stores, is still growing but the revenues are highly concentrated. At the top end of the revenue scale there are just 1.6% of developers with apps earning more than $500k per month, collectively they earn multiples of the other 98.4% combined.

State of the Game Developer Nation

Games dominate app store revenues, yet most games developers struggle. 33% of developers make games but 57% of those games make less than $500 per month. Experience breeds success in the games market. The more games a developer has shipped the more likely they are to be financially successful. However, 70% of games developers have shipped less than 4 titles.

Games is a multi-platform world with the average games developer targeting 3 platforms versus 1.75 platforms for non-games developers. Multi-platform games benefit from cross-platform game development tools with Unity by far the most popular, used by 47% of developers. The next paid tool, Adobe Air, comes a distant second at 15%. Apple and Google’s latest graphics technologies launch a battle for the richest gaming experiences. Third party game development tools like Unity and the Unreal Engine will be key to developers exploiting these capabilities.

Tools of the App Developer Trade

Third-party tools are a critical part of successful app businesses. There’s a strong correlation between tool use and revenues, the more tools a developer uses, the more money they make. We successfully predicted the rise of the Mega-SDK, where consolidation amongst tools companies allows developers to integrate multiple tool categories from a single vendor. Despite this, tool use is declining, partly due to the rapid influx of new mobile developers. These new developers are typically not aware of the tools that are available and thus reduce the average usage levels. 26% of developers that are interested in making money don’t use any third party tools, up from 14% just 12 months ago.

The most popular category of tool is Ad Networks, with 30% of developers using them. However, this is one of the few tool categories that is not associated with higher than average revenues. More experienced and successful developers show a preference for Cloud Computing platforms, such as Amazon Web Services or Microsoft Azure, with 40% of those with 6+ years experience in mobile apps adopting them.

Enterprise Apps – The Next Gold Rush

Enterprise apps are already the safest bet in the app economy and they’re only just getting started. 67% of mobile app developers primarily target consumers and 11% target professionals directly. The 16% of developers who target enterprises are twice as likely to be earning over $5k per app per month and almost 3 times as likely to earn more than $25k per app per month.

Penetration of enterprises with mobile devices and solutions is already broad but not yet deep. Currently iOS appears to be winning the battle for enterprise adoption and revenues. Yet many developers are focusing on the wrong platform with 10% more enterprise developers targeting Android than iOS. Although enterprise apps have been a historical strength for them, Microsoft and BlackBerry are seeing very weak adoption for their new platforms amongst enterprise developers due to lack of demand from enterprises.

This battle is in the very early stages. Microsoft is re-focussing on their core competence in productivity software while Apple and Google move rapidly to embrace enterprises. Google’s integration of Samsung’s Knox platform into the Android platform is a major step forward. Meanwhile Apple’s new partnership with IBM gives them a strong proposition in all the major vertical markets. These moves will undoubtedly drive greater adoption of mobile technology in enterprises and create countless opportunities for developers to help re-think the way we work.

For more information, download the full Developer Economics Q3 2014: State of the Developer Nation report!