Tips to Provide the Best Website Experience, Page 21 of 25

First appearing in 1999, “Hackathons”, also known as “Hack Days”, “Codefests” or “Hackfests”, are not only growing more popular, but becoming more useful. A hackathon is an event in which computer programmers, developers, graphic designers, interface designers, and project managers from different companies and businesses (or freelancers) collaborate together to develop software. These can be held for a number of reasons, most of them being educational, cultural and social purposes. Generally the goal is to create usable software.

In the past year, several 48 hour meetups were held to create apps, websites and programs designed to help migrants in several Latin American countries. It is very important to keep the specific group of people in mind while developing these apps. Programs should not be designed for the average American smartphone user but that of the average user of the specific country or group being addressed.

Just days ago, a hackathon was held in Miami, Florida for the communist country of Cuba. The government of Cuba, like China, Russia and North Korea, routinely blocks content and internet pages deemed unsuitable for its citizens. In addition to this, the average Cuban makes a monthly salary of about $20, making the limited access of information offered even more limited.This specific hackathon was designed to break down the communication barriers between Cuba and the rest of the world. Programs and applications were designed to help immigrants and citizens of Cuba that there is access to the rest of the world.

I just thought I would take a minute and share what is going on in the world around us. Bringing technology to countries with limited access to communication is an excellent way of assisting people in bettering their lifestyles. I also wanted to point out that we do have this access to global communication readily available to us. Why not take advantage of this? What can you do to take your business’ communication or technology to the next level? Is it through mobile optimization? Better organization or your social media? Just food for thought.

First let’s define each…

SEM: (Search Engine Marketing) the process of gaining traffic by purchasing ads on search engines. It is also called Pay Per Click and Cost Per Click marketing as that is how the ads are sold.

SEO: (Search Engine Optimization) the process of affecting the visibility of a website in a search engines organic search results.

I started out writing a blog on SEO VS. SEM. It seemed like a strong topic at the time, so I began reading articles and researching statistics. The more I read, the more I realized that the two are actually fairly complementary to each other.

Now that we know what each of these marketing strategies are, lets talk about how they work for you.

Search engine optimization is a slow and steady process. It can take several months for results to even show up in a search engine. Search engine marketing works pretty much immediately. Its not always cheap, but it will help you drive large amounts of traffic to your webpage very quickly.

With that being said. why not use SEM to boost your website traffic while waiting on your SEO campaign to show progress? It does not hurt to add a little SEM to your marketing campaign. Think of SEM as that quick shot of espresso you take while you wait for your cup of SEO coffee to kick in.

As a marketer, you are probably constantly thinking of innovative and new ways to advertise your product or service. You probably spend hours trying to get into the mind of the “customer” and what it is they want. We’ve all seen the Progressive commercials where Flo is manning the imaginary Progressive retail store. Each ad displays a new story of a customer in the store, while Flo uses her superb selling skills to figure out the specific needs of the customer. Everyone always leaves happy and everyone loves Flo! Wouldn’t that be fantastic to have a chance to sit with your customers face to face and figure out exactly what they want? For most businesses today, that simply is not feasible. At least not in the physical sense. We can, however, be there for our customers virtually with some quick, easy guidelines.

1. SEO:Search engine optimization is the process of affecting the visibility of your website in a search engine’s natural (unpaid) reach.

We have some really great articles on SEO, here is the most recent from Contensive News: http://www.contensive.com/Top-5-Benefits-of-SEO

2. SEM: Search Engine Marketing is marketing via search engines. For example, pay per click advertising. (This is when you post an ad that relates to the users search engine query. Each time a user clicks your ad, an amount is charged to your business.)

Here is some information on SEM and how it differs from SEO: http://www.websearchsocial.com/seo-vs-sem-whats-the-difference-why-does-it-matter-and-how-the-heck-do-you-do-them-both/

3.Real-time Assistance: Twitter allows for real time social media posts. Smart marketers have realized that reading and responding to clients on Twitter can actually be faster than going through email or support.

Virgin Atlantic uses Twitter to assist its customers, even while they are 20,000 feet above the ground: http://mashable.com/2011/11/15/virgin-atlantic-flight-status-bot-twitter/

4. Blogging and Social Media: Blogging and social media currently encompass a large percentage of marketing. Facebook and Google+ are among several social media sites that offer another avenue of branching out to clients.

Check out my past blog on inbound marketing and social media: http://www.contensive.com/Inbound-Marketing-and-Social-Media

Last month Amazon released a free beta version of its new analytic and testing tools for mobile applications. With this tool, mobile developers can track the usage of applications as opposed to the number of times the application has been downloaded. It also allows for analysis of the different user experiences across iOS, Android, and Fire OS. 

Fire OS is the Android based platform that Amazon uses for its Kindle tablets. These analytics are different from that of Google’s system because Amazon tracks devices on a daily and monthly basis while Google tracks users. By tracking devices, a user who has more than one device can be tracked accurately. The most exciting part about this new analytics system is hands down the ability to test on multiple platforms at once. The a/b testing lets developers see how each app runs on multiple devices and operating systems. Amazon also allows for a/b versions of the application to be released, testing marketability. 

Google is by far the powerhouse in analytics, but Amazon has the advantage of focusing only on mobile applications, which could make them viable competition in the world of analytics.

I was on the phone the other day with a client who works for a national trade association and they mentioned at the last board meeting that the “idea” of a mobile app came up. After a few questions it became very clear that the client didn't really know what they wanted or even necessarily why. They just knew based on the directives from the board they had a wheelbarrow full of dirt and were busy looking for a hole to fill.

My client is not that different from most people, who may understand from a user perspective what a mobile app is and probably uses them on a daily basis, but does not really understand from the development perspective that there are different types of mobile apps and how they differ. There are three basic types of mobile applications; native, web and hybrid.

A native app is an application that is built to run on a specific device such as Android or iPhone. These apps are usually downloaded from an online store like iTunes or Google Play. These kinds of applications are designed to run without the need for connectivity and can access the core features of the smart device that it is running on, think games and utilities like Angry Birds,calendars and contact lists. Native apps typically provide the most speed optimized experience, but since there is no connectivity they must be upgraded to remain relevant. Native apps also must overcome the “pain” obstacle. Since they have to be downloaded and installed the user must really want what you have to offer.

A web app is really nothing more than a website/page that is optimized to be viewed on a mobile device through a browser and must be accessed via the internet. Mobile apps have the advantage of immediacy, they don't have to be downloaded or installed; reach- they are available to all internet ready devices regardless of the operating system, and discoverability - search engines can find and index the content of the mobile app and make those results available to users looking for your type of information. Web apps are easily updated enhancing relevancy and lengthening their lifecycle, and easily shared via a link in a Tweet, Facebook post, email or text.

Hybrid apps are native apps that utilize the core features of the phone or device but connect to a server to deliver updated content or data. Hybrid apps still must be downloaded and installed but they need to connect to the internet to deliver or receive data from the user. Hybrid apps can cache content so they have the appearance of running offline but need to connect to the internet for the full experience. Hybrid apps are still built for specific devices but connect to the internet for relevancy, think-Twitter, Skype and Facebook apps.

There are pros and cons of developing mobile apps in each of these ecosystems and the decision about how to choose depends a lot on your business goals and audience.

If you or your organization has a wheelbarrow full of dirt and are trying to decide about your best path into the mobile space give us a call and our experienced mobile app developers can help you find your hole.

Dwayne McGowan