App Savvy

How This Book Is Organized

I wrote this book so that you can use it from idea to App Store sale, while at the same time being able to refer to it for a particular topic. This second goal is particularly important for those who may already have an app or are just stuck. For example, discussing how to differentiate your app from others is addressed in Chapter 2, while improving your app before it is submitted to the App Store is covered in Chapter 6.

What is not initially apparent from the sequential nature of this book is that Chapter 8—the marketing chapter—actually begins being referenced in Chapter 3. As you move forward, you’ll learn that marketing, or what I call your marketing crescendo, actually occurs in parallel with the development of your app. This approach highlights something that many developers miss. Namely, that many either do not market their apps or believe that marketing begins only after they have built the app or gotten it approved by Apple. If you start marketing your app at that point, you’ll miss out on a key opportunity for your app, because the launch into the App Store presents one of the biggest moments for exposure and you need to fully maximize it.

Thus, the initial culmination of your marketing crescendo will be reached when your app is approved into the App Store. To reach that point, I will continue to direct you to Chapter 8 throughout the book to perform your marketing checkups—marketing activities that occur in parallel with your app’s development—which consist of five phases. By the time you finish submitting your app to Apple in Chapter 7, you will have already referenced most of Chapter 8 and will immediately jump to Phase 5 of your marketing crescendo.

I also want to highlight that the process you are going to follow is essentially one complete pass through the life cycle of an app. This process starts with an idea and ends with updating your app once it has been launched. Some parts of the development process may require you to iterate; that is, you’ll need to repeat what you are doing and get it right before moving forward (see Figure 1). This can include validating your idea until it resonates with customers, revising a screen until it is easy enough to use, or improving the performance of your app before you submit it to Apple. While your decision to continue to invest in your app won’t necessarily take you back to the beginning of this process, the conclusion of this book may seem somewhat anticlimactic because you’ll already have been through all the steps at least once. This means that at the end of the book, the next step may actually be a previous step from an earlier chapter.

Figure 1. The life cycle for an application and how it relates to the various chapters in this book; notice how you will be referring to Chapter 8 throughout the book, performing your marketing activities and developing your app in parallel

With this background, it’s time for you to begin exploring your idea. Here’s how the rest of the book breaks down.

Strategy:

Chapter 1

You don’t start building an app...by building an app. You first need to wrap your mind around the vastness of the App Store ecosystem and discover whether your app idea should be more than just an idea.

Chapter 2

To build an app, you need to fully understand Apple’s touch devices—the iPod touch, iPhone, and iPad—and how you plan to differentiate your offering from other options.

Chapter 3

With the initial assumptions about the device you are targeting and the features you want your app to have, you’ll immediately turn to customers to start validating these ideas. Of course, you’ll first need to know who those customers are and how to find them.

Development:

Chapter 4

Having a concept for an app and some validated ideas about it will expedite your conversations with people or companies that will actually build it. Beyond understanding your app, you’ll need to know how best to find and then vet designers and developers.

Chapter 5

Once you have a team in place, you’ll use the assets you’ve created up to this point to begin developing your app. You’ll dive more into the details of specific features the first version of your app will have, and begin defining the look-and-feel and functionality as you drive toward getting a working version of your app.

Chapter 6

To improve the features and functions of your app, you and your customers will test it extensively before it is submitted to the App Store. To install an app outside the App Store, you’ll create a special version of it that you can distribute for testing.

Launch:

Chapter 7

After you are satisfied with the first version of your app, you’ll need to submit it to Apple for approval. Before running straight to Apple, though, you’ll gather everything you need to make the App Store submission process as smooth as possible.

Chapter 8

By the time your app is approved, you’ll have your pre- and post-launch marketing checklist in place and start checking those items off to maximize the visibility and reception of your app when it first hits the App Store.

Chapter 9

Comparing the criteria you defined at the start of the process with the feedback and data you now have allows you to assess how your app is doing. You’ll be watchful of early warning signals and avoid problems by keeping customers engaged and excited about your app.

Tips and tools:

Appendix B

Those daring enough to get slightly more technical will be rewarded with some tips and tools that will make their involvement in app development more efficient and enjoyable.