Appcelerator bypasses mobile-app-middlemen for ad agencies
ADOTAS – So you’re finally ready to make that plunge into the mobile market — but not just a mobile website. Nah, you’re going to head to app city, where the big kids play. Now do you go with an iPhone app? My goodness, it’ll take six months to develop? And then it won’t translate to Google’s Android platform? Suddenly you become short of breath and visions of Steve Jobs chortling circle round your head — you feel faint….
But this doesn’t have to happen to your interactive ad agency — not if you’ve signed up with Appcelerator’s partner program to use its integration platform for iPhone and Android applications. Cimex, Computer Sciences Corp., Intridea, Razorfish, Tribal DDB and TMA are all on board, the company announced today, while several more are getting in line.
This announcement comes on the heels of the June launch of Appcelerator’s Titanium Mobile, an extension of its Titanium Desktop for building PC-, Mac- and Linux-based applications. Titanium Mobile offers a group of more than 300 APIs to unlock the most neat-o features of mobile devices — in JavaScript, which makes many a programmer wipe the sweat for his or her brow in relief. A reported 12,000 developers have taken advantage of the platform to build apps now being downloaded in the Apple and Android stores.
The iPhone operating system is based in Objective-C, complicated code that Appcelerator Senior Vice President of Marketing Scott Schwarzhoff said “hits a web developer sideways — it takes a huge amount of code to do anything basic.”
As a result, most agencies are forced to outsource app development to small enclave of subcontractors, which drives up the price. Beside adding to the bottom line, possibly the biggest hangup with iPhone apps is the long time frame it to build them, which makes it quite difficult to coordinate with campaigns. Forrester Research estimated an average time frame of six months and a price tag between $20,000 and $300,000.
However, companies need to get their feet wet in the mobile market — eMarketer predicts 40% of Internet use in 2013 will be mobile, but agencies and companies entering the mobile arena should be more interested in native apps opposed to mobile websites or web-based apps for analytics. Cookies from web-based apps aren’t saved on a smartphone; native apps, however, will tell an agency how an app is being used as well as how much.
This is another feature of Appcelerator’s platform: “It’s as easy to analyze a mobile app as a website,” Schwarzhoff said.
In effect, by offering its Titanium service directly to ad agencies, Appcelerator is cutting out the middlemen in mobile apps — the app-building subcontractors. With these partnerships, agencies can use their internal coders to build an app similar to how a wbesite is constructed. Through a program similar to a translator, the platform turns the java code into an iPhone app. Want the same thing for Android? Fill out some queues with different information and with a click or two, wallah. Schwarzhoff noted that 80% to 90% of the code is reusable between the two operating systems.
Oh, and that hobbling time frame? For a recent campaign with Archrival, Appcelerator was able to assemble an app in approximately 50 hours over two weeks. Analytics determined that the average user played with the app for four minutes, which is four times as long as a user is excited by a web app.
Currently Appcelerator is working on platforms for the Palm Pre and BlackBerry software, but the Android isTwelve smartphones loaded with Android are hitting the market for the holiday season; Motorola in particular is betting the farm on Android. Gartner predicts that Android smartphones will outnumber Blackberry and iPhone in 2012.
Of course, after that there’s netbooks and more advanced mobile devices — this frontier remains largely unmapped.
Reader Comments.
No comments yet
Leave a Comment
Article Sponsor
More News
-
Loading ...
Latest News
- Infographic: HootSuite Analyses Social Media Impact of Super Bowl Ads February 7th 2012 ADOTAS - So, it’s the Tuesday after the Super Bowl, [...] more »
- Facebook to Serve Mobile Ads in Coming Weeks February 6th 2012 ADOTAS – According to a Financial Times report, Facebook will [...] more »
- Survey: 39 Percent of Mobile Users Responded to Super Bowl Ads Via Mobile February 6th 2012 ADOTAS - During the Super Bowl yesterday, mobile ad network [...] more »
- Sponsormob Leads the Way Into RTB for Mobile February 3rd 2012 ADOTAS – For more than half a decade, Berlin-based tech [...] more »
- Weird Study: Mobile Purchasing While in the Bathroom on the Rise February 3rd 2012 DM CONFIDENTIAL - According to 11mark, three-quarters of Americans with mobile [...] more »
- This Week’s New Hires February 3rd 2012 ADOTAS – Another week, another round of new gigs. Here [...] more »
- Two Surveys: What Are We Doing with Mobile Devices During the Super Bowl? February 2nd 2012 ADOTAS - With the Super Bowl fast approaching and the [...] more »
Features
- How Social Targeting Can Lead to Discovery February 7th 2012
- Video: “The Future of Engagement” Looks at Audi’s #solongvampires Campaign February 7th 2012
- Three Best Practices for Increasing Subscriber Engagement February 7th 2012
- Reaching the Multi-Tasker in 2012 February 6th 2012
- Fuel Social Conversation with Web Content February 6th 2012
Spotlight
Sponsormob Leads the Way Into RTB for MobileADOTAS – For more than half a decade, Berlin-based tech firm Sponsormob has remained relevant in an industry characterized by [...] more...
Reader Favorites
Classifieds
- PS Technical Writer - SEO Data Analyst
- Interactive Project Manager
- Media Buyer
- PHP Software Engineer (Facebook Platform/Social AP
- SEO/Marketing Internship at Green Education Startu
Recent Comments
- Tuesday, February 7 | Duncan/Day Advertising: [...] Messages Ever Work Online? [Econsultancy] 39% of Mobile Users Responded to Super Bowl Ads
- Influencing the Influencers – Joining the Circle of Trust | | SpongecellSpongecell: [...] We must admit, we love talking about interactive marketing, and we jump at the
- Dave Young: You're absolutely correct. However, it can be tough for the smaller brands to generate the
- Cory Grassell: Interesting research that aligns well with recent data that Twitter set an all-time record for
