Creating a custom iPad can be a bit of a bear. We’ve been creating apps for our clients since the day the iPad came out. Here are the three single most common scenarios I encounter when discussing iPad app development with new clients.
- Everybody wants an app—right now.
- Nobody knows what they want the app to do.
- Most end up needing similar solutions.
Who doesn’t want an app. If done right, a company can simplify, streamline and solve a whole host of business problems. The biggest shock is that companies are clambering to get an app launched before they even know what they want it to do. The bad news is that launching an app too quickly usually stifles its usability. The good news is that this aggressive approach inspired us to created a platform that can help launch an app in only a few hours, not months. More on that later.
Nobody knows what they want an app to do. This is often a double edged sword for us. It’s great because it gives us an opportunity to flex our creative muscles and build apps that pack a punch while meeting a business objective. It can be a challenge because we can sometimes run in circles trying to determine what the app should do and what problem it’s going to solve.
As exciting and momentous as the ‘app revolution’ is, it’s encouraging to see the similarities in what people are looking for. When the dust settles and the high level discussion about apps mellow, the conversations get eerily similar. Companies are looking for an app that syncs with a host of digital assets, that’s organized into a navigable menu structure and that they can easily deploy throughout the compnay. They want to maintain, add, edit and delete assets from a central location and have all iPads throughout the organization sync to it. A quintessential content management system(CMS) for iPads or tablets.
With that, every company already has a ton of digital content they’ve already produced. There’s brochures, video demos, sales presentations, training modules, email templates, websites, microsites, images, sell sheets, spec documents, white papers, etc. So much of this content is already developed, it just needs a convenient way of getting deployed. This content is used by sales reps to support sales calls and drive conversations about a company’s unique value proposition.
This is a conversation I’ve had over and over again. You might think, ‘That’s boring. The same thing over and over again.’ Well, not quite. These redundant conversations inspired the creation of App Data Room(ADR), an easy, fast and affordable way to build, manage and deploy a custom iPad app throughout an organization. We launched ADR only 3 weeks ago and are generating a lot of excitement when we demo it for our customers.
The app stuff is exciting and holds a lot of opportunities for businesses that do it right.