Posted on June 25, 2009, at 1:30 pm .
This article attempts to relay my experiences and lessons learned in the making of PodTrapper, my first mobile application for BlackBerry. It will cover development, pricing, marketing and sales in addition to other items I thought were relevant.
It all started in November of last year. I’m an avid podcast listener during my commutes, and at the time the only viable way to listen was to tote around my iPod. But I still needed my BlackBerry for work, so I was stuck with two devices. I had been toying with the idea of writing a podcast player for BlackBerry and with the announcement of the App World it was now or never. I’m hoping that the success of the iPhone App Store will enable other platforms to follow suit. Afterall, BlackBerry currently has more users and is shipping twice as many phones, albeit to users that may not know apps are available for their phone… yet. Plus the whole project sounded like a lot of fun.
I’ve read all the stories about iPhone developers making fortunes selling apps, how that may not really be the case, or even that people don’t even use the apps they download. I assumed that the truth was somewhere in the middle, but at the very least I wouldn’t have to carry two devices anymore.
So I bought myself a set of signing keys ($20) and went out to RIM’s developer site to grab their SDK. That’s when I ran into my first problem.
Continue reading Marcus Watkins’ experience developing for BlackBerry
Posted on February 4, 2008, at 8:17 am .
EarthTimes has received a press release from ExactTarget about the release of their Mobile Email Optimization Solution, which allows marketers to view and compare emails on a variety of different handsets before sending them out. Marketers have been wary of email messages on smartphones, as the wide variety of OSes, screen sizes, and applications makes it difficult to have them appear correctly on all phones. ExactTarget’s solution allows them to view the messages as they would appear on phones running the BlackBerry OS, Symbian, Windows Mobile and more, and gives tips on malformed or other less-than-optimum formatting in the email itself. While the application is certainly full-featured and interesting, I don’t know how excited I am about anything that might cause more spam to appear in my email.
Posted on January 25, 2008, at 11:32 am .
You might have heard about RIM’s recent “Ask Someone Why They Love Their BlackBerry” campaign, which puts the spotlight on respectable folk to pimp out their BlackBerry. Well, Josep and Ronen thought this was a bit lopsided, and deserves a counterbalancing. After bumping heads together, they came up with their own list of complaints about BlackBerry, which can surely be added to. So go on, sound off about the downsides of BlackBerry. Heck, if you’re feeling especially venomous, do a video and share it on YouTube, and even get some bonus points if you can find a cavernous white loft to film it in. The prize? Any combination of three games, themes or ringtones from BPlay for the most colourful parody of RIM’s latest marketing campaign.
Alex will win last week’s contest, for bringing up the interesting possibility of WiMAX and slider BlackBerrys in RIM’s ‘08 lineup. Enjoy FlipSide, Alex!
Posted on August 9, 2007, at 12:01 pm .
We stumbled upon a rather biting piece on inconsistencies between RIM’s marketing team and their site developers. The long and short of it is that BlackBerry ads catch the eye, but click-throughs fail to close the deal with a customer who’s already sold. The editorialist, Matthew Roche, dares RIM to to make their marketing full-circle, from first click right down to sale. It sounds like a no-brainer, but as a company that has traditionally left those things to carriers, RIM could be a bit out of their element. At very least, accurate and simple redirection towards local carriers should something they can handle, right?
