Next Generation Wireless Applications: Creating Mobile Applications in a Web 2.0 and Mobile 2.0 World, 2nd Edition

3.4 DIRECT-TO-CONSUMER (D2C) RETAILING

If you are going for the D2C route, there are a large number of practical considerations specific to the mobile ecosystem, some of which you might not be used to if you are coming from an Internet background. There are four key considerations when trying to offer a mobile application D2C:

1. Discovery
2. Distribution
3. Service access
4. Charging mechanism

Let's look at each of these in more detail in the sections that follow.

3.4.1 Application Discovery

The discovery of the application is important to your business success. If no one finds the app, no one is going to use it. Like many other points made in this chapter, they are obvious, but frequently either overlooked or underestimated in terms of effort and difficulty. Don't spend 90% of your effort and budget in getting an application running and then realise that sales are incredibly slow because no one is able to find it. Ultimately, the mobile user has to be able to find the application and then activate it for their device. There are a number of options for the user to discover the application:

• Internet (‘New Media’)
• Retail outlets
• Traditional media (e.g. TV, magazines, etc.)
• Mobile

Let's consider each of these briefly:

• Internet discovery – This relies on your users accessing the Internet in order to find some kind of collateral describing the application, which might be a dedicated website, a partner website, a web advertisement, a blog, a news article, plus others. These are straightforward ...