Last week at Apps World buzzdoes the app distribution tool exhibited at the show and CEO and founder of the tool, Assaf Kolirin presented in the New Platforms and Technology Developer Zone.

buzzdoes is an automated word-of-mouth tool that turns apps users into apps distributors. All it takes is a click on the buzzdoes icon for users to recommend an app to a selected list of friends – they just need to pick the ones they want. The result is that each happy user can steer dozens of new ones your way.

The ‘recommender’ is rewarded for every download that occurs as a result of his/her recommendation. It’s a win-win situation. The users gain from their goodwill and the developers gain new users. buzzdoes, have added a social aspect to the tool, where users can see their friends’ applications. This serves as an advertisement area where the developer can earn money from every download that occurs through the buzzdoes button on his/her application creating a new revenue stream.

“A few years ago, I was involved in developing applications for both the games and business markets. We thought our ideas were great and couldn’t wait to get them in front of users and we started looking for ways to market our apps,” says Assaf, “This is when I had my Eureka moment. Why not use the most reliable and influential marketing model – word-of-mouth? It worked for Gmail, it worked for Facebook. Why wouldn’t it work for my app?”

If you want to find out more about buzzdoes you can view their website here

A big thank you to those that attended the Apps World in London

Special thank you to all the speakers at the event, sponsors, exhibitors & media partners – have a look down the shots and see if you can spot yourself!!

It is difficult to overstate the huge impact and growth of App Stores over the recent years. With App stores remaining a lucrative channel for distribution of mobile content, operators are acutely aware of the need to build a strong content ecosystem around them in what is now a massively competitive mobile content landscape. Extending connectivity and data usage will not be enough to compete with the big guns in this space. Operators need to tap into their strongest assets which are their robust relationships with both brands and their subscriber base and devise strategies for app monetisation.  

At Apps World, Andrew Darling, Associate Director of Market Development & Communications EMEA, OpenMarket, will debate the issues surrounding operator strategies for app optimisation.  Andrew argues that operators need to strengthen their competitive position by creating a tightly woven ecosystem of partners. Successful monetisation and customer retention will come from robust relationships within a well managed partner network that ranges from Network Operators and Mobile Services Aggregators to Agencies, Developers, Analytics Providers, Publishers and Media & Consumer Brands.

Andrew Darling(@darlingbuds) is Associate Director of Market Development & Communications, EMEA at OpenMarket, a position he has held for the past 12 months and is a highly experienced senior level mobile industry marketing, communications and business development expert with a comprehensive 13 year background in telecoms, media and technology convergence as both a consultant and journalist, Andrew has spent the last decade focused on helping mobile content companies and service providers to understand the power of using mobile channels.

Andrew will be on the opening Key note panel at Apps World Europe in London on the 29^th November, debating the topic “Operator Strategies for Apps and Content”.

Also at Apps World, Oisin Lunny, OpenMarket’s Senior Market Development Manager, will address the challenges faced by developers, and the role mobile services aggregators play in facilitating real ROI from native apps and mobile web.  Oisin suggests that developers and brands are still not fully utilising operator API’s to improve the performance, usability and discoverability of an app or mobile website. Network operators also hold the key to successful customer engagement with new demographic technology, and this presents lucrative opportunities often overlooked by developers. By creating bespoke network solutions, such as in-app billing, micropayments, push notifications and mobile CRM, developers have the opportunity to breathe life into the value of an app or mobile website.

Oisin Lunny(@oisinlunny) is Senior Market Development Manager at OpenMarket, and explores new verticals and strategic business and technology opportunities. Oisin’s background of over 21 years in technology and media industry includes roles as UK Managing Director for the world’s largest social space for teens, Habbo Hotel, and Global CDN Product Manager for Media Services at Interoute Communications, Europe’s largest network operator.

At Apps World, Oisin will be presenting a session on “Network-enabled solutions for native apps and mobile web development. Synching true mobility with native apps.”

Visit OpenMarket at Apps World at stand 61

We’re very pleased to announce Ciklum will be exhibiting at Apps World at stand 84 on 29^th and 30^th November at Olympia 2, London, have a look at the floor plan here to locate them.

Ciklum is a Danish owned company providing near shore software development resources from the Ukraine and Belarus. Ciklum for the 2^nd consecutive year has been rated the best IT employer for 2011 in the Ukraine by the Ukrainian Community of Software Developers. Ciklum’s model and approach to ‘outsourcing’ is unique because of our open and transparent model providing our clients with their own captive entity of developers within a remote agile environment

You can register for your free pass to the Apps World exhibition to meet Ciklum here. If you’d like to arrange a time to meet with Ciklum at the event you can email Jonathan Posner at jposner@ciklum.net

We’re very excited to announce that local Meet Up group Apps Junction are holding a meet up at Apps World as part of our free to attend developer zone. The session will be run from 5-6.30pm on November 29th and will focus on matchmaking developers and App ideas in a friendly casual atmosphere. The format will consist of demos, pitches and expert speeches from AppsJunction members.

Mobile Applications are poised to hit the $9billion mark by end of 2011 and only going one way! Juniper Research predicts the market will reach $25billion in 5 years time! From Mobile Search, Browsing, Health monitoring, Money transfer & payments, advertising, instant messaging and location based services the possible areas are endless. Apps Junction sets out to help new application ideas come to fruition, allowing entrepreneurs, companies and agencies to meet developers and vice versa.

The session will be free to attend, if you wish to join Apps Junction event please visit their site here. To gain entrance into the session just register for a free Apps World developer zone and exhibition pass here and have access to all the other developer track sessions.

Capablue will be exhibiting this year at Apps World, Olympia at Stand 124 (29th-30th November).

They will be using the event to demonstrate several connected TV apps on their Capablue Connected platform, including the recently launched Karaoke Superstar Connected TV app. This is the UK’s first Connected TV app to have integrated Paypal payment, and provides an extensive playlist of tracks from favourite classic artists and all time classics to the latest chart hits.

CEO of Capablue Tom Cape will be speaking as part of the one day TV apps track at Apps World. He will be part of the first session on 30^th November focussed on an overview of the TV apps market a year on from its initial development. The session explores the challenges and opportunities the market has created and the direction it is taking. If you’d like to attend the session and the other workshops at Apps World you can register here.

If you’d like to book a time to meet with Capablue please get in contact with them at info@capablue.com they will be at stand 124

Related articles

• TV apps moving into the mainstream – #AppsWorld Europe (apps-world.net)
• Win a full access pass to #AppsWorld Europe (apps-world.net)
• #AppsWorld: Who will benefit from the rise of #TVapps? (apps-world.net)

This year’s networking drinks will be taking place at The Old Firestation in Hammersmith after the first day of Apps World at 7:30pm on the 29th November.

Formerly Hammersmith’s busy Fire Station, the amazingly unique space has been transformed perfectly into a lounge bar, dining room and conservatory with adjoining courtyard providing the perfect environment for some chilled networking after an action packed day!

The networking drinks will be free to attend for all sponsors, exhibitors, speakers and paid delegates and will run until late with complimentary drinks on arrival.

244 Shepards Bush Road

Hammersmith

W6 7NL

MoMo NYC Developer Panel

The Developer zone is being kicked off with a dynamic panel discussion hosted by Mobile MondaysNew York. The panel will centre on how developers can create, distribute and monetise crossplatform apps and on the future opportunities of multi-platform technology.The session will answer questions such as; what makes a successful app and what are the differentways developers can monetise their app? CEOs from Grapple Mobile, HopStop.com, NextUp andGateGuru will also be joining the session to provide valuable first hand insight into the industry.
Day one, Developer zone 9:50am

WIP Jam

Popular with mobile and wireless developers around the world, WIPJam offers a unique, highlyinteractive format, blending ‘UnPanels’ with intimate discussion groups held by industry leadersand developers.The WIPJam session, sponsored by Verizon, at Apps World will be an interactive, reactive gatheringfor North American businesses, brands, marketers and especially developers who want to connectwith each other and learn how to make the most out of the phenomenal developments in the regionalmobile industry, incorporating mobile into marketing, understanding the role of mobile social mediaand discovering how to reach a global audience.

Day one, Developer Zone, 2:00-5:00pm

Mobile app strategy in the tablet market

The recent development and mass availability of tablet devices has had a large affect on the mobileapps industry particularly impacting on publishers, entertainment providers and brands and theirdigital strategies.This session moderated by Bottle Rocket Apps and involving senior representatives from A&E Mobile,Scripps Network and SPIN will focus on how to justify and measure ROI in terms of developingfor tablet devices as well as discussing the relevance of tablet specific apps. There will also be achance to discuss the development of convergence apps and multi screen popularity in line withthe developments in TV.

Day one, Marketing track, 3:30pm

TV apps sessions

TV apps is the current buzz word in the application industry with internet connected TVs alreadybecoming available on the main market, and as a result we have dedicated an entire session in themarketing track and a session in the developer’s zone to this new platform.In the Marketing and monetisation track the hour long session will bring together experts from Yahoo!Connected TV, AT&T, Digital Mind State, Kit Digital, Discovery and NBC to discuss the future of the TVApps market and the opportunities it is already presenting.Day two, Marketing and Monetisation track, 15:40pmIn the Developer’s Zone Google TV will be running a session to examine TV apps from the perspectiveof the developer, focusing on how developer’s can face the challenges created by this new platform.

Day two, Developers Zone, 9:50am

Optimizing the apps ecosystem

With the rapid growth of wireless communication over the last couple of years and the expectedgrowth to 50 billion connections by the year 2020 it is time to consider whether network capacity canmatch the predicted demand for spectrum. Mobile phones have become multi-functional devicescapable of hosting a broad range of applications and although mobile networks were already dimensionedfor voice there is now a need for data-oriented devices which are generally unpredictable andunbounded in their usage of spectrum.Developer’s need to make changes now in the way apps are produced to streamline their data usageand prevent over loading of networks.Vicki Livingston of 4G Americas and Gautam Talagery of Ericsson will be focussing this sessionon giving developers tips and tricks to develop apps more efficiently to use less spectrum whilstdiscussing the larger issues of optimising the app ecosystem.

Publishing Panel
One of the industries that has been progressive in its reaction to the explosion of the mobile applicationmarket is magazine, book and newspaper publishing, leading to a rise of publishing apps anddigital publications. This development and change of strategy has led to questioning of the need fortraditional hard copy products.The Penguin Group USA, Rodale, Pearson and Random House will be discussing the potential forapps in news and publishing focussing on how publishers can use apps to build engagement withreaders and what functionality can be provided by apps. Whilst also considering the size of themarket for apps in different sectors of the publishing industry and asking the question, what is goingto be the impact of apps on the publishing industry as a whole?

Day two, Marketing track, 2:40pm

Apps World are pleased to announce that MPEGIF & DTG will be supporting the Apps World event taking place on the 30th Nov-1st Dec as Media Association supporters.

MPEGIF is an independent and platform neutral not-for-profit organisation facilitating and furthering the widespread adoption and deployment of MPEG and related standards in next generation digital media services.

It provides a forum to exchange information and views on technological, economic and regulatory issues that are relevant to these services. It also provides a powerful industry voice advocating the adoption of standards and consolidating the direction of the industry in the time of transition from analogue to digital television and media services. Its focus and constituency is derived from cable, satellite, telecommunication and new media service operators, channel owners, content providers, broadcasters, equipment manufacturers, system integrators, software providers, as well as industry advocacy groups, industry analysts, financial institutions and academic institutes.

The Digital TV Group (DTG) is the industry association for digital television in the UK and is independent and platform neutral.

Formed in the mid 90s to facilitate the introduction of digital terrestrial TV in the UK, the group is now at the centre of UK digital TV development. It publishes and maintains the DTG ‘D-Book’, which sets out the detailed technical standards for digital terrestrial TV in the UK, and runs the industry’s test and conformance centre: DTG Testing. The DTG has ensured the delivery of a rich consumer experience, a vibrant and stable market, and helped position the UK as a world leader in the evolution of television.

The group is presently focused on emerging consumer devices and experiences including Connected TV, 3DTV, high definition TV (HD) and video-on-demand (VoD)