iPhone It In: The Difference Between Good and Bad Advertising Applications

Yesterday, Apple began a countdown towards 1 billion downloaded iPhone and iPod Touch applications. As an iPod Touch owner, the applications turned my unnecessarily expensive iPod into the Swiss Army Knife of gadgets I couldn't live without.

It's been an extremely popular platform for games, social networking and...fart noises. But when used properly, it also makes a great advertising platform.

There are a number of ways to advertise through the iPhone, even within the more specific framework of an application. Do you run banners on another application? Do you make your own application? Or is there some other form of solution you can think of? The rabbit hole is pretty deep, and we're still just scratching the surface.

From my time downloading applications and going out of my way to check out the advertising related ones, I've found that if an advertiser is going to release their own application, it better provide a compelling experience for it to achieve any sort of effectiveness.

One of the better advertising applications that I think achieves that is Spin the Coke Bottle by Sapient. It's a really basic application that is as frivolous as it gets and I don't think is tied to any concept or promotion (other than its release near Valentines Day), but the experience it provided was just compelling enough to be effective.

I can't say that I've gotten any action thanks to Spin the Coke since I got this application, but it hasn't stopped me from bringing it out when I have friends around. We have a few laughs for a couple of seconds and put it away. But as the owner of the iPod, that experience was compelling enough for me to use multiple times and keep on my iPod to mess with in the future. Even when I'm not using it, that Coke button on my menu is like having a Coke billboard in my pocket that I see multiple times a day.

On the other end of the spectrum, something like FedEx Mobile seems ultra useful while still providing a engaging experience. I don't ship out packages much, so I haven't downloaded this application. However, during the few times I have shipped out parcels (R.I.P. XBOX 360), being able to check where they are at all times in the palm of my hand is a feature I would highly value. A feature like this would definitely alter my buying decision.

For both Coke and FedEx, those experiences are more than just another means of traditional brand advertising. You can still achieve that awareness through your application, but it's also a great opportunity to give the consumer a valuable experience in return. When you give them that valuable experience, you build a healthy relationship with your consumers who in return will be more likely to invest or reinvest in your product or service.

You can pass on this one.

On the other side of the coin, without that compelling experience, all of the branding and reach in the world will not save your application. I can point to a number of bad automaker advergames to prove this point. Give the consumer a poor experience, and you've offended them worse than you would have with an ad on any form of traditional medium that they just didn't like.

They went out of their way to download your application. When that experience is not to their standards, they're almost offended in a way. To them, your bad application means you wasted their time, their iPod memory and maybe even their money if it was a paid application. One of those automaker advergames almost broke my iPod when instead of loading the game, all it did was display an all-white screen I couldn't get out of. They'll quickly delete it, give it a poor rating on iTunes to tell others not to download your application and maybe sour the relationship you once had with a customer that went out of the way to receive your advertising message.

Those that get the importance of the experience will thrive in this space. Those that don't won't get much more than a few thousand 1-star reviews and a lot of potential customers lost.