If you haven't yet launched an app, do it quickly, just to see if your audience really wants them, says Renate Nyborg, Head of Business Development for A&N Mobile & TV in the United Kingdom.
Speaking at WAN-IFRA Digital Media Europe, being held in London from 11-13 April, Ms Nyborg says that's what A&N did with its Metro title - and the result from the simple exercise was a new apps business, tailored for the profile of Metro readers.
That first app was a simple PDF of the daily paper. "The key was doing something very quickly to get an idea of the appetite of our mobile readers for a mobile app," says Ms Nyborg. The result was 350,000 downloads.
Once the company learned its audience wanted apps, it started to develop more sophisticated offerings, ultimately leading to the creation of Metro Apps, a new business dedicated to lifestyle apps and games that appeal to the Metro audience and benefit from the brand.
"The key thing is to play to your strengths and build your strategy on insight," Ms Nyborg says. "It's not really about just jumping on the bandwagon like people did a few years ago on social media. It's about defining your audience, how they use content, and then building something that fits in to their behaviour."
