Appboy: The First Real Social Network Within Any Mobile App

Two of the hottest and most-talked about industries in tech right now are mobile and social. The two share a lot of similarities and many have even tried to combine the two with all sorts of social layers on top of existing apps. I am referring to solutions like Game Center, OpenFeint, and others.

When designing and building the Appboy SDK for iOS, we took a good look at this new trend of non-social apps going social, then we took a good look at developer needs, and we set out to improve the market.

The Appboy SDK, among many other features that we will cover in the coming months, focuses primarily on user engagement. When it comes to business, everyone knows you need to engage your audience and many have taken to social media to do just that. However, when it comes to mobile app development, too many developers have the mistaken impression that releasing the app is the end of the process. It is actually only the beginning.

Besides the obvious need to improve your app via frequent updates, gone are the days when you release an app and hope for the best. Users might download the app, and they might even love it, but without the ability to engage with you, the developer, user retention will decrease.

With the Appboy SDK, we basically built a social network within your app. Nope, that is not even a slight exaggeration. For starters, users actually have access to their existing social graphs within the app. That’s right, Twitter built right into your app. A user can tweet, follow, and actually use your app as a full-fledged Twitter app.

But there is so much more. With the Appboy SDK, which by the way, is completely unintrusive to the end user, you, the developer can message your users, which will then be displayed via a push notification. You can also cross-promote other apps that you encounter and think your users will enjoy. In fact, you can even recommend other media for your users including movies, TV shows, or anything else your heart desires.

You can also notify your users of new updates, exciting features you are working on, or pretty much anything else you think will interest them. Again, the Appboy SDK is a real fully functioning social network within your app.

OK, I think you get the message, you can engage your audience, but, in Steve Jobs’ style, there is one more thing…

Your audience can engage you! Within your personalized Appboy dashboard, you have a designated screen for user feedback. Remember when users would take every little criticism they have to iTunes for the world to see? How about you give them the option to tell it to you privately? On the flip side, users can let you know when they love something specific about your app, information that can be crucial for future development.

There is so much more hidden in our one line SDK, but for now, let’s sum it up. There is no longer a need to take to Twitter to see who your users are, how influential they are, and what they think of your app. All that information including followers, Klout score, number of tweets, and even how much time the user spent in your app, it is all available for you once you integrate the Appboy SDK.

Oh, and did I mention that the integration takes seconds? Well it does, so go grab it now, thank us later.