ABOUT

The Brief

Developers don’t build Windows Phone apps because they don’t think there’s a market for them.



The Idea

We show developers how much people are clamouring for Windows Phone versions of their apps. When people visit the Windows Store on their phone looking for an app we don’t have yet, we tell them. Normally the Store returns a “not found” message.

Using a simple update to the Store, we add a tab that reveals that the app exists – it’s just not on Windows Phone at the moment. But if the user taps the “ask the developer” button, we’ll contact them on the user’s behalf. This works because it’s “marketing at the moment of truth”.

We’re communicating with users exactly at the time when they’re most receptive to our message. And it means we can convert their disappointment into a feeling of satisfaction that we’re doing all we can to fix this problem. The developers will receive emails from Microsoft revealing the number of requests they’ve had for specific apps (or app categories, like picture messaging, say) to be ported to Windows Phone. The emails contain strong CTAs to download the SDK. The data we build up can be turned into infographics, blog posts etc, which can then be used for content marketing among the developer community.

We also use banners to solicit requests for apps, or to say how many people are asking for Virtua Tennis to appear in the Store. Using #PortItNow, we get people to go social about how much they want certain apps to be carried over to Windows Phone.