You never get a second chance to make a first impression. So why don’t we start putting retention first?

There are now 8.9 million apps on the market – and most of them are actually free. With thousands of apps added to the app stores each day, the rates of app retention are decreasing. Now, more than ever, consumers have an extensive choice – finding an app with a similar service or features to yours has never been easier! It can take seconds for the user to move on to the next app without so much as blinking.

The Yodel Mobile approach? Think user retention before acquisition

How vital is retention, in the grand scheme of your app’s success?

Well, the research is quite daunting at first glance. Findings from Statista showed that on the day of installation, the average retention rate across 31 categories was 25.3%. By day 30, however, this percentage drops to just 5.7% – (ouch).

Initially, the question to ask yourself is ‘How can I prove that I am worth the consumer’s time, before another app does?’

Acquisition was once considered the vital metric to measuring an app’s success. Attracting as many users as possible to fuel the app’s rapid growth was seen as the centerpiece to a launch. In today’s market and competition, marketers have to take into account that 21% of all users abandon an app after one use! Therefore, focusing on more than the initial app installs can allow for a much greater emphasis towards in-app engagement and consumer behavior – increasing user retention.

After all of your hard work to get users through the door, only a small fraction of them are likely to stick around. So how can you ensure that you maintain strong retention and engagement rates? We’ve got three simple solutions:

1. Onboarding

We all know that a user’s first experience with your app is pretty crucial. A good onboarding process will familiarise users with what the app does, what value it can offer to them, and generally make it easy for them to get started. In the short term, this is integral to retention. It removes the initial barrier that can cause users to drop off before they really start using the app. In fact, app retention rates can increase by 50% after implementing a strong onboarding strategy.

So what does good app onboarding actually look like?

• One of the most important things to remember is not to overload your new users. Keep these screens simple and don’t hit users with unnecessary permission requests up-front. Best practice is 3-5 screens that communicate information visually rather than through text. You could even consider whether there is a way you could spread the information out across their user experience.

• It’s known as ‘progressive onboarding’ – baby steps essentially. You stagger messages and introduce the app gradually. Drip-feeding messages may be the right approach for you, but this depends on your app. With fairly simple features, it may not be necessary. But if the app requires a multi-part registration process, for example, then progressive onboarding can be a great way of breaking up a potentially tedious process. This can increase your chances that users will actually finish the registration process.

2. App review and feedback management

Have you ever downloaded an app, reached one of the pages and immediately felt confused? This confusion can very quickly lead to frustration, causing users to ditch your app and move straight onto the next. Even after you’ve made sure that the onboarding process is as smooth as possible, some users are still bound to have questions. How can you solve this? The answer is as simple as an effective FAQ page.

• An FAQ page, or the addition of a support system of some kind, allows you to manage inquiries within the app itself. It removes that frustration that comes before users give up on your app altogether. You can even deal with issues when the user needs it most. You’re effectively killing two birds with one stone as you’re also minimizing the possibility of consumers turning to the app store to leave a negative review.

• Bad reviews also have a knock-on effect on your acquisition efforts, reducing the conversion rate from app store impression to install. The better prepared you are before launch, the more likely it is that users will have a positive experience within the app. The domino effect will topple, as this can also impact the number of positive reviews that you receive on the app stores, helping boost your ASO strategy and draw in new users.

3. Push priming

Let’s face it, we all know  can be an invaluable tool to engage users! They’re a key tool for re-engaging users and can even cause app retention ratpush notificationses to almost double – if they’re handled correctly. So, how can you utilize push notifications effectively?

• On iOS, push notifications require users to opt-in. As with any other functions that require user permissions, e.g. location tracking, this is much more likely to be successful if you ask at the right time…and in the right way.

• Prompts are more effective if they’re triggered based on the user’s latest activity – but finding exactly the right point in the user journey will depend on the nature of your app. For a shopping app, it might be after the user makes a purchase, offering them the opportunity to get live updates on when the package will arrive.

• In terms of how you actually ask for permission, make sure to pre-empt the native permission request with a screen in the app itself, priming the user and explaining the benefits of opting in.

Taking these steps will improve the conversion rate of users consenting to push notifications and other permission-based functions, which will in turn boost retention rates. For more advice, you can see the Yodel video guide on push priming here.

Once you have populated the app, the push strategy will be a key driving force in the app’s success and growth – fundamentally feeding into the Infinite App Growth Loop.

Maintaining Retention

Addressing retention before launch can be difficult, as you won’t have any historic user data to learn from. (Queue…the crowded app marketplace!)

There are likely lots of competitors already out there that you can take your learnings from. And once you have launched, remember that every aspect of retention can be tested and optimized. Ensure that you A/B test every message you’re showing to users, whether its purpose is onboarding or priming them for in-app permission. When it comes to retention, your work is never done.

The effort is more than worthwhile, and it shows.

A retention-first strategy safeguards you against one of app marketing’s biggest obstacles.

Launching an app can feel like you’re jumping off a cliff blindfolded at times!

This is why Yodel created the infinite loop – at each obstacle, there are strategies you can implement to allow for a smooth-running, effective approach. The infinite app growth loop will work to become a self-sustaining mechanism that will help you drive long-term, sustainable growth for your app!

If you have any questions on the Yodel infinite app growth loop or want to find out how you can put retention first, feel free to reach out to the Yodel Mobile Growth Team. Alternatively, you can check out their Mastering Mobile Marketing series or head over to their blog page, or check out more from our blogs here for more information.

To make matters worse, the U.S. is facing a PPE (personal protective equipment) shortage for the public and for medical workers. There is also a lack of infrastructure to administer cheap, effective, and rapid tests to citizens, which bodes terribly for eventual vaccine distribution.

Research and history show, however, that the U.S. federal government has played a major role in the past in catalyzing medical innovation and healthcare development. With the official federal government response taking months, the private sector may be the best hope for citizens to protect themselves.

Medicine in the Civil War

The U.S. government is already set up to regulate and push along healthcare innovation: the FDA approves new treatments, insurance companies figure out which treatments to cover, Medicare covers low-income citizens, the U.S. patent office helps determine pharmaceutical prices and competition, and the NIH and NSF provide grants and funding for medical research. These entities all have a substantial influence on medicine and healthcare in this country, and with more grants, faster patenting, and more experimentation, we could accelerate medical innovation in the U.S.

For the private healthcare sector, the government requires professionals and clinics to follow well-defined quality standards and clear financial incentives. Performance in the private sector depends on the rules and payments structure that government agencies set. But it wasn’t always like this. During the U.S. Civil War, MedTech developers were working on innovating the design and manufacturing of artificial limbs. During wars and pandemics, the need for dramatic and unprecedented levels of care and supplies create faster medical innovations.

For the roughly 70,000 veterans with disabilities who returned home, the U.S. government launched a program called “the Great Civil War Benefaction” for providing prostheses. Federal agencies worked together to examine and certify prototypes, allowing wounded veterans some leeway in choosing an approved product. The government controlled pricing as well: each leg cost $75, and each arm cost $50. Because of the government’s priority of cost, inventors began simplifying the design and costs to manufacture the prostheses. Over time, wounded veterans experienced better functionality, comfort, and pricing.

And the government saw an influx in the number of patents awarded to prostheses applications. 15 patents were approved between 1858 and 1862, and 87 patents were approved between 1863 and 1867. Within five years of the war beginning, prostheses production increased rapidly from five manufacturers selling 350 prostheses in 1860 to 2,020 legs and 1,441 arms sold in 1865. By 1870, there were 24 manufacturers producing prostheses.

Medical Innovation Today

In modern times, most economics research into medical innovation has been focused on pharmaceuticals. When the government gets involved, for example, by introducing guidelines, policies, and mandates, profits and innovation accelerate. Vaccine development rates have increased and so have profits and clinical trial activity.

Another case study revolves around the introduction of a drug benefit in Medicare programs. It accelerated pharmaceutical research for diseases that impact elderly people. When the government invests money to provide incentives for research, research shows that diseases in robust or expanding drug markets get more research and attention. Drug development also ebbs and flows with the number of incentives given out by the patent system. When, for example, insurers exclude drugs for a particular disease, R&D typically slows down greatly for that disease.

The Main COVID-19 Blocker? The Government

Many critics and citizens of the U.S. government say that the government has not provided any certainty, inspired any confidence, or pushed along innovation as well as it should have. With a vague plan that became politicized quickly, the government stopped states and the private sector from initiating their own research and development, which has, in turn, stymied the national response.

When the pandemic first began, the government worked closely with private companies, like 3M, to product N95 masks and ventilators. But there was no guidance for state and medical officials about who would get that equipment from the federal government or when. Of course, the national government also started explicitly favoring Republican states over Democratic states for federal aid in both money and PPE.

Early testing planning was also thwarted by the FDA when states were trying to design and implement new testing infrastructure, supported by private companies like the Seattle-based Gates Foundation. The federal government further blocked progress by rejecting tests manufactured in other countries as well as refusing to rollout testing kits early and often. Even though it’s been months since the pandemic hit America, citizens still can’t get fast access to a COVID-19 test. They must wait a few days for their test appointment, possibly travel to a new town or area, and wait another week or so before receiving test results. That, by itself, makes it difficult to track the disease and get it under control.

Clearly, the government has to play a bigger, more well-informed role in fighting the pandemic. Experienced officials must be respected and their advice followed closely. Masks and other PPE must be distributed equally, fairly, and quickly. Testing must be rapid, and results need to be returned faster. If that requires hiring and training more lab technicians, so be it. There needs to be bigger financial incentives for companies to research and innovate new solutions for PPE shortages, vaccination testing, and faster testing.

Progress Is Still Possible

It’s not too late for the U.S. federal government to turn around its performance from the last six months. There are still myriad opportunities to improve PPE distribution, funding allocation, school reopening policies, testing infrastructure, the messaging around mask-wearing, and social distancing. By setting clear incentives and standards, science can prevail over the pandemic, and we can possibly save many more lives than we previously thought possible.

Have you taken a COVID-19 test? How was the experience for you? Let us know in the comments below!

For the past few years, AppCon, the App Economy Conference, has taken over Washington, D.C. in late April. The annual event serves as an unparalleled opportunity for mobile app developers and other tech innovators to open a meaningful dialogue with political leaders about the future of emerging technologies and their impact on society.

This candid discussion is something that Marc Fischer, our CEO and Co-Founder, looks forward to every year. He usually makes the trek out to D.C. from Los Angeles just to attend this event. In the past, Marc has gotten the chance to talk with FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly and Director Ajit Pai about 5G’s future in rural areas, the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) about data privacy, and Congressman Ted Lieu about how education and innovation go hand-in-hand.

Due to COVID-19, AppCon 2020 has pivoted from its original arrangement — it has gone virtual! Thanks to this new digital format, the event is now spread over the course of four weeks so that attendees have a sufficient amount of time to discuss each important topic. Let’s take a look at the relevant issues that this year’s AppCon is tackling.

Why the App Economy Is Essential

Every year, AppCon is held by ACT | The App Association, an international organization that represents more than 5,000 small- and medium-sized tech companies across the mobile app economy. By connecting the tech industry’s top leaders with preeminent policymakers, ACT strives to drive smart innovation and regulation. Members of ACT include pioneers at the forefront of revolutionizing entertainment, improving productivity, enabling healthier lifestyles, and accelerating learning.

The app economy is probably bigger than you think; it’s a $1.7 trillion ecosystem that employs 5.9 million Americans. And this isn’t just in Silicon Valley; more than 83% of U.S. app companies are located outside of San Francisco. There are currently more than 2 million mobile apps available on major platforms like the App Store and Google Play. And with 3.4 billion app users around the world, it should come as no surprise that consumers spent more than $120 billion in app stores in 2019 — almost twice the amount they did in 2016.

Keeping the app economy strong and healthy is one of ACT’s biggest priorities, which is why the organization is extremely focused on building a workforce that’s educated and properly prepared for the 21st century. Despite a median annual salary exceeding $88,000, more than half a million computing jobs are unfilled in the United States. Only 65,000 U.S. college graduates earn a computer science degree each year, but this isn’t enough.

Computing and information technology occupations are projected to grow 12% by 2028, with software development jobs anticipated to grow by 21%. To address this substantial growth, ACT is urging Congress to pass the CHANCE in TECH Act, a legislation that would allow employers to streamline their apprenticeship processes and focus on developing and training job candidates correctly. ACT is also requesting that Congress appropriate at least $250 million to science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) Master Teacher Corps (MTC) program so that educators can receive advanced training to teach computer science correctly.

Week 1: All About Broadband

It’s no secret that widespread internet access is an essential utility to sustain the continued growth of the app economy and numerous businesses. Besides this, hundreds of millions of Americans depend on the internet to access educational opportunities, healthcare services, and participate in the global economy in general. But more than 20 million U.S. citizens currently lack access to broadband connections, making the digital divide a colossal chasm.

In Week 1, AppCon will focus on facilitating discussions around how improved access to broadband in rural and urban communities can close this immense digital divide. Political and tech leaders will examine the benefits that come with using television white spaces (TVWS), broadband mapping, and of course, the deployment of 5G.

Week 2: More Connected Healthcare

The COVID-19 pandemic has pulled back the curtain on telehealth. Today, the advantages of connected health tools are readily apparent to patients, doctors, and lawmakers — and they’re simply too big to ignore. Week 2 of AppCon will hone in on everyday digital health examples from the COVID-19 crisis, including the recent results from temporarily lifting telehealth restrictions in the U.S.

AppCon’s attendees will also discuss aspects of healthcare policy including payment for digital health tools, removing reimbursement restrictions for them, interoperability, the WEAR IT Act, and the now obvious necessity of better access to telehealth services for all Americans. If you’re a healthcare app developer, you won’t want to miss this week!

Week 3: Prioritizing Privacy and Encryption

ACT’s member companies alone handle millions of terabytes of data every day. That means that each of these organizations is on the frontline of protecting sensitive user information and ensuring that it’s being used appropriately. Each ACT member knows that proper data security is imperative. That’s why AppCon ’20 Week 3 is dedicated to this vital topic.

Political leaders and ACT members will discuss current issues regarding privacy legislation and the need for ubiquitous end-to-end encryption. AppCon attendees will also tackle one of the most timely issues of the last few months: Facial recognition. By now, you’ve probably heard stories about how law enforcement has been using this technology during the protests across America. Week 3 of AppCon ’20 intends to get to the bottom of this topic and discuss its implications for the near and far future.

Week 4: Platforms and SEPs

What do online platforms, competition, and standard-essential patents (SEPs) mean for the app ecosystem’s future? There are a ton of moving parts that go into this topic, and they’ve only helped fuel various debates in recent months.

AppCon 2020 will close out its final week with a focus on discussion about platform regulations, including antitrust and Wi-Fi standards regulations, IoT device chips, Bluetooth, and much more.

Has this blog post got you excited about the weeks to come for AppCon 2020? For more info, click here!

Have you ever considered the amount of information sitting in hospital filing cabinets collecting dust? Healthcare, especially in emergency situations, depends on instant access to current, complete, and correct information, or the consequences could be fatal. Yet we still insist on capturing that information on printed materials that are hard to find and easy to ignore. Information access is an endemic problem, but the industry as a whole has been slow to embrace a better way.

The Minneapolis Heart Institute is one exception. I partnered with this group to develop a medical app that expedites access to the latest cardiovascular protocols. In an emergency situation, when these protocols are necessary, physicians simply have to reach for their smartphones instead of rifling through their desks. Speed and certainty are essential in a cardiovascular situation, and the app provides both.

We’ve expanded the functionality beyond static protocols to give physicians on-demand access to information and assistance. The technology is able to connect a physician in a remote or rural area directly with a cardiovascular specialist. After the two physicians consult, the patient receives first-class cardiovascular care even if he or she is miles away from the specialist.

Read the full article at Medical Economics to learn more about how mobile apps can deliver better outcomes for all medical stakeholders.

Digital transformation is revolutionizing all industries. But no field is feeling its impact greater than healthcare. As a result, it’s vital that health tech developers and policymakers work together and collaborate to build a healthier future for all.

The Blue Button 2.0 Developers Conference (BBDC) strives to make this more feasible by connecting tech pioneers with preeminent political leaders to improve the interoperability of the US healthcare system. Marc Fischer, our Co-Founder and CEO, was in attendance at the second annual holding of this event.

In this post, we cover the most memorable highlights and announcements from BBDC 2019.

Opening a Dialogue for Healthcare Innovation

Held at the White House on July 30, 2019, by the Office of American Innovation (OAI), BBDC brings developers and policymakers together to learn and share insights from one another about how technology can best be leveraged to unleash new healthcare innovation. With an original focus on Medicare claims data, BBDC is intent on improving medical outcomes for all Americans.

Attendees at this year’s event included an array of leaders and innovators in the healthcare space. Government institutions such as the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC), the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS), and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) all had representatives present. Directors and chief executives from leading health providers as well as tech titans like Apple, Google, and Microsoft were also in attendance. And numerous startup founders, whose work ranged from incorporating AI chatbots into clinical studies to bringing mobile apps into clinical workflows, were also at the event.

BBDC 2019 speakers included leaders from various branches of the US government. Chris Liddell, White House Deputy Chief of Staff for Policy Coordination, gave opening remarks and welcomed CMS Administrator Seema Verma to the stage for her keynote address. Matthew Cutts, Administrator of the US Digital Service, also gave remarks. Cutts previously worked as part of Google’s search quality team and was the company’s head of web spam.

Empowering Patients With Better Data Access

Health record interoperability has been a red-hot topic for a number of years now. And due to its ability to empower all stakeholders in the US medical ecosystem, it was the main area of focus at BBDC 2019. At this year’s conference, CARIN, a nonprofit committed to consumer-directed health information exchange, unveiled its CARIN Blue Button API model and draft implementation guides.

Designed to provide patients with direct digital access to health insurance claims data, the CARIN Blue Button API is the private sector’s equivalent of the CMS’ Blue Button 2.0 (a program that helps Medicare beneficiaries access their claims data).

Beginning this year, the new initiative will be tested by twenty stakeholders including Anthem, Humana, Google, Apple, and Microsoft. It can hopefully move into production in 2020. “We envision a future where any consumer can choose any application to retrieve both their complete health record and their complete coverage information from any provider or health plan in the country,” the nonprofit explains in the new draft guidance.

With San Francisco Bay Area developers like Google and Apple supporting them, it looks like CARIN is well on its way towards achieving its vision.

Healthier Outcomes Depend on Interoperability

For her keynote address, CMS Administrator Seema Verma announced a similar endeavor to CARIN’s, but one that focuses on empowering healthcare providers and clinicians: Data at the Point of Care (DPC). Launched by CMS, this pilot program will give providers direct access to the claims data of Medicare beneficiaries so they can gain a more complete picture of patient history. Data can range from medication lists to previous diagnoses to medication lists.

Verma stated that this program builds off of Blue Button 2.0 and CMS’s MyHealtheData initiative, which strives to give patients more control over their data. “This new program will help fill in the areas of missing information that currently plague providers,” she explains. “By connecting claims data directly to providers at the point of care, providers will spend less time chasing down information or working with an incomplete picture of patients’ medical history.”

Providers can request access to the pilot on the program website. By participating, they can have direct access to patient information within their electronic health record workflow — no need to log into another application. CMS will begin deploying test data to the first few providers this month, with plans to start testing production data in September and October.

Politics can be truly divisive. But for topics like healthcare, data privacy, and education, we can all agree that smart reforms and regulations are sorely needed. Fortunately, progress is being made.

From April 28th to the 30th, AppCon 2019 gathered America’s top mobile app developers and preeminent politicians together in Washington, D.C. to discuss the most pressing issues facing technology and society in the near future.

Marc Fischer, our Co-Founder and CEO, was in attendance as a representative of California. He had the opportunity to talk tech with numerous political leaders at Capitol Hill. In this post, we’ve gathered some of Marc’s most memorable highlights from the event.

A Need for More Connected Healthcare

Each year, AppCon is hosted by ACT, the App Association. ACT is one of the leading public policy organizations in Washington, D.C. and represents technology companies, startups, and innovators across the country. By opening a dialogue with the country’s premier political leaders, ACT aims to protect and foster the tech industry by opening up opportunities for smarter regulations.

Healthcare is a topic near and dear to ACT’s heart. The organization started the Connected Health Initiative (CHI), a coalition of healthcare industry stakeholders, in order to spur improvement of patient engagement and outcomes through technology. So it should come as no surprise that some of the biggest obstacles in healthcare today took center-stage in many of Marc’s meetings.

Thanks to technologies like artificial intelligence (AI) and the Internet of Things (IoT), great leaps are being made in remote patient monitoring (RPM). Smart assistants like Alexa, home robotics systems, and wearable technologies are all bringing unprecedented value to point of care thanks to AI and IoT.

But some issues are still impeding progress in RPM. Marc and other AppCon attendees had the chance to discuss RPM reimbursement standards with the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS). It can be challenging for physicians to receive proper remuneration for time spent on telehealth consultations. This certainly needs to change.

Another hot topic was loosening restrictions on which medical professionals can review patient data. By opening this up to caregivers, nurses, and other people besides doctors, all stakeholders involved can gain a more holistic perspective on a patient’s health.

Marc also had the opportunity to meet with the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC) to discuss digital transformation in the healthcare system. It’s well known that there are some huge inefficiencies present when it comes to data exchange of electronic health records (EHR). To fix this, ACT’s members and the ONC are working together to pilot new projects that can help accelerate data portability and innovation in health IT.

Both RPM and data portability would go a long way towards helping those with chronic health conditions. Currently, 130 million Americans suffer from chronic health conditions. This ends up costing the U.S. economy more than $2.5 trillion per year. With Representatives Joseph Kennedy III (D-MA 4th District), Danny Davis (IL 7th District), Judy Chu (D-CA 27th District), and Senator Amy Klovuchar, Marc discussed potential telehealth solutions to lower costs and boost quality of care for RPM.

Among these possible solutions is the Wearable Equipment Adoption and Reinforcement and Investment in Technology (WEAR IT) Act. This would allow people to apply their HSAs or FSAs to cover part of the cost (up to $250) of consumer-facing medical wearables and other devices that have healthcare attributes. For example, you could apply this $250 towards the purchase of a new Apple Watch. Essentially, this new legislation would benefit patients with chronic illnesses immensely by making it easier for them to attain devices that could improve their quality of life.

Preparing for 5G

As we’ve covered in previous posts, 5G is fast approaching. But there are still some hiccups to work out. Marc met with FCC Commissioner Michael O’Rielly to discuss the standardization of this new wireless paradigm and what exactly constitutes 5G.

Recently, major telecom companies have been in a race to roll out 5G to their customers. And some have taken shortcuts. Most notable among them is A&T; the company released a platform called 5G Evolution (5GE) which isn’t actually 5G; it’s more of a foundation for when the real thing arrives.

But ensuring 5G arrives in metropolitan areas like New York City or San Francisco is not enough. Commissioner Michael O’Rielly and Marc also talked about the need for the FCC to take more of a leading role in ensuring 5G is faster to roll out to rural areas which were overlooked during the rollout of 4G.

This is crucial for many reasons. Not only will 5G open up opportunities for innovation in IoT, AI, and connected vehicles, but it will also bring possibilities for improvement in RPM and telehealth — both of which are sorely needed in rural areas.

Doubling Down on Data Privacy

Marc also had the chance to speak with representatives from the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) at the White House about data privacy. Preserving the integrity of our personal information is becoming more important than ever before. But doing this can often conflict with other endeavors.

As part of the AI Executive Order, the Trump administration issued executive mandates to open up data in an effort to accelerate AI innovation in America. Much of Marc’s conversation with the OSTP revolved around balancing out this order with updated standards for user privacy, data management, and the right to confidentiality.

Updating these cyber policies to ensure that both individuals and organizations are protected from internal and external espionage is a must. And the first step towards doing this is to have more government support in investigating acts of espionage or data leakages.

Large enterprise organizations need to be held accountable for leaking private customer information and not sharing this information until much later. A prime example of this is the Equifax hack; the company knew they had been hacked for four months before they went public with this information.

Progress Is Being Made

After four years of meeting with political leaders on Capitol Hill, ACT’s members are finally starting to see the fruits of their labor. RPM statutes have been written into law so that doctors can be properly reimbursed for their telehealth work. $250 million in federal funds have been released to support STEM education. And the government is beginning to better understand its role in the rollout of 5G.

We’re excited by the opportunities to innovate in the American economy with new technologies like AI, machine learning, and 5G. By driving the next wave of innovation, US tech leaders can help cement America’s leadership position in the world by creating jobs, boosting productivity, and increasing wages.

And from what Marc gathered at AppCon ’19, it looks like we’re right on track to do this. By collaborating together, the tech and political leaders of the United States can make a brighter future for us all.

From April 23rd to the 25th, Appcon 2018 took over Washington, D.C. The annual event serves as a great opportunity for tech innovators, app developers, and entrepreneurs to open a dialogue with the preeminent leaders in politics. It’s a time to discuss and shape the future of different technologies and, in turn, their impact on society.

Marc Fischer, our CEO and co-founder, attended AppCon this year. He got the chance to speak to a dizzying number of political leaders at Capitol Hill, the FCC, and the White House! We’ve gathered some highlights from Marc’s experience below, just for you.

Three Days of Non-Stop Action

In total, 54 tech leaders representing 29 different states flew in to discuss the tech industry’s impact on humanity’s future. AppCon is hosted by the Association for Competitive Technology (ACT), also known as the App Association. ACT is one of the foremost public policy organizations in Washington, D.C.

ACT represents tech companies, startups, entrepreneurs, and developers so that our voices are heard and our concerns are met with productive solutions. It aims to protect and foster the tech industry by instilling smart regulation so it can thrive in a competitive global economy.

The first day of AppCon centered around a conference discussing where the mobile app industry is and where it’s going. Currently, the global app ecosystem is worth $950 billion. Expect exponential value growth from enterprise applications and the use of IoT. But whether the app economy (or tech industry, in general) keeps succeeding or begins to falter depends on a few crucial variables.

The Importance of Education

Over dozens of meetings, Marc found one to be particularly salient: his stop at the White House. There, he had the opportunity to speak with representatives from the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP). Together, they explored both the positive and negative impacts that disruptive technologies like automation, AI, and drones would have on our economy.

Marc and the OSTP representatives also focused on another topic near and dear to the future of society and tech — education. The United States could be facing a job crisis, unlike anything we’ve seen before. ACT projects that the app economy will create half a million more job opportunities in the U.S. alone by 2024. Other niches in the tech industry are estimated to experience similar growth.

So, why’s this a problem exactly? Because last year, only 59,000 U.S. college students graduated with a computer science degree. There are currently 503,000 computing jobs across the U.S. So only one out of every eight computing jobs is getting filled right now. Only about 40 percent of K-12 schools tech modern computer science skills. This figure dwindles down to 20 percent if you’re only considering high schools.

Education and Innovation Go Hand-in-Hand

Marc and the OSTP discussed the importance of apprenticeships and improving computer science programs in school. But this is far too big of a topic to tackle in one meeting. So, going forward, Marc and Dogtown Media will work with the OSTP to engineer smarter education! Specifically, we aim to build smarter legislation for the apprenticeship and computer science programs that will be rolled out in public schools nationwide over the next few years.Marc Fischer with Representative Ted Lieu meeting on Capitol Hill on the sidelines of a congressional vote in progress.

Education played an important part in many of Marc’s conversations. In his meeting with Congressman Ted Lieu, the two focused on getting more funding for computer science programs in the Los Angeles school system. It was great to see a familiar face in D.C.! Lieu is the Representative for California’s 33rd congressional district. Dogtown Media and Mr. Lieu’s office will collaborate more on this endeavor through a tech community involvement event in Los Angeles this summer, so stay tuned!

To round out Marc’s discussions on education, he also got the chance to meet with Congressman Danny Davis, U.S. Representative of Illinois’s 7th congressional district. Davis is a huge supporter of the CHANCE in Tech Act (Championing Apprenticeships for New Careers and Employees), and so is Marc. It aims to incentivize private companies to expand their workforce through the form of apprenticeships. It will serve as a great opportunity to train workers with no technical skills to become experienced knowledge workers in one of the many burgeoning niches in the tech industry.

Protecting the Potential at Stake

Besides education, cybersecurity was also a crucial conversation starter at many of Marc’s meetings. Cybercrime costs consumers a global total of $3 trillion. And the app industry is in serious need of an upgrade. Current security protocols are sub-standard at best. As apps begin to play a more integral role in all of our lives, it’s important that we address this shortcoming now.

During their talk, Congressman Lieu and Marc discussed how it’s necessary to make it easier for businesses to cooperate with the federal government when it comes to defending ourselves against national and international cyber threats. Not only is fostering such a dialogue important for both of these parties, but also for the average consumer whose data they hold.Marc Fischer with Congressman Joseph Kennedy, Representative of Massachusets.

This topic also came up during Marc’s talk with Congressman Joseph Kennedy III, U.S. Representative of Massachusetts’ 4th congressional district. Besides discussing the need for Congress to legislate new net neutrality rules, the two also focused on ways to improve the implementation of the Small Business Cyber Act, which helps mandate regulations for government support of small businesses that have experienced a hack. Guidelines on how to manage such circumstances where data may be stolen or breached are absolutely necessary to figure out before you need them.

Of course, cybersecurity is moot if the ones holding your data in the first place are using it in questionable ways. This was the main agenda of Marc’s visit to Senator Dianne Feinstein’s office. Internet service providers (ISPs) currently have the ability to monitor our habits virtually anywhere. They then sell this data to third parties. In an effort to protect user data from ISPs, Marc’s main request of Feinstein’s office was to draft regulations that would prevent cases like this from occurring.

On a similar note, we also got the chance to voice our adamant opposition to the Burr-Feinstein bill. This would force companies large and small to build backdoors into all of their technology for law enforcement to utilize. This opens up immense issues around the cost of compliance, as well as a great risk that these forced access points could be exploited by malicious hackers.

Everyone Deserves to Be Connected

NOTE: Dogtown Media is strongly against any threat to an open, free, fair Internet. We FULLY disagree with the FCC’s decision to rollback net neutrality regulations. If you don’t believe us, just check out our recent articles in support of it here, here, and here.

It’s hard to fathom, but many people in the United States are missing out on the numerous advantages that modern technology offers, simply because of the fact that they don’t have a fast enough connection to the Internet. 34 million Americans across the rural United States are in this predicament. This was the main topic of discussion between Marc and Ajit Pai, the now-infamous Director of the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

Okay, now that we got that out of the way… back to the meeting! Just because two people don’t agree on one subject doesn’t mean they can’t find common ground with another. In Pai’s and Marc’s case, this happened to be improving nationwide Internet access. The two mostly focused on the rollout of 5G access nationwide over the next decade. Part of the infrastructure program involving this also includes room for speeding up Internet access for households and businesses, but Pai and Marc specifically focused on the best ways to bring technologies out to rural communities.

Leveraging Mobile MedTech More

Congressman and physician Michael C. Burgess, U.S. Representative of Texas’s 26th congressional district, decided to focus his talk with Marc on current medical issues facing the country. In particular, Burgess and his office were interested in learning how our healthcare system could utilize mobile technology more, and how it could reform Medicare and Medicaid.

Drug adherence is a big issue in preventative medicine. Mobile technology offers a plethora of positive regulation possibilities, like remote monitoring and scheduled reminders. Burgess and Marc touched upon the unique fact that this could also be used inversely to treat addiction problems, specifically the current opioid addiction crisis.

Mobile technology has the potential to transform how preventative medicine is represented in Congress. Currently, when a budget is put together, only the cost of the proposed legislation is shown — not the cost savings or return on investment. This holds back many great proposals from being passed that could reduce costs and improve patient outcomes. Burgess wants to change this, and he thinks that implementing cost-effective and innovative mobile solutions could help do it.

A Brighter Future, One Step at a Time

Dogtown Media is 100-percent committed to bringing empowerment to communities nationwide through our advances in technology. Marc genuinely felt like the tech industry’s voice was heard in Washington, D.C. over the course of AppCon. While the trip was undoubtedly exhausting, it was completely worth it. The dialogues that were opened could end up shaping our future.

From what we see, that future just got a little brighter!

According to a recent poll, 64 percent of Americans indicated that they would take advantage of video-enabled doctor visits. The same survey, conducted by Harris Poll on behalf of American Well, also found that 7 percent of respondents said they would switch to a healthcare provider that incorporated telehealth technologies into its service plan. In addition, the study determined that 63 percent of respondents believe telehealth technologies offer the potential for greater diagnostic accuracy than that of email and telephone-based remote services.

For healthcare app developers, this heralds a major opportunity. Mobile video offers deep untapped potential in the world of healthcare, especially among young adults. According to Mary Modahl, the chief marketing officer at American Well, healthcare marketing needs to make heavy investments in digital platforms. “The days of running TV ads, sending printed postcards, putting up office posters and hosting health fairs are coming to an end,” she said. “Marketing for health has got to be digital first, with mobile video taking center stage.”

Cost savings and increased choice are the two primary drivers of telehealth’s value proposition. According to recent statistics, a first-time in-office doctor visit costs an average of $82. American Well links new patients to doctors and specialists for just $49 – a savings of more than 40 percent. In addition, mobile healthcare services afford patients greater choice of doctors and specialists, allowing them to choose a physician based on a wide range of relevant factors.

Telehealth services are also much more convenient, especially for non-emergency health concerns and obtaining prescriptions, especially for bacterial infections and chronic conditions that require ongoing medicinal management. Chicago mobile app development professionals and software developers around the country can take advantage of this major future growth area by creating apps that deliver affordable and expedient healthcare services to patients.