An app earns its place when the customer gets something back for keeping it on their home screen. That's the thread running through this interview with Putti CEO Bruce Howe: the businesses that succeed with apps start from the customer journey, not from the technology, and most should get their website right before they build anything at all.
This Q&A was first published by Tribe Recruitment in June 2019, when Bruce had recently returned to New Zealand to lead Putti. We're republishing it because the questions haven't dated, even where the examples have.
We live more and more of our lives through apps. They're there when we shop, read the news, pay for parking, apply for a job. They're even there to help us switch off.
Tell us about yourself and about Putti
I am Bruce, CEO at Putti. I came back to New Zealand after twelve years offshore with Microsoft and Nokia. I came back for family, as most Kiwis do, and I came back knowing I did not want to return to big corporate.
At Putti our core purpose is to build the right technology for our partners. That runs from digital forms to mobile apps to business applications to ERP and middleware, so a broad array of software, web and mobile work, all done here in New Zealand with a New Zealand team.
How has the appetite for apps changed?
Our business started around the time the iPhone launched the App Store, which was an interesting phase. Large and small companies alike were building mobile apps largely because it was the newest thing, so there was a surge early on.
Then came a period where businesses could not see the value. There was no real economic model, customer engagement was not necessarily there, and the upkeep and maintenance did not work out.
More recently apps have picked up again, and most New Zealanders will have noticed particular industries and brands moving into the space. Service stations have apps so you can pay at the pump. Restaurant chains have seen the value.
The reason is that consumers are genuinely in the mobile space. Customer search is now split evenly between computer and mobile device, and smartphones are where the growth is. People are not just browsing on a phone, they are transacting on it.
The other half of it is that the work Apple and Google have done on their operating systems allows for far more imagination and much better use of the hardware. Brands can build something genuinely creative rather than a mobile version of a web page.
What separates an app that works from one that does not?
Companies thinking about building an app need to be clear on why they are doing it and how they want to engage their customers.
We see real loyalty behind the brands that get this right. The Wendy's work is a good example: taking a restaurant experience and creating a mobile one. It uses geofencing, so as you get close to a restaurant you can get a push notification with an offer. You can start your order on the way, then choose the drive-through or pick a table number and have the meal brought to you.
That is a specific experience for a customer who was prepared to download the app, sign in and register. They get something back for that effort.
So it comes back to the consumer journey. If someone is going to put your app on their home screen, you need to know what that journey is and what experience they will have with your brand. That is where the creativity comes in, and that is the work we do: getting through the user stories and finding the interesting things an app can actually do.
What kind of app work does Putti do?
A great deal of it. We look after the NZ Herald app, one of the highest-volume apps in New Zealand. It is an interesting piece of work because it plays with different advertising models, and we went through the paywall implementation with NZME, which was a significant step into a new business model for them.
We have done a lot in the hospitality space, and a lot of work outside New Zealand. We built the Air Europa app, a full airline experience. We have done a number of large hotel chains, including Hyatt, Ritz-Carlton and Best Western. They used us because we deliver high-quality apps.
The exchange rate helps, but it is not the reason. We can build apps here in New Zealand, build them well, and beat suppliers in the markets a lot of companies default to.
Should every business have an app?
No, and most should not start there. Every business should have a website. A quarter of New Zealand businesses still do not have one, and a website is the most fundamental piece a business has: it is how you tell your story when you are not in the room.
The next step is making sure that website is mobile responsive. It sounds obvious, but there is a large drop-off when a site is not optimised for a phone.
Then you can ask whether you want to take the step into a native app on Android and iOS. That is another step up in cost and it deserves a real answer. People talk about digital transformation as one thing, but in practice it is a sequence: a digital form, a website, then perhaps a mobile app, and options beyond that.
How should a business choose who builds it?
Talk to a few companies. There are several doing genuinely good work in New Zealand, so shop around.
One option is to look at what the large international platforms are doing. Microsoft, Google and AWS are all in this space and have partners here who resell their services. Then there are companies like us that focus on customised work. Talk to both so you get a balanced view, and be honest with yourself about whether you want something off the shelf or something built for you.
Where do you see apps heading?
The split between Android and Apple is here for some time yet, and what has been built through native app solutions holds true for a while ahead.
There is plenty of talk about an app-free world where devices engage through the web and you get a similar experience. I think that is well down the track. The way businesses are adopting native apps now is genuinely interesting, and I expect that to hold.
Bruce Howe is CEO of Putti. If you're weighing up whether an app is the right next step, talk to us, or read our guide on what custom software costs in New Zealand.