Apple x (RED) (Updated for 2019!)

admin - March 24, 2017June 20, 2022

Apple fans all over the world were jolted into action earlier this week when tech giant, Apple, unexpectedly announced the release of a new iPhone, iPad, apps and accessories. What’s really interesting about this latest release, specifically for the iPhone, is that isn’t the tech that comes as a huge surprise, it’s the aesthetic.

The latest release of the iPhone possess the same hardware as the iPhone 7 and has been announced as “iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 Plus RED Special Edition.” The phone comes in a red aluminium finish and has been produced to commemorate more than 10 years of partnership between (RED) and Apple.

For those of you who don’t know (RED) is an organisation dedicated to making it easier for individuals and businesses to join the fight against AIDs, a disease that more than 37 million people are living with today. (RED) as a business and their partnership with Apple specifically is extraordinary as they together are seeking to engage the community in the battle against AIDs through new and more direct avenues.

In producing the iPhone RED Apple seeks to give their customers an unparalleled channel to bring the world a step closer to eradicating AIDs and Apple isn’t alone in doing so. Coca-Cola, Beats, Starbucks and many more other globally known brands work in conjunction with (RED) to plan, create and implement projects to engage their audiences in contributing to the (RED) agenda.

The partnership between Apple and (RED) is one that should be celebrated and embraced as it is pushing our global community in the right direction. As the years go on we are seeing tech companies getting really involved with philanthropy and making conscious efforts to accept their responsibility to their customers as figureheads of society. We have seen this initiative being undertaken by the likes of Bill Gates, the founder of Microsoft, Marc Benioff, CEO of Salesforce (also associated with (RED)) and Mark Zuckerberg, the CEO of Facebook.

In light of this Apple is still expected to reveal a significantly upgraded iPhone later this year and the rumour mill for the “iPhone 8” is forever churning. To learn more about the Apple rumours read our post here.

Social Media & Fake News: Facebook Is Finally Taking Some Accountability

admin - March 15, 2017July 25, 2022

Facebook is fast becoming an inherent part of our society, with roughly 25% of the world’s population making up its user base, the gravity it holds is almost unparalleled. We have seen elections won and lost based on the strength of their social media campaigns and we have seen global events such as war and terrorism in a way no society previously has. With such an availability to effortlessly produce and post information, a negative byproduct has occurred. The growth of social media platforms alike Facebook have allowed for fake news, designed to change the perceptions of it’s readers, to inundate social feeds.

In light of the ever increasing amount of fake news shared online, Facebook has developed a plan to stop the spread of fake news on it’s site. In a recent blog post, facebook detailed it’s plan that will seek to determine the actuality of news by engaging third party organisations and the general community.

To begin, Facebook is testing out new reporting methods to make catching out hoaxes easier. As part of this plan, users can report a news article or story that they think is suspicious by clicking on the upper right hand corner of a post. Additionally, the company is making alterations so that its software can detect the “red flags” or signs of fake news.

From here Facebook will have outside fact checkers to examine these stories that their software and their users have deemed to be based in untruths. After this process has been conducted and the news is ruled unfactual or fake, Facebook will then tag the story as “disputed by third-party fact-checkers” within Facebook’s newsfeed.

In doing this Facebook is exploring and acknowledging the gravity it holds in defining society’s view of the world. This point may seem obvious for some but the information and headlines that are blasted at 1.86 billion users play a crucial role in defining people’s opinions and broadening their knowledge. Many people dismiss the weight that social media platforms such as Facebook holds, but we live in a world in which technology is an inherent part of our daily life.

For many, Facebook has become a valid source of knowledge and gives a platform to inform those who otherwise might have been left in the dark. For others, social media platforms offer a springboard like effect i.e. they raise topics that one may not have thought about and from there have the capacity to go on to engage and learn more thoroughly about a topic.

For Facebook to have openly acknowledged their accountability to its users sends a really powerful message for the future of social media and the growing importance that social media will play in our future.

Project Collaboration: Working alongside our new neighbors

admin - March 15, 2017June 20, 2022

It seems that businesses in the same industry will gravitate towards each other in the same way like-minded people do. Much like Silicon Valley, 17 Cordelia is also a hub for tech companies, however maybe to a lesser degree …

Digital8 and NetEngine have found themselves both in the same industry, the same building and probably competing for the same clients. Despite this we have managed to forge a positive professional relationship, collaborating on projects and working together to define web design in South Brisbane.

Unlike Digital8 who focus their efforts primarily on web design, app design and digital marketing, NetEngine specialises in software design. Their team of designers and developers dedicate themselves to their projects and seek to make a difference through their work. Their primary focus is on building new apps and platforms to streamline business efficiencies and systems.

It was a pragmatic and positive approach to collaboration that opened the door to the two organisations working together on a recent project. In this particular project, Digital8 were given a very fast turnaround time on quite a large project and needed the assistance of a very fast and very high-quality UI/UX team.

Designers Tim (Digital8) and Felix (NetEngine) worked together to respond to our client's spec. Together they created a scope, built a wireframe for the front end and developed a full UI/UX design. The collaboration was unique in the industry, however, was ultimately a success both professionally and on a technical level.

Famous Examples of Growth Hacking

admin - March 6, 2017June 20, 2022

Airbnb

Airbnb has always worked hard to distinguish themselves from Craigslist however when starting out, Craigslist had something they wanted —a massive user base.

In order to tap into this their huge market share, Airbnb offered users who listed properties on Airbnb the opportunity to post them to Craigslist as well—despite the fact that there was no sanctioned way to do so.

The benefits of the Airbnb/Craigslist integration were numerous. Not only were the volume of potential users accessible via Craigslist, but the fact that Airbnb listings were far superior to the other properties available—more personal, with better descriptions and nicer photos—made them more appealing to Craigslist users looking for vacation properties

As well as this, Airbnb would send thousands of the below emails to the owners that were listing their properties on Craigslist.

Though this hack definitely constitutes spam it certainly helped Airbnb to grow their listings quickly and at almost no cost.

StatusPage

“We owe 25% of our growth to one line of code”.

At Y Combinator, back in 2013, Status page had this conversation with their designated partner, Kevin Hale:

Kevin Hale: Guys, why the hell are you offering the people the chance to take your “powered by” branding off their status page?

StatusPage: Well, once people are paying for the service, we don’t think our branding should be on the page.

KH: Don’t do it.

SP: But we think it will piss people off.

KH: Don’t do it.

SP: Even for our top tier?

KH: DON’T DO IT.

SP: But…

KH: Look, if Desk.com can get away with it, so can you guys.

Kevin was 100% right.

This conversation totally changed the trajectory of our business. It keyed our growth from $5k MRR to $25k MRR and provided a scalable acquisition to grow far, far beyond that.

Some of the customers that Statuspage has attracted through this link are huge accounts like Cisco, Adobe, Contactually, BlazeMeter, Barracuda Networks, Take-Two Interactive, and Chartio.

Hotmail

The email startup executed one of of the web’s earliest growth hacks (though the term wouldn’t be coined for another fourteen years).

Rather than blowing its marketing budget on advertising, groundbreaking browser-based email service Hotmail elected to leverage a free resource it already had— existing users.

Hotmail already had about 20,000 users one month after launching in 1996 and it opted to market its service directly to the friends, family and colleagues of those users by employing a simple strategy: It added a tagline, “Get Your Free Email at Hotmail,” at the end of each existing user’s outgoing mail.

When a Hotmail user sent out an email on his or her account, the recipient could click on the tagline link, which would direct them to a page where they could set up their own account. As a result, the company user base not only skyrocketed to 1 million users within 6 months.

Dropbox

There are a lot of services out there that use incentivized invites, but Dropbox has one of the best implementations I’ve seen. Whenever you login to Dropbox’s web interface, there is a constant reminder to invite more friends. Sitting in the top toolbar you can’t help but notice the little giftbox icon with the enticing label “Get free space!” rather than the more boring”Invite friends”. After clicking the giftbox Dropbox informs you that can get 500MB of space for each friend you invite. 500MB is a pretty sizeable amount, especially when you consider it is 10% of what you start off with in the free version of Dropbox. There are two important traits that an incentive should have and Dropbox nailed both of them. First, an incentive needs to be very appealing to the user. Badges, unlocking features, etc., only appeal to a subset of users. A good incentive is something that all users will find appealing. The second trait is that the user should start seeing the benefit after the first few invites.

Before you put thousands of dollars into Facebook or Google ads first see if there is a way

to implement a growth hack. Facebook encourages people to find their friends via email. Amazon sends daily emails related to your recent searches. Some eCommerce websites email you with a 10% off coupon if you haven’t ordered from them in a while. How do you help users on their initial first steps with your product? What do you do to help them keep coming back?

Need some ideas? Chat to us today!