University Ss. Cyril and Methodius Skopje Faculty of Economics
Research of Macedonian market for launching Studentus mobile app Subject: Multichannel marketing Mentors: Prof.Lidija Pulevska, Ph.D Ass. Dimitar Jovevski , MA
Group “ Dream team� : 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6.
Katerina Boncheva Jovana Milanovska Marina Andreeva Simona Stojanova Gabriela Stojanovska Margarita Panovska
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,,Studentus” is а smartphone application where students can connect, buy, sell or exchange belongings and services, plus find a place to live.
Users This application is created for students and aimed to solve their problems during their studying. It is intended for students from different towns of Macedonia which are educating in Skopje or in some other town. These students are facing with a lot of existential problems at the beginning or during their studies. So an application which reduces financial cost and time for searching an apartment is attractive for installation. For future students it will help them to socialize easier showing on a map around them where are locations of interest, a library, Internet, student discounts, night life and party etc. Studentus will have also features worth for students that are already studying in their hometown so it will be useful for them too. This application will be social, it will build a community around interest with continuously rising users, attractive for all groups of interest. Our other two types of users are: student-service providers and apartment owners. They will be motivated to advertise their services on a place where they will directly reach the users of their services-students.
Market of mobile applications Till 2015 5 billion people will use mobile Internet. The number of mobile applications downloaded in 2015 will reach 98 billion, which means that the market for mobile applications is growing much faster than expected. Although there are no official data for the use of mobile applications by Macedonian users, it is evident that their popularity on the Macedonian market is growing rapidly. It is obvious that from enormous number of applications on the market the most hopeful for survival are those that will solve real problems. Having in mind that Internet is mostly used by students or 96.4 %, creating an application of interest for this target audience has a good potential for success. In the near future 4G services in our country will enable using of mobile broadband Internet with a high quality, speed and reliability with more accessible prices and developed market competition.
Competition Our country has over 900 thousand users of social networks or activities on Internet are happening right on the social networks. People spend an average 37 minutes a day on social networks, more than any other place online. In terms of which social network has the most customer attention, speaking by the time people spend on it via desktop computer and smartphone, Facebook is with the leading position then Instagram, Twiter, Whats up… We should use them to access out target audience.(ex. promoting on Facebook, connecting with profile on Facebook, offering services like free calls…) There are a lot of applications for students on the market but only “Student’U” offers similar services for students. Student’U is a smartphone app which helps students to meet other 2
students nearby and to engage more fully in student life. It offers information, new student places, chat and option for sharing pictures. It is student focused socializing. With this app students can find out scholarships, volunteering, exhibitions, affordable touristic offers, student organizations. “Studentus” is focusing on existential challenges on the market which is different from Student’U because it is focused on the social part. Applications that are interest based and solve problems are much valuable for installing and maintaining in the mobile phone despite the huge choice of applications that are offered on the market. In the domain of renting apartments a competitive IPhone / Android application that has recently been launched in the market is the application of Pazar3. Pazar3.mk is the leading advertisement site in Macedonia for classified ads. The site offers private people and firms of Macedonian as well of foreign nationality to engage in trading activities. In the domain of deals our potential competition will be Grouper and Kolektiva if in the future they place mobile application on the market. Also Foursquare is our competition in the category “Around me” which is one of the features that we recommend the application to contain. Foursquare is a free app that helps people share and save the places they visit. Then when you look for inspiration for what you go next and when to go, Foursquare gives personalized recommendations and deals based on where you, your friends, and people with your tastes have been. So in some way matches our idea of “Around me”.
Doing the research In order to find out is there a potential to launch a student application, we interviewed 100 people using a structured questionnaire with 14 questions. Interviewed are future students, undergraduate students or postgraduate students, because they already have meet with students problems or they will in a near future (from 17 to 29 years old).Here is presented the questionnaire and the results of the survey.
ПРАШАЛНИК: а) Да б) Не
1. Ппл: а) Машки б) Женски 2. Впзраст:_____
Дпкплку имате смарт телефпн пдгпвпрете ги прашаоата пд 6-9, вп спрптивнп прпдплжете ппнатаму.
3.Студентски статус: a)Иден студент б)Студент на дпдиплпмски студии в)Студент на ппстдиплпмски студии
6. Дали кпристете мпбилни апликации? а)Да б) Не 7. Кпј Оперативен систем гп кпристите? a)Android б)IOS в) Windows
4. Од кпј град сте?___________ 5. Дали имате смарт телефпн?
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11. Кпј начин сппред вас е најдпбар за решаваое на гпренаведените прпблеми? а)Огласник б)Pazar3 в)Reklama5 г)Агенција д)Спцијални мрежи д)Grouper.мк e)Kolektiva.мк ж)Мпбилни апликации з)Другп, ___________
8. Кпи апликации најчестп ги кпристите?( мпжете да пдберете ппвеке ппции) а)Facebook б)Twitter в)Viber/WeChat/WhatsApp г)Linkedin д)Foursquare д)Mail е)Instagram ж)Автпбускп з)Други,___________
12. Дали би кпристеле апликација кпја решава студентски прпблеми? а) Да б )Не в) Мпжеби
9. Какп дпзнавате за нпвите апликации? а)Преппрака пд пријатели б)Банери в)Реклама г )Спцијални мрежи д)QR кпдпви д)Дпбар рејтинг на App маркети
13.Дали сакате да бидете известени дпкплку на пазарпт се лансира таква апликација? а) Да б) Не 14. Ве мплиме пставете гп вашипт маил за дппплнителни инфпрмации вп пднпст наапликацијата.________________________
10.Сп кпи прпблеми се среќавате за време на студираоетп? а)Напдаое на сместуваое б)Напдаое на Интернет в)Студентски пппусти г)Читална д)Напдаое на цимери д)Приватни часпви е)Инфпрмации за нпќен живпт и забава ж)Сппртски активнпсти з)Другп, ____________
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A total of 100 individuals responded to the questionnaire. More than half were females, 59% and 41% males.
A total of 100 individuals responded to the questionnaire. More than half were females, 59% and 41% males.Respondents were on age between 17 and 29 years old.
All of them are future students, undergraduate students or postgraduate students, because they already have meet with students problems or they will in a near future.
We interview students that are not from Skopje, but from other cities in Macedonia, because they are our target students.
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91% of the students are using smartphones. Those who those who don't use smartphones, were not answering questions 6, 7, 8, 9.
It is obvious that they who use smartphones are using mobile applications too.
From the next question we can notice that android operative system is the most useful in Macedonia (68%), but iOS operative system is also of considerable meaning. So for launching the application it is best to be launched on both of the operating systems.
The most usefull applications in Macedonia are those: We can see that Facebook application is the most usefull (24%), Viber/WeChat/WhatsApp, apps that allow to make free phone calls and send text messages are taking the second place, 17% and maill applications on a third place, 15%. 6
The next question is very important for us because that will tell us how to promote this application. " Word of Mouth " and positive comments are very strong ways of promotion . Social networks (viral marketing) is also important for promotion, after that are: high rating, ads posted on other applikations, banners, QR codes.
Problems that all of the students have are:
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In order to solve their problems, they use all of the possible ways to find informations. The best source are social networks, after that mobile applications that can answer only some of the questions (ex: Avtobusko, only for timetable); After that is the web page and mobile application Pazar3; Grouper.mk the web page for offers and deals with lower prices; Огласник, macedonian newspaper for advertising; Kolektiva.mk; specialised agencies; Reklama5.mk.
They are willing to use one application that will solve thar problems, and provide more informations during their studies in Skopje.
It is good that 84% of respondents would like to be informed when the application is launched.
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Profiling users Users are a crucial aspect for the launch and usage of an app. Mobile’s true power comes from its personal nature. When an app is installed on a consumer’s device, they have it in their pocket all day every day. That’s why it is important to listen to the users and engage with them in a personal manner. Because of this, in order to find out and describe the users of the app, their characteristics, their problems, we decided to investigate in a bit different manner than using a surveyWe can identify two types of groups of users on this applications, those are future students and undergraduate/postgraduate students. They are presented in personas: Fiilip Arsof- future student Gender: male Age: 18 Location: Kochani, Macedonia Personality: Ambitious, communicative, sociable Desired faculty: Faculty of economics Internet and app usage: daily usage Goals: To finish his studies in time; Motivations:
To gain new knowledge;
Filip Arsov is finishing his last year in high school. He is planning to go to faculty of economics in Skopje. Filip wants to take the challenge to study in one of the best universities in Macedonia, in a bigger city than his native. While browsing on the internet he found the application Studentus, he read the comments left below and he thought it will be very helpful for him when he goes in Skopje
To meet other peopple and make frendship. Frustrations: Not being able to find all necessary informations connected to studies and social life; Difficulty in establishing contact with colleagues.
Scenario: Filip wakes up on Sunday morning, while drinking his first coffe he starts surfing on the Internet to find informations about accomodation in Skopje, the comments of the application appears . He seems interested and open the application to find something more about it. He also can see that the application can solve more problems except the accomodation. After figuring out how how it works, and the benefits it can provide, he 9 decides to download the application.
Elena Miteva-student Gender: female
Motivations:
Age: 21
Elena Miteva is third year student on the Faculty of law, "Ss Cyril and Methodius University of Skopje" She is from Bitola, and in the past 3 years she has had problems finding accommodations in Skopje. For the weekends she want to go out with her friends and colleagues, but sometimes they does not know where to go. She is interested about libraries in Skopje, sports activities and students offers and deals with lower prices, educational services for extra lessons.
Temporary Location: Skopje, Macedonia Personality: Ambitious, Internet and app usage: daily usage
Goals: To ease the ways of finding accommodation and all necessary information; To find friends near her; To save money and time Frustrations: Long and exhausting negotiation process; Not being able to find all the necessary informations on the Internet Scenario: Elena passed all the exams and don't have any obligations. Now she have leisure time without an idea how to spend it. Her friend told her about the application that she have used for finding accomodation on the begining of September, and after that he used the same app to find lessons for dancing. She found the same app, looked how it works, and find out that here is the answer she is looking for. Thanks to the app she found how to spend her time, fith friends that live near
The other two personas for the users of the app are created on the base of personal interviews. We spoke with people we know who are part of the potential target user base, and then
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synthesizing the answers created the 2 personas: Baze (profiling the students-service providers) and Goran Mitevski (profiling the apartment owners).
Persona for the students-service providers Before creating the persona, we made interviews with 3 undergraduate students and 1 graduated student who have experience in teaching lessons for other students as a personal service, and one of them even owned a small ‘private school’ for giving lessons for several subjects for students of Economics. The interviews covered a discussion connected with the following questions: 1. How do you find your client students? 2. Have you had an experience with advertising your services in some way? 3. Are you willing to pay in order to get a better access with your target customers? 4. Do you have a smart phone, do you use mobile applications, which apps are you using? 5. Are you willing to use a mobile application to promote and provide a channel for your users to access your services? Persona for the apartment owners In a similar procedure like for the creation for the previous persona, we made interviews with three owners of apartments in Skopje. They were actually the owners of the apartments where two of our team members live. The questions based on which the interviews were conducted are the following: 1. What’s your experience with renting your apartment to students? 2. Have you ever advertised your apartment for rent in some way, and if so please describe your experience? 3. According to you, what’s the optimal price to pay in order to advertise your apartment? 4. Do you have a smartphone, do you use mobile applications, which apps are you using? 5. Are you willing to use a mobile application to rent your apartment and do you consider it to be helpful?
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Features Doing the research among our target users and analyzing the many reviews and reports from the users of mobile apps, we came up with conclusion that features of mobile app are the most important aspect having in mind the functionality and utility as main characteristics. Taking a closer look at the most successful apps for 2013, some of them matching the most used from our target ,we came up to six major characteristics having in common. Here we count connectivity, convenience, localization, reachability, security and personalization. Having in mind the usage of these characteristics and the initial idea behind Studentus to be a place where students can connect, buy, sell , exchange stuff and find place to live and the planned design and sketches of the app, we propose several main categories of features that we consider to be important for Studentus to be widely-accepted and used application. We divide them in four groups: 1. 2. 3. 4.
Around me Housing Educational services Offers and deals
We must pay attention to the interchangeability of the categories and combination of some characteristics of the categories in order to response well the demand of functionality and usability. 1. Around me. Our vision of category Around me is to be feature based on localization and the possibility to offer location-based information as a key feature that makes mobility vivid and practical. This feature will be meant to partially serve the main purpose of application when launched, which is finding places to live. We visionise this feature to use GPRS to locate the user and its surrounding and show apartments for rent. When clicked they will lead to Housing part, which will be explained later. This feature will also serve the purpose of finding places for food, coffee, libraries and bookshops, shopping, nightlife and other culture events. Having in mind that one third (35 out of 100 ) of our respondents use Foursquare daily, we believe that having this service will make it “one-stop shop� app, further increasing the probability of Studentus to become must-have app for every student. After a brief survey and extensive conversations with our colleagues, we came to conclusion that this feature is of a great importance for sustainable application and it would be nice if the developer pay a greater attention to it. Innovation and development is what prevent things from getting boring and out of use, so to avoid this, here we make suggestion for including the possibility for connecting with Facebook and making available for user to see who of his friends have been at the place and to read the review he left. It will greatly complement the Housing part, because as it is known from marketing the recommendation given from someone you know is much more credible than a million bucks commercial.
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2. Housing Housing feature is what will make the base purpose of Studentus launching . This category will consist of the basic idea behind the application which is helping students to solve the biggest problem during university period-finding place to live and flat mates. As shown on the sketches for the look of the application, we find this concept user-friendly and our research shows that not much should be changed here. As a suggestion, the application should provide a platform organized as base directory where users looking for flat mates could register. This search could be combined with marking an apartment this user would like to rent, enabling him find potential flat mate and getting the desired apartment. Having in mind the specificity of renting as activity, it is recommendable not to put Buy button in this category because rarely when will one rent an apartment before visiting it. Potential feature here, which could further lead to extensions of the app is Contact. At first time it could function as offline post of the phone number and email of the person renting the apartment. Later, it should be thought of enabling direct contact between app’s users , having in mind the extensive usage of platforms like Viber or What’s up and the students as target category that are inclined to cheap or better free calls and messages. This free contact feature will contribute for Studentus to become closer to “one –stop shop” student app. 3. Educational services The category educational services is primarily aimed to serve the users who are looking for help in subjects they are not very good at or help with the Faculty tasks they cannot handle by their own . According to the survey we made, this is one of the most common problems the students are facing during their studies (mostly future students). The high level of mobile apps usage among students appoints to a promising potential usage of this app. So, this feature will be useful for the students looking for private lessons of other kind of help connected with their studies. They will have an access on the tip of their finger to offers made by the other type of users of this feature-the people which are providing these educational services. Every item listed in this category will be rated and reviewed by the previous users, which will serve as a credibility sign for the potential users. On the other hand, the people providing for this kind of services will have an immediate access to their target customers. These providers in fact are not only professional teachers who give private lessons, but also students who are able to provide such services to other students. The idea is that through this application the students who have exceptional skills in some educational fields can get ‘customers’ very easily and connect with them and in this way earning some money during the studies. 4. Offers and deals Offers and deals feature would make Studentus a deal-finding app that delivers big discounts mainly made for students at local places. Having in mind the popularity of Grouper as the most successful site for deals and discounts, it might be a good idea to thing in direction of committing partnership with Grouper to fulfill this category of application. This category should 15
be tightly connected with Around me section, using the built-in GPS functionality to find places around that offer deals and discounts. This category has a great potential for success because it is proved that students are category which is inclined towards saving.
Marketing and Distribution channels The most important part for survival and development of every application are the distribution and marketing channels. The results of our research showed that the majority of the respondents use android operating system but also we can’t ignore the users of IOS operating system, because the number is constantly rising. So we suggest this application to be present on both markets in order to completely utilize the opportunity the app to be seen and downloaded. Timing is everything. Timing isn’t just about gaining first mover advantage, but also picking the right time of year both for the type of app and avoiding periods when too many new apps are competing for attention. So we recommend launching this application in three phases. 1. Activities in pre-launch phase The pre-launch phase should last approximately 10 days before the official launch. In order to create desire to download we need to get early coverage. First of all establishing Facebook fan page is needed.
On the previous picture you can see our idea for the look of the fan page. With this fan page we can announce the launching of the application, through these activities: * Brief description about Why, who, how, where, what and when of application development. * Posting short video consisting of application screen shots that can also be uploaded on YouTube. * 7 days paid Facebook ad campaign-Facebook ads are an inexpensive way to build a marketing presence. You could create Facebook mobile ads for your app, and/or create Facebook ads for 16
your Page. Both options allow you to tailor the demographics of the audience you’re looking to reach. You can set a maximum budget, defined by cost-per-click (CPC), and track the effectiveness of the campaign throughout. *Integrating facebook fan page with twitter to increase the visibility and awareness of the application. *The integration of social network fan page will lead to easily establishing and developing a hash tag (#) Studentus to encourage the interaction with potential users. *Counting days to the official launch 2. Activities in launching phase According to us, this phase should start in June. Why June? Having on mind that one of the startup features is housing, the best time to launch the application is in June when student start to think about finding a place to live. Launching phase can be conducted through these activities: *Official announcement that the app is launched. *Sharing a link on the fan page to direct the users to install the app. *Contacting relevant pages such as: Fakulteti.mk, it.com.mk to write an article about the app. *Creating a newsletter and sending it to all respondents who have left their email on the survey and the fan page *Placing stickers with app’s QR code on several location like faculties, bases, cafes and fast food restaurants where students are spending the majority of their time. *Free first two weeks after launching the app for users that place offers. *Developing simple web page. Example:
*Placing banners on the most used web pages for students, such as fakulteti.mk 17
3. Activities in post-launching phase In order to lengthen the app’s life cycle and to keep users constantly use the app. We must build loyalty and stability to show users that we take care for the app, by periodically upgrading it and cleaning it from bugs. Here are a few suggestions: *Initiate reviews. Tell users that you want their feedback. * Developing word of mouth marketing strategy through reward. The idea here is to increasing the download rate. For example: each user that will bring 5 new users will gain some benefits: 1. For users that only use the app will gain for example one new features earlier than the official launching date. 2. For users that place offers will gain for example to place one offer for free. *Developing a blog to keep users integrated *Upgrading the app with for example one feature every three months. As a conclusion, to keep users interest and make profit, it’s important to follow all the phases respectfully. Don’t use all the promotion channels at once, rather use the appropriate ones at the appropriate time. Because the formula for success is the right timing with the right channels.
PAYMENT Regarding the fact that users are overwhelmed with so many applications and most of them are free and the potential competition from the social networks, we consider that at the beginning the users will be able to install the application for free. This would be an incentive for the potential users which are students with tight budgets, so their willingness to pay is small. Later, with the further development of the app and its enriching with additional features, users can be charged for getting it. The users on the supply side, who are providing services will be charged for selecting the CREATE AD section. The price for creating a single ad for a period of 90 days will cost XX denars. We also suggest a possibility for a subscription fee for the creators of the ad with an amount of XX denars for a year. This will be an incentive for these users to take advantage of the subscription fee and create other ads for other categories too and in that way expand the range of ads the app contains.
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