CheatSheet: How to Build an App for UberRush

Everyone knows about Uber. They’re one of the most disruptive and successful tech companies in the world, having started off as a ride-sharing, pseudo-taxi service. They’re an algorithm and associated mobile app revolutionized the taxi industry, solving a huge issue most people didn’t even realize was there.

This is where the success and brilliance of Uber Cofounders Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp truly lie. It isn’t in creating a beautiful piece of code that performs with near perfection, while simultaneously being some complex that it kept any competitors from pulling ahead of Uber. It isn’t even their ability to bypass state and city regulations, thereby avoiding the huge costs that Taxi companies face.

It was in their ability to realize that there was a problem: people around the world were in dire need of a ride service that was available immediately. Plus, they wanted something that can be summoned to the rider, rather than the rider hunting down a taxi. Most people didn’t even realize this was an issue, much less seeing the path toward solving it!

Disrupt, Disrupt, Disrupt!

But as with most Silicon Valley tech companies, Uber follows a simple creed: innovate or die. Conquering the world from San Francisco to Beijing to New York wasn’t enough; so UberEats was launched. Similar to other food delivery services, UberEats allows the user to order food and have it delivered by an Uber driver.

Camp and Kalanick have also launched UberRUSH; which delivers products within an hour. The true entrepreneurial genius behind UberRUSH is that it’s offered to businesses as an API. This means that SDI’s developers can take any app and add in the UberRUSH API. This way, users never even have to leave your app to have their orders delivered near instantaneously.

Let’s take a traditional Marketing approach to this: First, we will identify the problems with delivery services, then we will talk about how integrating the UberRUSH API is superior to other options and good for your SMB or startup.

The Problem[s]

There are a lot of delivery services out there. A lot a lot. We all know the big guns: UPS, FedEx, even the US Postal Service. There are even Delivery Services that go beyond the traditional shipping giants, such as GrubHub, DoorDash, or PostMates. Even Amazon has its own rapid delivery service.

While these are all great options with their own advantages there are issues with each one:

• Traditional Shipping/Receiving companies (UPS, FedEx, etc) are great for shipping in volume and have nice inexpensive options. But the fastest they offer is 1-day shipping, which costs an arm and a leg. 10 years ago that would have been enough. Unfortunately, today is the day of instant gratification, so 24 hours is 23 hours too long.

• GrubHub and other Food Delivery App businesses are great, quick options that aren’t super expensive. But they only focus on food delivery, and are only consumer-facing. As a business, you probably have your own app (contact us if you don’t!) so what you need is a Business to business API. Something that can be added to your branded app.

• PostMates solves the issue of B2B services, but isn’t an integrated API. Users and shoppers need to use the branded PostMate app. So that cuts out your own app and brand, unfortunately. Also, PostMate tends to focus on the big players, leaving the small guys by wayside.

• Of course, there’s always the old, traditional way of doing things: having your own drivers. But then how often do you have a rush delivery order? Even if you have a lot of them, you’re still looking at paying employees for round trips, providing auto insurance, wages, gas money, maybe even benefits.

The Solution

Let’s talk about how UberRush works. UberRUSH integrates fully with any app, granting you the ability to provide one hour delivery service. Not tomorrow, not just relegated to food. Even better, UberRUSH is specifically oriented at small local businesses, ones that can’t traditionally offer deliver services.

As Uber’s Product Manager (Calvin Lee) has stated, UberRUSH is the company’s first attempt at a wholly B2B service. With SDI’s help, you can integrate this API right into your app, allowing users to instantly order their products with a single tap of a button.

It avoids the expense of maintaining your own delivery service, because you’re only hiring a driver as needed, you don’t pay their insurance and other incidentals and you’re only paying for a one way trip. As the company itself points out, when an UberRush Driver, you’re only paying for the trip from your business to your client (and that cost is passed on to your consumer).

So with a simple call to our developers, you can add incredible value to your app, while keeping your users firmly planted in your own app. Plus, the costs are negligible and the appeal massive. Don’t have an app for your company yet? No problem: Give us a call at 408.805.0495/408.621.8481 – or click to contact us!

Everyone knows about Uber. They’re one of the most disruptive and successful tech companies in the world, having started off as a ride-sharing, pseudo-taxi service. They’re an algorithm and associated mobile app revolutionized the taxi industry, solving a huge issue most people didn’t even realize was there. This is where the success and brilliance of Uber Cofounders Travis Kalanick and Garrett Camp truly lie. It isn’t in creating a beautiful piece of code that performs with near perfection, while simultaneously being some complex that it kept any competitors from pulling ahead of Uber. It isn’t…

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3 Ways to Acquire More Users with Better Data Analytics

Businesses, small to large, startups to corporations, survive and thrive off of data. This has been true for as long as the business has been around. CEOs at the beginning of time understood that the more data they had about their organization, the more chance they had a succeeding.

For centuries, people have sought to have better data reporting tools; but until the advent of the digital age, crunching massive amounts of data in a realistic, actionable timeframe was near impossible. Fortunately for the entrepreneur of today, we now live in the time of Big Data.

Big Data gives CEOs and business owners more control over their business than any time in human history. With Big Data Analytics, you collect more data, from more places, with better reporting – in real time. This means a lot for how a marketing strategy is created, concerning anything from brand growth to user acquisition for apps and websites.

Why is real time so important? Because it allows you to move quickly to new trends before it’s too late. Finding out that a particular element of your mobile app isn’t performing up to snuff a week later could potentially mean thousands in lost revenue.

Of course, with so much many metrics being analyzed, it’s easy for the important ones to get lost in the noise. That’s why it’s important to hire an expert development team, like the one at SDI! SDI can install top-notch software like Google’s Analytics 360 Suite to help you gain full control of your business.

Then we research the heck out of your industry to discover what data metrics will be the most effective. By providing tailored metrics with real-team actionable reporting, our team helps your team quickly and accurately respond to data changes. With our help, you will have the ability to make real, positive, impacts on your business.

So Data makes the world go ‘round, but why don’t we narrow down the scope of this discussion just a little bit: how data can help you convert users for your app or website (sometimes referred to as a Data Driven Acquisition Strategy). Specifically, let’s take a look at some common tests that web marketers perform and more a more general conversation on User Acquisition.

Growth Hack Tip #1: Testing

There are many tests a good digital marketer uses to analyze user traffic on a website or app. That being said, there are two in particular that help a marketer when it comes to a visitor to user conversions The first is A/B Testing.

A. A/B testing is a very cool user acquisition tool that SDI’s marketers especially adore. It lets two visitors who are roughly similar and visiting your website or app at the same time see two different versions. Whichever gets more visitors to signup is thus better at getting users.

B. One of SDI’s marketer’s favorite tools is A/B testing. This lets us create a control user and a variable user: they are shown two different versions of your product; whichever converts more visitors is judged to be the more effective design.

Growth Hack Tip #2: Multivariate Testing and Heatmaps

Multivariate testing is similar to an A/B test, in that marketers are looking to see which design is more effective (A or B). But whereas an A/B test compares two complete designs, Multivariate testing compares different elements on a single page.

For instance, if I’m running a Multivariate test on the login page for my iPhone app, one visitor may see a screen with red headers and green footers, one may see one with a red header and no footer, another may see no headers or footers – and so on.

The idea is that a Multivariate test allows marketers to test near endless mashups of various elements. Well really, the idea is, as always, to see which design converts more visitors into users.

Multivariate Testing also works exceptionally well when combined with analytic heatmaps. Heatmaps allow marketers to track exactly where on a web page or app screen a user is hovering or touching a screen. This makes it a great tool to judge points of interest, especially for apps (heatmaps for websites, while very useful can be confounded by users hovering a cursor over an element while away from their keyboard).

Growth Hack Tip #3

Hire professionals. Obviously, we’d prefer it was us, but no matter what, this isn’t an area where you should just take a leap of faith. This is one of the most effective tools for business growth out there (and it’s largely free), but it’s also a hot mess. You don’t want to hike this big [data] mountain without an excellent Sherpa.

A professional team already knows the morass that is digital marketing. We know what to track and how. We know what works and what doesn’t. But most of all, we know how to show you what to track, watch and change (that whole teach a man to fish proverb and all!).

A good marketing team like SDI can help you create User acquisition and growth strategies that work. From industry-specific, actionable metrics to improved analytics testing tools, SDI can put full control of your business, right at the tips of your fingers!

All in all, a robust, effective Analytics software is the most essential weapon in the arsenal of modern day business owners. It allows you to see what’s working, what’s not – and what might work better. Most importantly, it good analytics are designed around your industry, ensuring you are provided with the most effective tool possible.

Your Big Data Team

Ready to install robust Big Data analytic software like the Google Analytics Suite 360 on your app, website, or software program? Give us a call at 408.805.0495 / 408.621.8481 – or click to contact us!

Businesses, small to large, startups to corporations, survive and thrive off of data. This has been true for as long as the business has been around. CEOs at the beginning of time understood that the more data they had about their organization, the more chance they had a succeeding. For centuries, people have sought to have better data reporting tools; but until the advent of the digital age, crunching massive amounts of data in a realistic, actionable timeframe was near impossible. Fortunately for the entrepreneur of today, we now live in the time of Big…

Read More

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