Event Apps, the App Store, and ASAE

Apple has focused on a quality experience for iPhone users from day one – from the iOS UI design to the regular annual rollout events to the iTunes App Store. There has been a lot of discussion lately about this last one – maximizing user experience in the iTunes App Store.

It maximizes user experience to (1) have apps in the App Store that run on the latest, supported Apple hardware, and (2) avoid app confusion with a category full of duplicates.

Funneling down to the event app, many words have been written about Apple having an issue with event apps. Apple has not put a specific remark in its developer guidelines about event apps. Instead, Apple has reiterated what it has always said: Don’t put in clone apps.

At Results at Hand, we have a container app, the ConferenceBeat Events App. For standard events, you can put your event in the ConferenceBeat app, and it will give you all the functionality you would expect from a native app – push notifications, local storage, etc. We also continue to create premium native apps that are customized for each event including customer branding and unique functionality.

As our trade group, the ASAE has provided a level-headed analysis of this situation. Your app developers receive feedback from Apple on every submission. Apple wants a high-quality experience for users. We continue to respond to feedback from Apple whenever received while making our premium custom app offerings tailored to our customer’s requirements. We want you and your event attendees to have a great experience with our event apps, just like we want you and your members to have a great experience with our year-round membership apps.

— Jonathan L Brown, CTO, Results at Hand Software