Month: December 2015

Developers certainly use developer programs from the platform vendors, almost half of them dropping by daily, but when they’ve got specific questions they value third-party sites, populated by their peers, more than the official channels.

That’s a key conclusion from VisionMobile’s 9th Developer Economics survey – a biannual event which gathers data from more than ten thousand developers around the world. That survey yields a whole load of demographic and procedural data, including how (and why) developers make use of developer programs. That information has been gathered together into Developer Program Benchmarking 2015.

Along with rankings for 15 of the most-popular developer programs the report looks at what developers value most, and where they think there is room for improvement. One of the most-interesting findings is the support for third-party forums over and above those provided by the platform vendors.

Neither topped the list of importance: documentation and example code were, unsurprisingly, the things that developers wanted most from a developer program. IDE integration came next, but directly below those three was support on public forums such as Stack Overflow and Instructables. That puts third-party forums two ranks above those devoted to a specific platform or technology, and hosted by the platform vendors.

Those dedicated forums were cited by 20% of mobile developers, and 24% of desktop developers, as being in their top-three desired features. Well short of the 31% (mobile) and 30% (desktop) who put third party sites into that category. Peer support is obviously important – Stack Overflow has become the primary source of developer Q&A in recent years, claiming more than 16 million solutions provided and 8 million developers using the site every day; a significant proportion of the total developer population estimated at 18 million. Github – recently valued at $2bn by the Wall Street Journal – hosts repositories for Google, Microsoft, and Amazon, while Intel works closely with Instructables.

With that in mind it’s less surprising to see that the four companies rated best for their involvement in third-party sites are the same four who rated best overall for services offered to developers. The commitment in reaching out to developers is reflected in the services provided to developers who come calling.

But why do developers eschew official channels to such an extent? In part it is lack of trust, born of a cynicism endemic to the younger generation which makes up the majority of developers. There is a feeling that official channels won’t host comments, or responses, critical of the vendor’s products or services – though there is no evidence that this is the case, and vendors are quick to provide examples which contradict this view. Perhaps more important is the way in which modern developers work across platforms, and are often looking for support which will help them work with competitive products.

A developer working on an Android app, for example, may want advice on integrating that application with Amazon’s cloud service, and IBM’s equivalent, so will look for support on a third-party site where developers may have experience they can share. Those posting also feel a freedom to discuss the merits of competitive platforms, such as the payment systems available through Google and Amazon’s respective application stores, where support on either vendor’s site may be more focused on their own product range.

This perception is largely false, as vendors’ forums host a wide variety of discussions, but the effect remains pervasive. Developer Programs which rated highly all invest in third-party sites, providing staff to answer questions and ensuring that their agenda is represented in every discussion. As applications continue to expand across platforms – taking in cloud services and IoT resources – so developers will increasingly look beyond hosted forums to community sites like Stack Overflow and Instructables: a trend that developer programs will have to follow if they wish to stay relevant in an evolving industry.

E-commerce as we know it is about to be fundamentally reshaped, as every connected object in the future becomes a potential commerce channel.

Internet of Things – from smart home devices to connected cars – will transform e-commerce and allow it to stretch across the breadth of the customer journey – from awareness, to intent, to purchase. Billions of “things” will double as e-commerce points of sale (PoS), unbundling and extending PoS for e-commerce outside the web, app and product silos controlled by e-commerce players. But how will we get there? Read on – and also download our latest free report, focusing on the Commerce of Things, presented by Braintree!

E-commerce is forecast to continue to grow fast, and m-commerce twice as fast for that matter, the latter poised to reach a value of $600 billion by 2018. The Internet of Things (IoT) is at last leaving the hype phase and is becoming a revenue-creating reality. By 2020, there could be as many as five connected objects per every smartphone user. And by then, the IoT market is set to reach a value of $1.7 trillion.

IoT and e-commerce have until now evolved in parallel. They are now embarking on a common journey where every connected object becomes a potential e-commerce real estate. With IoT, washing machines can now not just deliver detergent just in time by knowing when your supplies run out, they can also recommend the right detergent, based on your usage or type of clothes, on demand. Car makers can recommend where you buy your gas, by understanding your drive journey, availability of gas stations, pricing on-demand discounts, and gas station commission – in fact Google’s Waze does this already. Watchmakers can command a commission from health insurers, as they can monitor your heart rate, temperature, fitness habits and determine what risk zone you are in. Moreover, makers of connected devices can now afford a negative BOM (bill of materials) “à la Dell”, by subsidizing the cost of hardware with the revenues from bundled e-commerce services.

E-commerce is already the biggest revenue generator among mobile developers, yet only a small minority have acknowledged it and few have seized it with both hands. Mobile developers using e-commerce (for physical or digital goods) have median monthly revenues of $1,000-$2,000 compared to a measly $200-$350 median monthly revenue for mobile developers across all revenue models.

Yet, only a small share of mobile developers, 9%, have chosen to work with e-commerce, based on our 9th Developer Economics survey wave of May 2015, of more than 13,000 software developers globally.

We expect however that this number will grow as off-the-shelf fulfilment and payment platforms ease the pain of managing inventory, customers and transactions. Scaling up will become easier and therefore e-commerce a less daunting and more appealing option for an increasing number of developers.

Services such as Dash Replenishment Service (DRS) and Pinterest’s buyable buttons are all early, and telling, examples of the commerce things to come. They show how e-commerce is evolving towards letting customers make purchasing choices based on impulse and context instead of having to browse and select among a myriad of items. They also show how a purchasing decision is vastly simplified when discovery and payment friction has been removed.

The e-commerce of things journey has only started but it will have far-reaching consequences for e-commerce, IoT, and overall how goods and services are consumed in the future. For an in-depth analysis of how developers and IoT are shaping e-commerce, download the free VisionMobile report on the Commerce of Things.

-Andreas:
As Founder, Andreas oversees the growth and strategy at VisionMobile. He has been working on the mobile industry since 2000, helping take the very first smartphones to market. Since then he’s worked with the top technology brands including Microsoft, Intel, Google, Amazon and AT&T. In his academic life, Andreas is an Adjunct Professor at Lund University, Sweden, where he teaches Internet Business Models. He is passionate about mapping the future and the economics that will shape how people communicate, work and play.

You can reach Andreas at: andreas@visionmobile.com or @andreascon

-Marlène:
Marlène Sellebråten has researched and written about the global telecoms, mobile and mobile innovation market for 15 years, working as an analyst, a tech editor and a consultant, for analyst firms such as Gartner and publications such as CommunicationsWeek International (now Totaltelecom). More recently she was editor-in-chief of Sweden’s leading publication on B2B mobile, Mobilbusiness, as well as Sweden’s largest publication on B2C mobile, Mobil, before joining VisionMobile as an Analyst Partner.

You can reach Marlène at: marlene@visionmobile.com or @MSellebraten