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Project Overview
Pocket App was approached by News UK and The Sun Newspaper, to design and develop a donation app as part of its Remembrance Day Poppy Appeal campaign with the Royal British Legion. The ‘My Poppy’ app utilised SMS to enable users to donate £2 to the cause at the tap of a button. After donating, users received their own digital poppy that could be shared via in-built social sharing options. A microsite was also developed in order to demonstrate the number of downloads via an interactive poppy field as well as information pages about the Royal British Legion.
Project Commissioner
Project Creator
Team
Pocket App
News UK
Project Brief
Pocket App, the UK’s largest independent app developer, created a new mobile app in October 2014 in support of The Sun newspaper’s Poppy Appeal. The ‘My Poppy’ app was developed in just three weeks and was available to download from 4th November 2014 in the run up to Remembrance Day on 11th November 2014.
News UK approached Paul Swaddle, CEO of Pocket App, as he had previously worked on the first ever application to support the Royal British Legion over ten years ago. Given the short timeline and tight deadlines they needed a developer they could trust to understand their needs and deliver. Pocket App’s unique experience and skillset not only matched but exceeded these requirements.
Commissioned by News UK, on behalf of The Sun, ‘My Poppy’ was available as a download on any iPhone or Android mobile device. Users could make a donation via text message to the Royal British Legion’s campaign to support UK Armed Forces, veterans and their families. Once they had donated, users received an in-app digital poppy which they were able to share via social media or download to set as their mobile phone wallpaper. Their digital poppy was also added to a virtual poppy field so consumers could have visibility of how many donations had been collected.
Project Need
The My Poppy app was an innovative and interactive way for consumers to contribute to The Royal British Legion Remembrance fundraising campaigns. The project was highly collaborative and with such short timescales certainly put Pocket App to the test. Pocket App delivered My Poppy on time and under budget.
Pocket App took a highly innovative approach using agile-sprint development. Normally Pocket App would take 2 weeks to design and develop, and then deliver an early interim build. This cycle was dramatically shortened into daily releases. Often projects of this nature get held up waiting for client approval but in this instance there wasn’t time. Pocket App was releasing design specs to the client and then making the decision internally to press ahead in line with the brief rather than wait for approval. Pocket App was confident in its understanding of the brief and knew that it had the expertise and the trust of News UK to make those decisions.
Constant communication and daily releases also helped with quality assurance. Pocket App kept the design as simple as possible with the mantra of delivering core functionality to a high standard without compromising the deadline. Above all Pocket App knew that it needed to make it incredibly easy for the user to donate to the cause. Equally it was important that the user had an engaging experience throughout; this was achieved through the digital poppy and populating the digital poppy field.
User Experience
Pocket App put the user at the heart of the development process. Every aspect of the design was kept simple and functional to ensure the highest percentage of users would complete their donation.
The landing page for the My Poppy application directs the user to a clear and simple donation page that used innovative SMS technology to allow users to donate £2 with a single click. The app could register your number and remove the need for extensive registration pages and credit card details simplifying the user experience and making the donation process as easy as possible.
Once the user had donated engagement was continued via the use of an interactive poppy field built into the application. As users donated the field became increasingly populated with individual poppies that each represented a donation and 'grew' as donations increased.
The My Poppy app also drove user engagement and increased interactivity via a number of social media tools built into the application. Those who donated received a virtual poppy that could be shared on all the main social media sites from within the app and a downloadable image that be used a profile picture, cover photo or desktop screensaver to show your support.
As with all aspects of 'my poppy' the social media tools were kept simple and accessible to allow for the ideal customer experience.
Project Marketing
Predominantly 'My Poppy' was marketed through the Sun newspaper.
As part of the Sun's Remembrance Day coverage there was an 8 page spread featuring 'My Poppy' and its importance to the overall campaign. They also utilised their social media presence, and that of the Royal British Legion, in order to spread the word.
The marketing campaign and the overall appeal was very successful; My Poppy was App of the Day in the prestigious Mobile Entertainment publication. It was also in the top 50 global Android apps on the Google Play Store. My Poppy had 11,000 downloads on the first day and 18,000 downloads in November, raising £25K for charity.
Project Privacy
Pocket App always goes beyond industry standards for security and privacy policies for their applications. Due to the sensitive nature of the information being used in My Poppy, Pocket App took this even further.
All information was thoroughly encrypted and Pocket App signed a non-disclosure agreement to protect the personal information of all users as well as information discussed during the development process.
Community
Apps more than ever are helping our communities to connect and engage, from emergency services to Not for Profits to social groups, these apps not only assist in delivery but provide efficiencies importantly providing those at the coalface more time to do their important work whether it be fighting fires or managing the local team. It's not all serious though we're also looking for apps that work to help bring the community groups together with fun and enjoyable activities.
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