Let’s face it. Mobile app development and mobile marketing are still relatively new areas that need fine tuning. These are areas not yet fully explored and utilized so it is understandable if you are still struggling to make it work.

A lot of generic ads are out there. The most common is ‘download x app now’. People have learned to ignore this kind of app. Why? Well, the first question that will come to mind is why? Why should I download this app? What’s in it for me? What will it to do to make my life easier? How will it help me? The ad clearly does not address these questions. So what can you do to make your product get noticed? Here are a few tips.

Find the right audience

Review blogs are a good choice to get close to your target audience. If you have a beta product, you can ask these bloggers to review your app. Ask them to rate your product. It’s good if your product is still in the testing stage as you can still fix the bugs. Having different people review your product gives you more ‘eyes’ to spot errors. When launch time comes, you can be sure that your product is ready.

Use social media

If the bloggers have given you a good rating, spread the word through social media. Share a link to these reviews on your Facebook page. Tweet about it. If you can make a good photo presentation, pin it on Pinterest. You can also hold contests in cooperation with the bloggers to generate more attention. You can give away 5 apps for free for each blogger. Make rules such as they have to ‘Like’ your Facebook page, they have to follow you on Twitter and Pinterest and they have to be a follower of that specific blogger. Make sure that the blogger also has some benefits so that you can have a good working relationship.

Another way of generating traffic is to write an article about your app and share it with other bloggers who are willing to post your content for free. You can then put a link to your download page, Facebook page or a blogger’s review page at the end of your article.

Make good advertisements

Don’t be lazy with your ads. Stay away from generic ones like the one mentioned above. Give your customers something that they can relate to, something they can use. Make your ads appealing enough to warrant a click on the download button.

At the end of your advertisement, place a link that directs your customers to your download page. Don’t dilly dally with more unnecessary words. The client already hit the download button so he or she does not need any more convincing. He or she is already convinced that you have a good product and they are willing to try it.

Content marketing is a good way to earn trust and gain a credible reputation in cyberspace. You already know that you have a good product. It’s just a matter of finding the right venue for you to be heard.

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A lot of the older Android phones with old Android OS needed either root access, the Android SDK, or some other App to take screen shots. Even some of the new phones coming out don’t have a native option to take screen shots. Luckily, that seems to be changing.

I’m not sure at which Android OS it started with, but some Android phones can take screen shots these days with the press of a few buttons. Too bad it’s not the same process on every phone. These generally will work and you might have to fool around to get the timing of pressing the buttons correct. Here are ones I know about:

• Samsung Galaxy S2 – Hold down the Home + Lock button
• Samsung Galaxy S – Hold down the Back + Home button
• Samsung Fascinate – Hold down the Back + Power button
• HTC Sensation – Hold down the Power + Home button
• HTC Evo 3d – Hold down the Power + Home button
• MyTouch 4G – Hold down the Power + Home button
• T-Mobile G2X – Hold down the Power + Home button
• HTC Amaze – Hold down the Power + Home button

Please add your experience capturing screen shots without the use of SDK’s or Apps in the comments section and I’ll add it to this page.

Here are guides if you need to take screen shots using the SDK or MyPhoneExplorer.

Thx.

At the bottom of each post, there will be a QR code that looks like this:

This code can be scanned from the monitor with a bar code scanner app such as Barcode Scanner by ZXing Team or Shop Savvy.

Once the QR code is scanned, it will link to the location of the app in the Android Market.

I’m currently using an HTC Sensation. I’m fairly happy with the stock battery that came with the phone, a 1520 mAh battery. I would get between 9 – 11 hours with average usage. That doesn’t sound like much, but I’m a heavy user. I’m almost always on WiFi and using apps. If I weren’t such a heavy user, I could probably get 15+ hours of usage.

Even though I was content with the stock battery, I decided to purchase an after market battery with a larger mAh rating. I ended up getting the Anker 1900 mAh battery with a battery charger similar to this one from Amazon. This is about 25% more juice than the stock battery. The 25% is pretty accurate. I am getting about 25% more usage time, about 12 – 15 hours on average, 2 to 3 more hours than the stock battery . The Anker 1900 mAh battery is working just as expected.

Having an extra battery is super convenient if you are traveling or always on the go and don’t have a couple of hours to stop and charge your phone. Whenever I travel, I always carry my extra battery and charger with me. When I run out of juice on one battery, I just pop it out and replace it with my fully charged one. Then I charge my depleted one over night when I can a couple hours alone with an outlet.

One thing to note is every time I switch batteries, the phone will take a longer time to boot up. My phone normally boots up in about 30 seconds. Every time I change out the battery, my phone can take as long as 3 minutes to boot up.

I can get a full charge using the external USB charger in about 2 hours.

The charger can be a little confusing to use. It doesn’t come with good directions. There aren’t any markings on the charging leads. Here’s a great video on how to use the charger posted by a person with the username SalvadorDali on Youtube.

If you’re in the market for an extra battery, check out the Anker 1900 mAh replacement battery.

This is one option the Android OS (as of version 2.3.3) lacks that’s available on iPhone’s.  Why Oh Why can’t we take screen shots easily?  Taking screen shots on the iPhone is so easy.  You just hold down the home and sleep buttons simultaneously.  Then the image will be in the Camera Roll.  With Android devices, it’s not so easy, and you have to be connected to a PC.

There’s a few ways to take screen shots on Android devices.  One way is to use the Android SDK (software development kit).  Another is to use an app.

First, we’ll go through the process using the Android SDK.

1. You’ll need to download on your PC:

1.  The Android SDK 
2. Java^TM Platform, Standard Edition Development Kit

2. Install the Java^TM Platform, Standard Edition Development Kit

3. Install the Android SDK

• Installing the entire Android SDK can take a while.  You can download the .zip instead of the .exe version.
• With the .zip version
• Extract the “android-sdk-windows” folder from the .zip file

4. Find what version of Android you are running. On your phone: Settings -> About Phone -> Software information -> Android version

5. Go to the folder you just extracted android-sdk-windows/tools/ and open up SDK Manager.exe

6. When the SDK Manager opens, Don’t install any packages by choosing “Cancel” when it asks you to “Choose Packages to Install”.  It will take a long time to install all the packages, so we are only going to install the one that is pertinent to you.

7. In the SDK Manger, select Available packages->Android Repository

8. Select and only install the SDK Platform for the version of Android you are running

9. Go back to the android-sdk-windows/tools folder and open up ddms.bat

10. Make sure USB debugging on your phone is checked. On your phone, Settings -> Applications -> Development -> USB debugging

11. Plug in your Android device with a USB cable to your PC and you should see your phone.

• If you don’t see your phone, the correct USB driver is probably missing.
• If you have an HTC device you can use HTC sync and bypass the steps below to download the USB drivers. This was the only way I was able to get the correct USB Driver for the HTC Sensation 4G.
• Unplug and plug in your Android device. When you plug in your Android device Windows will automatically try to load the drivers for your phone.   Don’t allow Windows to download the driver automatically. Update the driver manually via the device manager.
• Go to the SDK Manager and download the USB drivers in: Available packages->Third party Add-ons->Google Inc->Google USB Driver package

• In the Device Manager, install the driver from the folder of the usb driver you just downloaded.

12. Open up the Davlik Debug Manager by going to the android-sdk-windows/tools folder and open up ddms.bat

13. Select your device

14. Take a screen shot by pressing “ctrl s”.

Help people out and email me your Phit Droid solutions and I’ll post them here.

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Copy and pasting from a web site is critical.  Either to enter information to an email or entering tracking numbers to a Package Tracking app.  Here are the instructions on how to Copy and Paste from a Web Site.  I will provide 2 sets of instructions.  One without a physical keyboard and one with a physical keyboard.

1.  Bring up the menu and select “More”.

1a.  If you have a physical keyboard you can skip to step 3a.

2.  Select “Select Text”

3.  Select the text you want with your finger.  The highlighted text will be copied to the clip board.

3a.  Press Shift + roll the track ball to the spot you want to start high lighting.  Then press the track ball while keeping your finger pressed on shift and it will start high lighting.  Roll the track ball across the desired high lighted text.  Either press the track ball down again or take your finger off shift to stop high lighting.  This will copy the desired text to the clip board.  Go to step 4A.

4.  To copy the text to an email – Long Click on the email.  This will bring up the input menu.  Select “Paste”.  Long clicking on most places where you input text will bring up this menu.

4a.  Press menu + v to paste.

5.  The copied text will be pasted to the email.

I will give 2 ways to perform this.  With the touch screen menu and if a physical keyboard is present.

1.  Place the cursor either before or after the spot you want to copy.  You can do this with the track ball or your finger.

2.  Long click on the curse with either your finger or the track ball until the menu screen pops up.  To long click, hold down your finger on the screen or the track ball.

2a.  If you have a physical keyboard, skip to step 4.

3.  Click on “Select text”.

4.  Highlight the text you want to copy with either your finger or the track ball.

4a. With the physical keyboard, you can use the shift key + track ball to select the text

5.  After you’ve highlighted the text, press the track ball or long click any where on the screen with your finger.  This will bring up another menu and select “Copy” to copy the selected text to the clip board.

5a.  With the physical keyboard press menu + c to copy the text and menu + x to cut the text.

6.  Place the cursor on the spot where you want to paste the text.  Long click with either your finger or track ball and select “Paste”.

6a.  With the physical keyboard press menu + v to paste.

7.  Now the selected text has been copy and pasted

Are you having trouble configuring your free Yahoo email account on your phone? Here’s how to do it.

I’ve heard you may have to turn off WIFI, but I don’t have a problem with the WIFI on.

Open your email app and click on “Add Account”

Enter your email and password. Then click “Next”

You’ll see this warning.  Click “OK”

You’ll see this message.  If it’s successful, it’ll go to configuring the outgoing email settings.  If it fails, you’ll get the screen below.

If you get this message click on “Edit details” to get back to the screen below

Click on “Manual Setup”

Click on “IMAP”

Enter your username and password.  Enter “imap.mail.yahoo.com” under IMAP server.  Enter “143″ under Port.  Click “Next”.

You’ll get this message.  It should work and go onto the Outgoing server settings.

Input “smtp.mobile.mail.yahoo.com” under the SMTP Server and “25″ under the Port.  The username and password should already be entered.  If not, input them.  Click “Next”.

You’ll get this message

Adjust your options then click “Next”

Input your preferences then click “Done”

That’s it!  Your account should be set up.