Bring on the Apps: GovLoop Launches Android App and Brand-New iPhone App

Mobile growth
It’s been really amazing to watch the growth of mobile in the last few years.
– 1996 – I remember when my sister got a car phone thinking how unnecessary it was. I thought – this is lame.
– 2002 – I got my first simple LG flip phone – it changed my life with free evening minutes where I could talk to my family/friends while I was walking home from grad school.

– 2007 – I got my first smart phone – a work blackberry. At first, I felt cool that I could get my email anywhere. Until I realized, I could get my email everywhere so I couldn’t get away from work 🙂

– 2009, I got my first iPhone – honestly it was a game changer. It’s probably my most important tech gadget I use. I use it to read news, check my Twitter, read news on Pulse, text friends – first thing I use in morning, last at night.

GovLoop mobile
With the growth of mobile, it becomes more and more important to GovLoop. Almost 40% of Facebook’s use is mobile according to a recent report. I see the same trend with GovLoop and we want to create an experience on Govloop that fits how people live their lives – on the road and mobile.

So I’m excited to announce a few new mobile updates.

1) Brand-new iphone app – We’ve had an iphone app for awhile. While it was solid, I’ve been looking forward to revamping it for awhile – there were a number of bigs with user profiles and the RSS feeds often became stuck. Thus, we launched a completely new app from scratch this week – it’s a lot better in a few ways. It has integrated into your govloop profile so you can update your status and share photos. You can read the top blog posts and discussions and it also integrates into our weekly podcats so you can listen to top interviews on the go.

This is a completely new version of the app so if you have to download this app separately. It’s not just a update to the current one that will be pushed automatically – it’s a complete rebuild

Download here– or just search GovLoop on the app store from your phone

2) Our first Android app– When we launched our iphone app, literally a few minutes later I got asked – where’s the Android app? The Android market has grown like crazy since then so I’m super excited to launch our Android app. It’s set-up the same as the iphone app where you can log into your profile and share status and read the top blogs/discussions and listen to podcasts.

Download on the Android market- or just search GovLoop on the app store from your phone

3) Mobile web– if you aren’t an app person, we are also optimizing our mobile website. Currently if you go to govloop.com/m – you get a mobile optimized site. We are also working on more updates to the mobile websites in late Q1/early Q2 this year

So how did we do it?

We worked with a new app partner called Shoutemto create this app. We picked them as they have integrated with the Ning API so we can have an elegant integrated solution. Additionally, they create powerful, clean apps at affordable rates across all the major platforms (build once, publish across platforms).

Final thanks – the whole team at Shoutem from the CEO Viktor to Josh to Davor have offered great customer service to help bring the app across the line.

Tell us what you think? Download the app, leave a comment. And give me ideas of what you want in the next version – the beauty of mobile apps is it’s not one and done…you keep iterating over time

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