Tech startup: MYAPP2GO.COM

company:MYAPP2GO.COM

INITIAL LIGHT BULB After nearly a decade in the banking software and services industry, Dan Rogers “shifted gears” and launched MYAPP2GO.COM last year with cohorts from his previous business, MSP Inc. At the time, the iPhone 3 was in its infancy and Rogers saw the writing on the wall for his previous business. “We did an 180-degree turn and went into the app world,” he says.
The company went live in October 2010 and currently has a staff of five people split between Cañon City and Colorado Springs.

IN A NUTSHELL MYAPP2GO.COM offers a turnkey solution that includes a customizable mobile app and unlimited text messaging. Rogers describes the app as a “shell,” noting, “You’re responsible for the guts” – which can include anything from text to images to video.
The apps work on iPhones, BlackBerry Torches and phones running on the Android platform, are downloadable from a website without going through the iTunes Store or similar intermediaries, and include a unique app-launching thumbnail and easy integration with Facebook and Twitter.
“Any company that wants to engage customers via smartphones needs to have a strategy,” Rogers says. “In today’s world, people have to look to the mobile environment as a marketing medium. If you haven’t looked into it yet, you can easily fall behind a competitor or the general public. This is the new word of mouth.”
Rogers says text messages are key to engaging the mobile consumer. “It’s going to get read 98 percent of the time, versus about 20 percent for an e-mail,” he says, noting that there were more smartphones sold in the second quarter of 2011 than desktops. It’s all about convenience: “If you’re looking at your phone more than your desktop, you’re looking for convenience.”
MYAPP2GO.COM is priced at $99 for setup and a $45 monthly subscription fee. “We think there’s real value there,” Rogers says. “It’s cost-effective and easy to maintain.”

THE MARKET MYAPP2GO.COM is targeting small and medium-sized businesses that don’t have a national presence, Rogers says. Current clients are in all sorts of industries, running the gamut from bars and nightclubs to chambers of commerce and day-care centers. “We’re talking about the local salon and coffee shop that are in every ‘hood,” Rogers says.

FINANCING Rogers and his colleagues self-financed the company’s launch and have no intentions to look for outside capital. “We don’t need to reach out for any funding,” he says. “It’s one client at a time.” And the organic strategy looks to be working: In its first year, the company has inked about 800 clients “from California to Florida,” Rogers says.

where Cañon City | FOUNDED Early 2010 | web www.myapp2go.com

“Cañon City is not well known for being a tech town, but it’s really coming along. There’s a pocket of us here with a national presence.” – MYAPP2GO.COM owner Dan Rogers
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