Build Smarter Mobile Apps with Real-Time Relevance

Personalized mobile user experience is a hot topic today because a smarter app will delight users, keep them coming back, and make your business stand out above the crowd. The extreme version of personalization is real-time contextual and social relevance. According to Jason Arbon, the contextual brain for your app is only a few API calls away. Based on lessons learned working on search relevance and personalization at Google, Bing, and a stealth mobile app startup, Jason describes the value, performance, limitations, and data-privacy of local and web services available today. He demonstrates practical examples of leveraging APIs such as Foursquare, Yelp, Google Places, Facebook, Twitter, and Location APIs (latlong + velocity). Then, Jason describes available natural language processing APIs such as NSLinguisticTagger and illustrates ways to use in-app usage data to improve an application’s contextual experience. Take away ideas to make your users happier—and you and your app look smarter.