Constant Variables
Constant Variables takes a behind-the-scenes look at what it takes to build and grow digital products. Focused on helping non-technical people become more comfortable with the nerdy jargon related to mobile software development, we break down technical topics to make them less complex and more accessible, because as Steve Jobs said, “Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you and you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use.” From project managers charged with managing a digital project, to app-based startups looking to scale, to organizations tackling digital transformation initiatives, we share our insights and regularly interview individuals who have "been there, done that" to leverage their expertise and learn from their mistakes.
With design in its name plus 50 years of industry experience, Design Center knows more than a thing or two about best practices for building a digital product. Design Center’s Director of Strategy Chris Cornejo joins the show to chat about how design thinking has shifted from “how it looks” to “how it works”, the advantages of an outcome mindset over a solutions mindset, how COVID has impacted strategy and design processes, and how to prepare for a project’s initial strategy session.
What got you your first customers won't get you the next ones. Jordan Ambra of Serenity Software joins the show to talk about the challenges of going from a startup to a “real” business, transitioning from a people-oriented business to a process-oriented one, and preparing for growth by focusing on fundamentals.
A podcast episode about everything and nothing. Tim riffs with SalesReach Founder & CEO Josh Fedie on a number of topics, including how to protect your idea from getting stolen, the ups and downs of being an entrepreneur, why it’s important for companies to have a CEO who is publicly visible and vulnerable, and the future of Clubhouse.
There’s no content that can’t be made interesting to learn. Even installing a printer can be fun as long as the experience is made to be “meaningful, memorable and motivational.” Dr. Michael Allen of Allen Interactions joins the show to chat about how his company builds interactive learning programs around organizations’ best practices that leave people asking for more and shares his advice for designing impactful user experiences.
In an era of subscription overload, apps with subscription revenue models have their work cut out for them acquiring (and retaining) subscribers. That’s why Dan Burcaw founded Nami ML, a machine-learning company focused on helping app developers grow mobile subscription businesses by reducing churn and focusing on the core user experience. Dan joins the show to share his insights on the plight of a subscription-fatigued economy, how data collection and user privacy don’t have to be enemies, and how the app landscape has changed since the launch of the App Store in 2008.
Are the tech geniuses behind the likes of Uber, Facebook, or Groupon born with a magic dust that’s contributed to their success? Short answer: No. However, global fascination of these companies has created a dangerous barrier of entry into the tech industry. Software engineer, consultant, and tech startup founder Shawn Livermore is dispelling the myth of the tech genius with his best-selling book, Average Joe. Shawn joins the show to breakdown how the idolization of tech geniuses has shaped the tech industry and how tech is actually made by everyday people, how communicating complexity can be more powerful than writing code, and how anyone can become a “tech genius”, but it may not be what you think it is.
When life gives you rain, puke a rainbow. That’s the motto of Erica Hanna, Emmy Award winner and owner of Puke Rainbows Creative. Erica joins the show to chat about the power of video for a business, and the role it can play in getting people to adopt a product or new way of working. She shares tips on how to use video to establish the voice of your business and tells some fun stories along the way, from the origin of her unique company name to her uplifting experience working with Prince.
Clifton Manneh is on a mission to teach 100,000 youth how to code through his company Konduct Coach Learning, an edtech platform where youth and professionals gain employable skills and enhance their professional development. He joins the show to chat about how his mom’s cooking influenced his passion for community-based learning, the lessons he learned as a solo-entrepreneur, and the impact he hopes Konduct Coach Learning will have on the community.
Ever been hosed by a developer? It’s an unfortunate story we hear time and time again. Understanding the high-level milestones associated with most development projects can give you confidence in knowing your project is on the right track. In this episode, Tim chats about the tangible assets you should expect to receive at each development stage, along with a fair pace for completing each stage.
With a proliferation of low code/no code development tools on the market, these platforms can be an attractive option for businesses looking to build an app quickly without the use of an experienced software developer. But these tools have their limitations. Tim chats about the benefits and challenges of this development approach to help businesses determine if low code/no code apps are the right solution for their project.
Audio is booming, and as more organizations recognize its value, a proliferation of podcasting tools, platforms, and shows are hitting the market every day, making a highly-accessible medium feel intimidating to noobs. Founder & CEO of Matriarch Digital Media Twila Dang is no stranger to the power of audio, and she joins the show to share how simple it is to get started with podcasting, with just a cellphone and a plan. Twila gets into the weeds of how businesses can be successful with podcasting and the doors that open when you make something you’re proud of.
Think your email's private? Think again. Big tech email providers use your data as a way to get rich. But it doesn’t have to be this way. Fastmail CEO Bron Gondwana joins the show from the Land Down Under to chat about why “free” email isn’t free. Bron explains how email is the biggest social network in the world that isn’t ephemeral, why building digital products should align with your moral values, and how open source and open standards benefit all.
Every week, millions of people come online for the first time, and how they use technology plays into the future of tech. Heading into 2021, we’re looking at how we can use tech to work together to continue to make everyone’s lives better. In this episode, Rob and Tim come together for their annual chat about technology trends for the coming year, from the breakup of tech giants, the next stage of autonomous vehicles, and machine learning in healthcare, to ultimately where companies will be investing when it comes to tech in 2021.
Building a company comes with a learning curve for any entrepreneur. Building an app-based company as a non-technical entrepreneur can make that learning curve sharper. Mike Jackson, founder of The Premium Experience, joins the show to discuss his experience building a tech based business as a solo, non-technical founder and how it prepared him for the launch of his next company, Black Tech Talent. Mike shares what he wishes he’d known when he first had an idea and didn’t know where to start, how he pivoted his focus when the global pandemic shut down his company’s growth plans, and how he’s opening doors by educating different viewpoints on hiring Black talent.
Murphy's law of "Anything that can go wrong will go wrong” doesn’t exclude software development (unfortunately). In this episode, Tim outlines common risks associated with app development and how to get on the same page as your development team to have systems in place to mitigate them.
With experience building two tech-based companies from the ground up, serial entrepreneur Eric Martell has gathered an impressive collection of analogies around succeeding in the startup space. He joins the show to chat about building his recent venture Pear Commerce, marrying product philosophy with business philosophy, hiring people who buy into your mission, investing in repeat customers over acquiring new ones, and using tech to scale, before finally nerding out with Tim over database tech.
One of the first development decisions you’ll make when building an app is whether to build on a native platform or a hybrid platform. In this episode, Tim gets into best use cases for hybrid and native apps, along with each platform’s limitations, so you can decide the best approach for your project.
When looking for a technical team for your project, you’re not asking for a product. You are asking for a relationship that results in a product. You’re not asking for lines of code. You’re asking for solutions that produce meaningful outcomes. Founder & CEO George Brooks of digital product agency Crema joins the show to discuss how to find the passion and posture of a digital agency, the no-win situation that is RFPs and why it’s important to go outside the RFP process to have a conversation, why his digital agency vets clients in return by finding out if they’re ready to be a tech company and whether they want a relationship or a transaction, and how he didn’t name his company after a Mexican sour cream.
There’s no such thing as a free app or website. If you’re not paying for a product, you are the product, and when it comes to “free” apps, the product is your private information. Apps collect, store, and use data in ways that are both purposeful and nefarious. In this episode, Rob and Tim chat about why apps collect data and how it’s used, how app owners can be intentional with user data, and how app users can protect their information.
Building an app isn’t just about the technology but about the lives it makes easier. Ashley Bennett, Sook Jin Ong, and Pamela McCauley share the inspiring story behind the development of the Minnesota Family Investment Program’s pilot app, MFIP Connect. They discuss the app’s powerful role as a communication tool, along with the unexpected questions around social equity it brought to the table. They dig deep into how they prioritized initial features, knowing they wouldn’t meet the needs of every user, and how feedback gave them space to innovate.
Some app features are seemingly easy to develop but are actually complex to implement, driving up development costs. These are features we see everyday, and therefore take for granted. Rob and Tim chat about the nuances of features like data sync, search, push notifications, in-app purchasing, messaging, and more to help you understand where to get the most value with the least amount of effort when building your product.
For a restaurant, a customer leaving with a bad taste in their mouth is the ultimate faux paus. And we’re not just talking about food. A stellar user experience when ordering from a restaurant’s app can be a differentiator in this competitive industry. Rob and Tim chat about their experience building a delivery app for a Midwest pizza chain, then take a trip further down memory lane to the hip days of AOL, floppy disks, AIM, and Space Jam.
When we put humans first, we can learn a lot. Stephanie Hammes-Betti is the Senior Vice President of Innovation Design at US Bank, and her 18-year career there has given her extensive know-how in UX/UI design, usability testing, and technology solutions. Stephanie joins the show to chat about how innovation happens within a large organization, how to go about listening to customers, and the benefits of teaching an innovative mindset to employees.
Apple has traditionally put itself first, users second, and developers third, but some big names are going to bat for all developers in a fight against Apple’s commission rate. Tim and Rob discuss the ongoing controversies surrounding Apple and the App Store and their thoughts on how it might play out.
If we were to write a playbook on how to start an app-based business, the first-time entrepreneurs behind Parrot.MD would be our case study. But every story has its conflicts. Parrot.MD’s CEO and co-founder Tim Steele joins the show to talk about the creation of the app, the role social equity plays in fundraising, and the essentiality of focus groups.
Every company thinks they’re a special snowflake, and when it comes to digital transformation, they actually are. Jen Swanson is a digital consultant who guides companies in their digital transformation journey with her philosophy of placing small bets often. In this episode, Jen breaks down how digital transformation is not just a technology integration, but a people and process integration, that ultimately delivers a more valuable customer and employee experience in every part of a business.
Building an Android app requires overcoming several idiosyncrasies. Tim and Rob share their tips for building Android apps so you can successfully navigate Google’s unique requirements. (If you’re looking for tips around building iOS apps, check out the previous episode.)
The Jed Mahonis Group has been building mobile apps since 2012, and we’ve tripped over many hurdles when launching iOS apps. Tim and Rob share their tricks of the trade for building apps specifically for iOS, so you can learn from our mistakes and successfully navigate Apple’s unique roadblocks. (And if you’re looking to build an Android app, our next episode has you covered.)
Minnesotans love to talk about Minnesota, and nothing proves that more than PodMN’s collection of over 760 Minnesota-focused shows. Jeremy Sinon and William White of PodMN join the show to discuss the custom podcast platform they built to help Minnesotans discover all the great audio entertainment Minnesota has to offer. They talk about what it took to build a podcasting platform from scratch, how they deal with a huge amount of data to create a curated, personal touch inside the app, why they chose to build their apps natively, and tricks they’ve learned from the radio industry on how to retain listeners.
Building an app is easy. Building a business is hard. Sean Casto of app marketing agency PreApps joins the show to discuss how your app’s initial success doesn’t rely on its unique features, but on how you market it and present it. Sean breaks down both organic and paid marketing strategies to grow your users and make more money, where user acquisition models play into each strategy, and how it all boils down to understanding your data.
When it comes to design, simple is not bad; simple is good. Amber Christian of Wonderly Software Solutions has worked really hard at making her product Bella Scena simple to use, and she joins the show to discuss a design process few people are talking about and even less are doing: Human Centered Design. She shares some practical applications of Human Centered Design, how continuous integration (CI) can save your developers tons of time, lessons she learned in the ERP world, what to do when you receive contradictory pieces of feedback from your users, and the pros and cons of bootstrapping a business.
Solving the technical challenges to make learning fun is the specialty of Andamio Games, and its President, Adam Gordon, joins the podcast to chat about the unique infrastructure challenges educational game developers face, from funding to design to feedback. Adam shares why partnering with textbook manufacturers might not be the panacea Tim thought it would be, how to incorporate feedback from both educators and students, and what grants can do to boost your organization’s chances of success.
The “Don't Repeat Yourself” (DRY) development approach of writing code as simply as possible to make it reusable can also be applied to standardizing and automating workflows to reduce repetitive patterns. Virtual CFO and software expert Susan Boles joins the show to discuss the evolution of automating workflows and how the process doesn’t start with software. Susan shares actionable tips on where you can get started with automation, what to work on after you’ve automated the low-hanging fruit areas of your business, like onboarding and delivery, why you should work with virtual C-Level persons like CTOs and CFOs, and how you can find experts to help you take your business to the next level.
Building a successful app requires both art and science work in harmony. CTO Brad Ash joins Tim on the podcast to discuss the development of Fruitful, a fertility mentorship service he co-founded with his wife. Brad chats with Tim about the personal story that led to the creation of Fruitful, how difficult it is to supervise yourself when you’re building out the software, the importance of user feedback and focusing heavily on the user’s experience, and how to give users a reason to be excited to use your app.
Accelerator programs can have a measurable impact on your business’s growth, but when is your business ready to join one? Tim interviews Kate Evinger of gener8tor Minnesota, and she breaks down what accelerator programs can do for your business and your community, along with how to vet the right program for your business.
Business owners often wear multiple hats, but to scale a business, you need to take off some hats, so to speak, in order to focus on growth. Tim chats with Stephanie Scheller of Grow Disrupt on the first steps to take when thinking about growing your business, how to decide what parts of the business to focus on, and how to properly use outsourcing to scale.
Social engineering is a catch-all phrase to describe the various ways criminals trick you into giving them access to your system or confidential information. Because humans are prone to relying on their cognitive biases when making decisions, social engineering can be very effective. Tim talks about the most common types of social engineering attacks and some tactics to implement to ensure you stand the best chance of protecting yourself from yourself (and from your employees accidentally making a mistake).
Tim chats with Clare Stead, creator of the Oliiki app for parents! They talk about a plane ride to Zambia that altered the course of Clare’s life, the educational study that led Clare to creating Oliiki, how important marketing is to the success of an app, impostor syndrome and how to overcome it, and why you need to draw your app out on paper before you begin programming it.
Automating your business processes can save you a ton of time and money in the long run. Rhamy Alejeal joins us on this episode to discuss how you can get started with automation in your company (specifically around your HR process).
User privacy can be a key differentiator between you and your competition. Adam Stone of Secure Digital Solutions joins us on the show to talk about several concepts around privacy, including the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA), Privacy by Design, risk management around third party dependencies, and how you can take steps in your process to ensure your user’s private information is secure.
How does one of the largest companies in the world get a mobile app built? Tim chats with Savon Sampson, former senior marketing director for McKesson, to find out how! They discuss her process for finding a development team, how they took the app from an idea to a real product, and what she might do differently if she were tasked with building an app today.
Tim talks about all things accessibility with Jonathan Hassell of Hassell Inclusion. They discuss the importance of inclusive design, how to shift your organization’s mindset to think about accessibility in everything you do, and what you can do to make your app usable by the 20% of the world with a disability.
Tim chats with Dr. Courtney Hill and Adam Choe of Yonder, an app for helping young children prepare to visit the dentist. They discuss the history of Yonder, how important it is to find the right fit for a development team, the brutally honest feedback that comes from having a target audience of 3-5 year olds, the joys of bootstrapping a business, and some tips for working together as a team.
How can you, as a budding app owner, decide which app development team to hire? Tim provides a list of questions you can use to interview potential developers, as well as what answers you should be looking for.
Predicting what will change in technology in the coming year is always a fruitless experiment... but let’s do it anyway! Tim and Rob chat about 9 technology trends and where they see the industry moving in the new year.
A Minimum Viable Product (MVP) is a type of app that you can ship to your customers with enough features to get the point across and collect their feedback for future improvements. Tim and Jenny take a look at popular apps and chat about what they would be like in their MVP form, along with the pros and cons to releasing an MVP.
Security is a never ending game of cat and mouse, and it is important to do the fundamentals correctly to reduce your chances of a breach. Tim chats about all things related to securing your mobile app system.
There are many different types of teams you can choose to build out your mobile app. Tim goes over 5 possible setups, complete with the pros and cons for each setup.
In Part 4 of our App Development Lifecycle Series, Tim breaks down the final stage of development: deployment. We share our process for shipping production-ready code to the App and Play Stores, what to expect during the review process, and how this phase loops back to the strategy phase.
In Part 3 of our App Development Lifecycle Series, Tim breaks down the Development and Testing Phases. We share how we work with our clients to develop custom mobile app systems, as well as how we test them to make sure they work how you (and your customers) expect it.
In Part 2 of our App Development Lifecycle Series, Tim breaks down the Design Phase. Design is not only how your app looks, but also how it works. In this episode, we share how we work with our clients to design a valuable and easy-to-use mobile app experience for their users.
In Part 1 of our App Development Lifecycle Series, Tim breaks down the Strategy Phase. A well-considered strategy is critically important to the success of any project, especially a complex mobile app project. In this episode, we share how we work with our clients to build a plan for delivering an app that meets their business goals and provides value to their users.
Show notes for this episode can be found at constantvariables.co.
Tim chats with Trinity Wiles, an entrepreneur and Global Coordinator at WatchPitch, about how to use your resources to your advantage when creating a mobile app.
Tim sits down with Amanda Brooks, creator of the FASTZach routing app, to discuss the lessons she learned in building a mobile app from the ground up.
Tim interviews Kurt Schmidt, President of Foundry and former Director of Project Management at The Nerdery, who takes him to school on how to effectively strategize and manage the development of a mobile app.
In this episode, you will learn:
- The importance of a mission statement in driving all product decisions
- What differs in managing a million-dollar app project versus a thousand-dollar app project
- Why you need to include your development team on the macro decisions of your company
- Why it’s not enough to know “who your user is”, but also “where your user is at”
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at https://jmg.mn.
Recorded July 13, 2018 | Edited by Jordan Daoust
Tim interviews Chris Ruff of Glympse who explains how location-tracking works in a mobile app and how you can securely & accurately provide a service provider's location to your customers.
Tim interviews "Hot Lou" Abramowski of Evergreen, who gives practical advice for both running a business on Facebook and marketing your mobile app with Facebook Ads.
Tim interviews Tom of Kindu, who shares how he developed a mobile app which attracted hundreds of thousands of users with no previous development or marketing experience.
Tim interviews Jonathan Richter of Winnona Partners, a mobile app consultancy, who shares the lessons he's learned around the business of app development which you can apply to your own iOS and Android projects.
Tim interviews Pedram Nastaean and Yomiyu Hirpa of Kwikly, an on-demand dental staffing agency, who share how they were able to launch a mobile-based company with minimal previous technical experience.
Mobile app developers throw around a lot of jargon and buzzwords, but you don't need to fear them! In this episode, Tim and Rob explain several common acronyms and terms you'll hear when working with a development team.
Validating an app idea requires objectivity, introspection, and a bit of blind faith. Tim and Rob discuss three metrics they use when approached to determine whether or not it would make a good mobile app.
In this episode, you will learn:
- Why you need to find 10 people who are dying for your app to exist before you begin building it
- How much commitment it takes to see an app succeed
- The importance of thinking long-term when crafting an app idea
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded February 22, 2018 | Edited by Jordan Daoust
Even though we get paid to release apps for our clients, it has been a while since we've built and released one of our own. In this episode, Tim and Rob discuss the recent release of mncraft.beer, a new Minnesota brewery tracking app.
In this episode, you will learn:
- Why we are app developers and not product namers
- How "free" work will always cost you *something*
- Making money isn't necessarily the only source of revenue
- That three years leaves a lot of time for self-improvement
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded February 1, 2018
Edited by Jordan Daoust
Show Notes:
Most mobile applications (especially on-demand apps) require a server to keep everything running smoothly. In this episode, Tim and Rob explain what a server is and the role it plays in your mobile software system.
In this episode, you will learn:
- Why the server is "The One App To Rule Them All"
- How "the cloud" plays into your server
- What is the "front end" and "backend" of an app
- Enough about databases and APIs to make you dangerous
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded January 11, 2018
Edited by Jordan Daoust
When building an on-demand app, who do you try to get on your platform first: customers or service providers? In this episode, Tim and Rob suggest 7 techniques you can use to sustainably grow your on-demand app.
In this episode, you will learn:
- How to get large by starting small
- The value in acting as the service provider yourself
- Why getting your 1,000 true fans is crucial to success
- That money really does solve all your problems
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded December 14, 2017
Edited by Jordan Daoust
On-demand apps like Uber and Postmates are among the more technically complex apps you can build. In this episode, Tim and Rob explain how these apps work in an easy-to-understand way.
In this episode, you will learn:
- How your mobile apps allow users to browse products/services, place an order, and track the progress of the order in real time
- Steps you can implement to save battery resources for your service providers
- Why you need a third-party payment provider to do your credit card processing
- The way you can manage all of this chaos through an administrative dashboard
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded November 9, 2017
Edited by Jordan Daoust
A common way to cut down on mobile app development costs is to only build out one platform at a time. Tim and Rob explain the advantages to building on either iOS or Android, and provide tips for choosing which platform is right for your product.
In this episode, you will learn:
- Which platform tends to bring in the most money
- Which platform tends to attract the most users
- The reason "fragmentation" can play a role in your decision to develop for Android
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded November 2, 2017
Edited by Jordan Daoust
Tim and Rob discuss the pros and cons of 5 popular revenue models for mobile apps.
In this episode, you will learn:
- The true cost of a "free" app
- The reason why the traditional "paid" app model doesn't work well for mobile apps
- Why "freemium" apps are the most popular source of revenue
- "Paymium" is actually a word, but not a popular revenue model
- The complexities of starting a "SaaS" product
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded October 26, 2017
Edited by Jordan Daoust
Show Notes:
Free Apps:
Paid Apps:
Freemium Apps:
Paymium Apps:
SaaS Apps:
Tim and Rob discuss how 10 mobile-related technologies will evolve in the year 2018.
In this episode, you will learn:
- How artificial intelligence isn't exactly Skynet
- What on-demand apps will deliver to our doors
- Why 2018 may be the year our parents start using the Internet of Things
- When you will be able to buy your own self-driving car
- How your health will be improved by wearing your Fitbit or Apple Watch.
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded November 30, 2017
Edited by Jordan Daoust
Show Notes:
- This Robot Is Cranking Out Crazy New Scripts for 'Friends'
- XKCD's thoughts on computer vision from 2014
- Kwikly, an on-demand dental staffing agency
- Levels of driving automation - Wikipedia
- DARPA Grand Challenge - Wikipedia
- Burger King has launched its own cryptocurrency in Russia called ‘WhopperCoin’
- What is blockchain technology?
Tim and Rob take a shot at answering the oldest question in software development: how long does it take to get an app shipped from scratch?
In this episode, you'll learn:
- What exactly is an "on-demand app"?
- The actual time in months that it takes on average to build an on-demand app (spoiler: it's anywhere from 3 to 6 months)
- Steps you can take to speed up a development project before it even begins
- What to do if your project stalls in the middle of development
- Tips for getting your app into the App Store faster
This episode is brought to you by The Jed Mahonis Group, who builds mobile software solutions for the on-demand economy. Learn more at http://jmg.mn.
Recorded October 19, 2017
Edited by Jordan Daoust
