GBG Case Study
Android provides platform for Filipino app to unlock advertising and marketing opportunities for SMBs
About Unlock & Load
• unlockandload.com • Manila, the Philippines • An Android-based product discovery and rewards platform • 2 founders • January 2014
In 2007, Filipina computer science graduate Ria Lu started her own games and apps company. Soon, she was creating apps for various multinational brands. This gave her first-hand insight into the high costs of advertising and marketing – costs that are far higher than typical SMBs can afford. As this sector accounts for 90% of companies in the Philippines, Ria sensed an opportunity. She noticed that people often just look at their smartphone and swipe for something to do, and thought, “Why not let them look at ads?” And so she created Unlock & Load, a mobile lock-screen Android app. Due to launch in November 2014, it’s a cheaper, scalable alternative to conventional advertising and marketing, designed to be affordable to SMBs. The Unlock & Load app was developed in Android, the market-leading mobile operating system in the Philippines. The incentive for potential users to download the app is the chance to earn free gifts. With the app installed, they see ads instead of their own photos on their lock-screen. If they swipe left instead of right, they go to the URL of the advertiser, and every time an ad is displayed, they get a token. These can be exchanged for free gifts in the Unlock & Load reward shop. So, if the advertiser is a coffee shop, users can enjoy a free coffee for a certain number of tokens. Android is not the only Google product the company relies on: Unlock & Load also uses Google for Work (Gmail, Calendar, Drive) in its back office.
“I wanted to build a cheaper, scalable alternative to conventional advertising and marketing, designed to be affordable to SMBs.” — Ria Lu, Founder, Unlock & Load Moving on, Ria says, “The biggest challenge is user acquisition. Because Unlock & Load is an app for everyone, we need to reach so many people. But I’m determined to support other Filipino SMBs like mine, the kind of businesses that often have really interesting products or services to offer. I think people should know about them.”
© 2014 Google Inc. All rights reserved. Google and the Google logo are trademarks of Google Inc. All other company and product names may be trademarks of the respective companies with which they are associated.
