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SPEAKER: In the last video, we talked about the developer
experience and how to enhance the developer experience based
on understanding their needs.
Let's take it to the next step and understand
how to attract and engage developers.
To get started, let's take a look
at the digital value chain.
Most customers who are just embarking
on their digital journey will start
on the right side of the chain and simply expose
the back-end data assets.
The developers will appreciate getting access
to the back-end data until they have
to manipulate large payloads that
affect the performance of their application.
That's why it's so important to know your target audience.
Moving from right to left, the API team
who's charged with exposing the back-end data for developers
needs to understand the application developer's needs.
Using the customer journey and personas technique
to frame up a sample use case and taking the returns
material authorization process as an example,
the API team will need to determine how much data
is needed to process the RMA.
If the only data needed is the last few orders,
don't send the entire order history.
Likewise, if only customer name and address
is needed for the RMA, then don't
send extraneous customer data that can slow down performance.
The digital value chain helps identify your target audience.
Most people can relate to the end customer who
uses the mobile apps to order coffee, purchase
products, or track deliveries.
And most people overlook the application developer
as a target audience.
Depending on where you reside on the digital value
chain will depend on who your target audience is.
Looking right to left, the target audience
for the back-end developer is the API team.
The target audience for the developer is the customer.
Now take a look at the middle of the digital value chain.
The target audience for the API team
is the developer who consumes the API product.
Now let's take a closer look at the developer.
The application developer is also known as the API consumer.
The developer community is very diverse.
We often hear from companies that
believe a developer community is restricted only
to internal developers.
However, the developer community includes
internal developers, partner developers, and developers
external to the company.
Successful communities include all types of developers
and even goes so far as to treat both internal and external
developers the same.
Companies with a focused API product strategy
will look outwards to engage developers.
So if your target audience for API products
is your developer community, you will need to actively engage
this community.
There are three key areas of focus in developer engagement.
One, understand the needs of your API consumers,
what do they need to discover APIs,
and understand them in order to get started.
Number two, market your API product
like you would market any other product or service.
Just publishing to a developer storefront is not enough.
You want to drive developers to your storefront.
Number three, adoption is key to the success of your program.
You will need to define the metrics for adoption in order
to track and measure your progress.
Is the number of developers registered on your developer
portal the best measure of success?
Or perhaps it's the number of API products used
in production applications.
The storefront for developer engagement
has a number of parallel paths to be thought through.
Acquisition of developers is key.
The developer portal needs to catch
the attention of the developer community,
and the developer must know how to get
started with the API products.
How do you go about doing this?
We will talk about it in the next slide.
The developer portal is a storefront
for your API products.
Therefore, the product catalog needs
to be compelling to developers.
Documentation must be complete and comprehensive
for quick adoption.
Ensure that the onboarding process is frictionless.
The easier you make it for the developer
to register and obtain a key so they
can get started with your application
is key to fast adoption.
And finally, don't forget about ongoing maintenance and support
of your storefront.
And more importantly, your API consumers.
If developers have questions on the use of your API products,
be sure to provide a forum to get answers.
Let's dig into a few of these concepts.
Follow the 5-5-5 rule for developer acquisition.
That is, you want to grab their attention in the first five
seconds, build interest in the next five seconds,
build a case in the next five minutes.
Grab their attention by making your storefront visually
stunning.
Create an API catalog with thorough documentation,
making it easy to understand.
Ensure that you have a value proposition
by making a compelling case to use your APIs.
Create a Getting Started page providing a step-by-step guide
on how to work with your APIs.
Showcase your customer success stories.
This can spark ideas for future innovation.
Make it easy to get started.
Don't hide documentation behind registration.
Make them want to register.
Finally, get them engaged by hosting events like hackathons.
Proper documentation will facilitate
onboarding and adoption.
Putting the effort into complete documentation
up front will improve the adoption rate
and down the road can reduce the amount of support needed.
Note that documentation needs to be maintained over time,
so plan on a team to update content
on your developer portal.
Make your onboarding process frictionless
by minimizing the amount of information
required to register.
We recommend obtaining basic information needed
to identify the developer, such as name, email address,
company, and perhaps a brief description of the application
the developer plans on creating.
The easier you make the registration,
the faster you can onboard the developer.
Self-service on your developer portal is key to adoption.
What does this mean?
You want to engage developers by making API
products discoverable to them.
This doesn't mean you are giving them the keys to the kingdom.
You can grab their attention by associating your API products
with a brief description of what they can do.
You have the ability to prove API key requests,
giving developers access to your API products.
In addition, permissions based on the type of developer
can help you tailor the storefront experience
for internal, external, or partner developers.
Lastly, provide the capability for developers
to try out the API products on the spot
will go a long way towards faster adoption.
A few years ago, I was working with a customer who
was preparing for a demonstration
to allow a patient to update their prescription
on a mobile app.
The application developer was represented
by a firm external to my customer and based offshore.
Of course, in these situations, there's always a time crunch.
The application developer working with my customer
had less than a week to complete the demo application in time
to showcase it at the annual HIMSS conference.
Yes, we were all under the gun to create the application,
get access to the API product, and showcase
the self-service features of the Google
[INAUDIBLE] developer portal.
The first step was for the developer
to register on the developer portal and request an API key.
The access to the API product was granted
in the space of a couple hours.
Then it was all about engaging the developer
through complete documentation so he
knew how to work with the API.
Once the developer had access to the API,
his app development was quick.
Fast forward to the HIMSS conference for that year,
and my customer was able to showcase
a cool mobile app allowing patients to update
their current prescriptions.
My customer had done this by exposing an API product
giving access to patient electronic health records.
Like all well-managed API products,
this one required an API key in order for developers
to access the API.
The process of granting or declining
the request for an API key is available through the developer
portal.
The developer remarked on the speed of granting the API key.
He mentioned that in the past, it
had taken two weeks from the time he
submitted the request to the acquisition of the API key.
Acquiring the API key within two hours of the request
was phenomenal and greatly speeded up the time
to deploy the mobile app.
Once your storefront is up and running,
don't forget to put effort into support and maintenance.
Keep your documentation fresh and up to date.
Provide online forums, blogs, and frequently
asked questions to reduce the effort required to support
the developer portal.
Treat your online storefront like a retail channel
and spend the resources to keep it a vibrant community.
Your API consumers are important.
Focus on addressing your API consumer
needs with an API First approach and make engaging
with your company effortless.
I will leave you with a few best practice tips.
Make your API catalog discoverable,
make registration on your developer portal frictionless,
ensure that your content is engaging and up to date,
and finally, give your developers the ability
to engage with you by enabling them to test their application.
This will ensure quality rollout for everyone.
I hope you found the topic of developer engagement engaging.
Be sure to check out the next video on adoption strategies.
Thanks for watching.