If you want to see how to market things badly, check out what’s happened with the Edinburgh Fringe Festival app.

The app has been a key resource over its existence, particularly for artists with less exposure and a lack of PR money. There was a Now and Nearby function that allowed punters to simply ‘take a punt’ on local shows to help fill the space between some of the bigger events.

This year, the organisers have decided to withdraw the app stating they:

…simply d​id not have the budget required to build and maintain the app this year ​at the point when this work needed to be undertaken (Dec 2021)

Fringe Society CEO Shona McCarthy

Instead of an app, the organisers are producing a hardcopy guide. It’d be easy to wade in and challenge why a decision in December was only being announced in July. I’m more interested in the features element which we find in learning systems and platforms.

If your employees are promised functionality and, 7 months later and a month before going live, that functionality is withdrawn, you’ve lost them.

Adding the key functionality on the website after you’ve been challenged over the lack of an app? You’ve lost them.

If you’re expecting people to find content via a website which doesn’t have an intuitive search functionality, you’ve lost them.

This. Stuff. Matters. You HAVE to get it right and if you know you’re not going to meet expectations, address them immediately.