THE CUT

Very few brands have the discipline to stand for one thing and stick with it. Colorsplash, a beautifully restrained photo-editing tool, dramatizes your photos by removing all the color and allowing you to selectively add the color back. This sole capability is cool enough to be valuable but simple enough to succeed as a mobile app.

Though the evidence is clear that tapping into social network APIs like Facebook and Twitter can build awareness and even drive sales, too few brands are doing it. Popular apps like Instagram, another photo modifying app, make ease of sharing across social networks a fundamental usage component.

Brands must continually strive to improve their offerings by identifying unmet needs. One trailblazing app is ZocDoc. The ingenious app allows you not only to locate nearby doctors that accept your insurance plan (in 13 US markets now) but also book an appointment at a specified time. Think OpenTable for doctors.

Some products are complex by nature and finding the added support you need to understand them can be challenging. Ringtones, a fun app that allows you to convert any song in your iTunes library into a ringtone, is a bit complicated at first, but knowing this, the creators also offer a great demo video that makes learning the 3 requisite steps a snap.

Lots of brands offer great resources on the web that aren't yet mobile-friendly – a big oversight in an increasingly on-the-go world. OpenTable.com, our favorite online restaurant reservation service, has a brilliantly functional iPhone app that helps you find a restaurant and book a table in less than a
New York minute.

For years brands have been saying the "customer is king" while spending the bulk of their marketing budget on self-congratulatory ads. The Songify app, however, puts the consumer front and center by turning the user's spoken words into a melodic song and transforming even tone-deaf writers into
veritable rockstars.

All too often, brands only focus on the practical needs of their audience and overlook the irrationality that frequently guides behavior. One new app that appeals to our softer, whimsical side is Qwips. Built around personal voice recordings, Qwips allows you to manipulate your audio with effects and pictures sure to touch the heartstrings. (Full disclosure: Renegade helped design Qwips!)

The average iPhone user has over 100 apps on their phone and spends over an hour a day using them. As apps become indispensible, consumer phone usage increases, as do their expectations for all mobile experiences. If your brand doesn't have a mobile-friendly site, then you better make one fast. Beyond that, dare we suggest: 'Appy New Year!