Chrome App – How I built one for my blog

I have just built a Chrome app for my blog and published it on the Chrome App Store. A Chrome app is a web-based application designed to be used entirely within a Google Chrome browser. A Chrome app could be a music player within a Chrome browser that enables you to use your browser as a music player; it could be games, business tools or even office applications etc.

My Chrome app basically adds an icon to the Chrome browser that launches my website when clicked on. You can say it’s much more like a bookmark, my aim of building and hosting this app is to make it easier for my readers to bookmark my site on their Chrome browser for easier access.

Having my Chrome app installed on your Chrome browser will mean you can access my site on any computer even if you do not have the address offhand. It also means you don’ get to forget the URL of my site ever since you already have my app installed on your browser. You don’t ever have to type my site URL in the address bar again since you can simply click on my app to launch my site on your browser.

But most importantly, publishing my Chrome app will provide me with an opportunity to expose my site to a wider audience, who may never have heard about my site but can find my app on the Chrome Store. There are a lot of people out there who will find your site for the first time because they stumbled upon your Chrome app on the Chrome Store.

Write a Chrome App for your Site

Download the attached file Chrome-app.zip to your computer, extract it and open the manifest.json file on Notepad or Notepad++. Edit the file as follows;

</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">{
 "name": "Your Site name",
 "description": "Your Site description in 132 or less characters.",
 "app": {
 "urls": ["http://www.netmediablog.com/"],
 "launch": {
 "web_url": "http://www.netmediablog.com/"
 }
 },
 "manifest_version": 2,
 "update_url": "http://clients2.google.com/service/update2/crx",
 "version": "0.1",
 "icons": {
 "128": "icon.png"
 }
}</p>
<p style="text-align: justify;">

On line #2, replace the “Your Site name” with the name of your website.

On line #3, replace the “Your site description in 132 or less characters.” With any description you want for your app.

On line #5 and #7, replace “http://www.netmediablog.com/” with the correct URL of your site starting with http://

 Then save the manifest.json file.

Next create a 128 x 128px image of your site logo and replace the icon.png file on the Chrome-app folder you extracted earlier. Ensure the image format is in PNG. Then zip the file once more.

Then head over to Chrome Dashboard and upload the zipped file containing the manifest.json and icon.png files.  Enter an appropriate description for your Chrome app on the space provided for “Detailed description” of the app.

Next upload the 128x128px icon.png file you created earlier on the “icon” section.

Add a 1280x800px or 640x400px screenshot of your site and upload on the screenshots section. You can go ahead to add even more promotional images.

You will also be required to verify that you are the official owner of the site you are linking to in the app, so under “Websites” enter your site URL and choose “Blogs” in the category section.

If you app has a price you can put a price for it but since it’s more like a bookmark app I am giving it away for free. If you want your app to be available worldwide leave it at “All regions” else select the regions you want it to be listed on.

Select the right language that will help your users find your app easily; in my case I used “English (United State)”.

Next enter the Google analytics ID for your site if you want to track your item.

Then click the “Publish Changes” button.

 

Download Netmediablog Chrome App

You will be required to make a payment of just $5 with Google Wallet to activate your developer account. Don’t worry this is just a onetime payment; you can go on and publish as many apps as possible in the future without having to pay another dime.

It may take up to 24 hours for your app to be approved and once it has been approved and your payment accepted, your Chrome app for your blog will be available on the Chrome Store for people to download.

I hope this guide will help you easily build a Chrome app for your blog or site as well. The benefits are great and this may be the extra you needed to do for maximum exposure of your site. This may be all you have to do to change the traffic condition of your site. If people have your app on their Chrome browser, the possibility of them returning to your site if very high as they will always see your icon on their browser every time they open a new tab.

Let me hear what you have to say about this, share your views with me or ask my any questions you may have via the comments. Remember to download Netmediablog Chrome app now.