The problem with any industry (whether it's books, music, movies, restaurants, web apps, mobile apps, consumer products) is that the ones at the low end of the spectrum generally share the following attributes:
1) They are either of very low quality compared to others at the top, or are complete garbage and are generally not worth buying at all
2) They are generic me-too rip-offs of existing popular brands or products
3) They try to fill a niche that doesn't readily need to be filled or isn't well-understood
4) Lazy marketing/communication or, worse, "build it and they will come" complacent genius attitude
There is a reason that companies like taptaptap can continue making _at least_ a half-million dollars in revenue on their apps consistently. You've got to take a look at the mid-section of the app store rankings to get a feel for what the real, unhyped apps are doing, and why they are successful.
What I mean is, take a look at the apps at #75 to #150 on the app store chart. You get a good cross-section of apps in all categories _and_ price points. Let's also remember that, if figures from past blog entries about app store sales-to-rank correlations generally hold true from day to day, apps in that mid-section are generally getting between 400 to 1000 sales a day. Link that to a sales price of, say, 4.99, and you're looking at some serious money per diem, even after Apple's cut.
That's where the true beauty of the "Gross sales" chart comes into use. It's less of a popularity contest or crapshoot, because I've seen indie companies with little to almost no brand relevance clinging to that mid-section rankings for well over a year, and some of them are priced above 99 cents (in a few instances, well above).
What it really boils down to is quality. If you don't have anything worth selling, I guess no one will buy it. Furthermore, it's really hard to determine if what you're doing is worth buying to the general iPhone or Android smartphone user. Put another way, if you take everyone playing in your space, would _you_ choose your work over the competition? If not, why not? Because I can tell you this right now: Most, if not all, of the apps that have ever kissed the top 10 rankings on the app store were made by 2-4 person teams and took a few months of full-time work to complete. The ones that stick around update _constantly_ or are established brands. There are some flash in the pans that make it to the top but if you look closer, they are either building hype elsewhere (such as with a free facebook or flash app) or fills a niche in Utilities that heretofore haven't been well-served.
4) Lazy marketing: Hm. What steps would you take to promote an iPhone (or Android) app, assuming it's a well-made app that doesn't fall into the categories 1) to 3)?
This is where the test of true value comes into play, for both your app and the person promoting your app (who could easily be the person who created it).
Here's some starters. Note that none of these cost anything really, unless you outsource any part of this:
0) One little way I've seen some devs do it, and this isn't really true of everyone, is they have a developer blog or diary with little snippets of code or screenshots or balsamiq mockups or character sketches for games, to build hype. I see streetwear clothing brands do this all the time, and it captures the energy of the product before you even see the finished product.
1) Get active on boards and social groups that have alot of members that would take their interests to their phone. If you're an automobile mile-per-gallon (MPG) calculating app, frequent some hypermiling or green-car (or even general automotive) blogs and forums, get active, and then tell the site admin that you've got an app for that and that you'll promise them a promo code if they can review it. Be prepared for all kinds of tricks back from them (especially if the site is popular). If you want to make a deal (payola review, promotion, etc.), go ahead and make it. You don't generally have to do much with the smaller niche sites, though. A promo code will probably do it. You can also PM one of the board moderators or senior members if they want to take a look at the app as well. Could be worth it.
3) When it comes out, Facebook wall, tweet, prweb announce, etc the launch. The usual stuff that $19.99 "e-marketing" ebooks tell you to do but you should know from reading HN every day anyway :) That stuff's easy.
I agree that app store marketing is very tough, and even with a great marketing strategy it can fall flat on its face.
Generally the strategy is send out promo codes to blogs which can provide an uptick for a few days.
Besides that you should probably try and introduce social features to the app such as facebook/twitter.
Another option is the rising number of pay per install services. My own startup adsreloaded.com (/end shameless plug) is involved in this area, as well as other companies such as apperang, or Flurry's appCircle.
As someone who's had apps break the top 50 in the iPhone store (for a while, Reflexion) and currently has a top 25 in its category in the Android store (NewsRoom), I can say that the economics aren't fantastic.
On the iPhone the competition is fucking insane and it depends on a lot more than just your product. First, yes, you need something that is amazing, better than Reflexion for sure, but you also need to have the connections to get it pushed at launch so you get in the top 25. Once there, if your app is brilliant, then you will make bank, no doubt about it. But there's a lot of if's there. You'll notice that the players doing well in the AppStore now (repeatedly) are the ones that can leverage previous hits to catapult new ones. To give you an idea of scale, the few days we were a top 25 game we were making over $1k a day.
On Android, the money just isn't there yet. The culture so far doesn't seem to encourage paid apps to the same extent as the iPhone. We've floated up and down in popularity in the Paid Applications section and have done ok, but nothing you can really base a business on. Somewhere around $3k/month I believe.
The figures in the article using 'average' are way way off. My experience, as well as what I've heard from others is that the 'average' paid app makes nothing at all. Perhaps if you are in the top 5% then you are making a little bit, but a pittance, and the top .1% is rolling in it. This is especially true in the iPhone store, divide by 100 for the Android store.
It's a tough way to make money, no two ways about it.
Yeah, that's really the bottom line. Good stuff just finds it's way to the top. Even good fart apps, or moron tests, or funny novelty camera effect utils.
You can't polish a tur- umm bad idea. But you can polish a decent idea or a quick, good idea into a performer. People are making a living on the app store (some a really good living) and they don't even chart.
Wasn't there a guy doing a gardening app that was making 6 figures on his own just by word-of-mouth? I don't think he charted except perhaps in his category. I forgot his blog or app name but he sold in-app purchases to re-energize his sales.
Just because all the stuff making money is good (well not all, but most) does not mean all good stuff makes money.
There are some really fantastic apps and games where people are making nothing at all. The problem is it is too binary as it is, it just isn't very predictable.
All the random articles you see on the web of people making good money ignores the thousands upon thousands of people who aren't.
First off, congratulations on your success on both the iPhone store and the Android market. As an aspiring app developer for Android, i'm wondering if you are willing to share some specific marketing/sales strategies that lead to your success.
I noticed that for your android app, there is a trial as well as paid version, does the trial drive a lot of traffic to the paid? How are the return rates like on your android app? I heard that a lot of people does the "buy-app, backup with astro file manager, return app , restore app" trick to get freebies.
I also noticed that you have a website for your app, does this help sales at all?
On Android it is fairly easy to some word out, only because it is a much smaller ecosystem. So hitting up all the standard blogs once your app is well reviewed and polished up will generally get you a mention.
From there it is pretty much organic, we did a bit of tweaking of our application name based on what we think common searches are 'news', 'rss'.
People like trials, though it is probably mostly relevant for an app like NewsRoom, where the real utility comes from using it for days. For smaller games I'm not sure it makes much of a difference, though that it is surely true that the Android market is especially harsh to the amusing for 10 minutes kind of games that sell quite a bit in the App store for 99c. Those apps make nothing on Android, as people return them within the 24 hour window.
The trial was also useful for international customers, as we allow people to get an unlock key from our website. Paid apps aren't available in a lot of countries that the Android marketplace lives, so this lets those users who want the full version have a way to buy it. We don't get a ton of sales that way, but a few a day.
I don't think the website helps much at all, though the video might help give people an idea of how it works. We consider those to just be checkboxes for getting blog coverage, most purchasing decisions are made on the phone I think, where people aren't googling the app first.
For somebody who is so super-excited, those are some really dismal numbers to be excited about. Frankly it looks like a sucker's game. You might be better off playing the lottery. Trying to be a rock star.
I think that places like the AppStore and Android Market are good places to extend an already viable product like The Weather Channel, Twitter, OKCupid, Evernote and Facebook, to name a few off my head. At least for general applications. But due to the quantity of already available free applications, you'll need to aim for high quality applications that offer something unique.
Game developers on the other hand need to understand that the platform has a market with a short attention span. Unless it's a port of an already successful game like Doom or Final Fantasy, you're probably going to have to be pushing out a new app every couple months to stay on top. It is too easy for a consumer to get bored, and with a couple hundred thousand other free games available, you'll quickly lose your users if your game is dull. Games are where high quality unique applications can shine.
In the end, developing me-too rip-off applications will get you no where. It may be a couple thousand a year, but that's not enough to do it full time. There's a lot of hype for developers who wan't to make a lot of money real quick with mobile applications, but it is no different than the shareware/trialware application buzz from some years ago.
1) They are either of very low quality compared to others at the top, or are complete garbage and are generally not worth buying at all
2) They are generic me-too rip-offs of existing popular brands or products
3) They try to fill a niche that doesn't readily need to be filled or isn't well-understood
4) Lazy marketing/communication or, worse, "build it and they will come" complacent genius attitude
There is a reason that companies like taptaptap can continue making _at least_ a half-million dollars in revenue on their apps consistently. You've got to take a look at the mid-section of the app store rankings to get a feel for what the real, unhyped apps are doing, and why they are successful.
What I mean is, take a look at the apps at #75 to #150 on the app store chart. You get a good cross-section of apps in all categories _and_ price points. Let's also remember that, if figures from past blog entries about app store sales-to-rank correlations generally hold true from day to day, apps in that mid-section are generally getting between 400 to 1000 sales a day. Link that to a sales price of, say, 4.99, and you're looking at some serious money per diem, even after Apple's cut.
That's where the true beauty of the "Gross sales" chart comes into use. It's less of a popularity contest or crapshoot, because I've seen indie companies with little to almost no brand relevance clinging to that mid-section rankings for well over a year, and some of them are priced above 99 cents (in a few instances, well above).
What it really boils down to is quality. If you don't have anything worth selling, I guess no one will buy it. Furthermore, it's really hard to determine if what you're doing is worth buying to the general iPhone or Android smartphone user. Put another way, if you take everyone playing in your space, would _you_ choose your work over the competition? If not, why not? Because I can tell you this right now: Most, if not all, of the apps that have ever kissed the top 10 rankings on the app store were made by 2-4 person teams and took a few months of full-time work to complete. The ones that stick around update _constantly_ or are established brands. There are some flash in the pans that make it to the top but if you look closer, they are either building hype elsewhere (such as with a free facebook or flash app) or fills a niche in Utilities that heretofore haven't been well-served.