Dancing App Stores - Android Open 2011

Dancing App Stores

Jesse Vincent
@obra
jesse@bestpractical.com
Wednesday, October 19, 11

Dancing App Stores?


“That company in
Brooklyn is so hip they
have dancing app stores
on their website”


There are many, many
Android App Stores


(not quite as many
app stores as
dancing hamsters)


I almost called
this talk...


88 Lines About
44 App Stores


If I spent 20 seconds
on each Android App
Store, this talk would
run over time


http://amazon.com/appstore http://www.appitalism.com http://yaam.mobi
http://andappstore.com http://www.applanet.net https://bloomworlds.com
http://android.pdassi.de http://www.camangimarket.com https://market.android.com
http://andspot.com http://www.docomo-market.info https://marketplace.cisco.com/apphq
http://appoke.com http://www.eoemarket.com https://nookdeveloper.barnesandnoble.com
http://apps.fasmicro.net http://www.explorepda.com/products.php? http://f-droid.org
http://appslib.com OS=Android http://m.sonyericsson.com/playnow
http://m.djuzz.com http://www.fastapp.com http://www1.orange.co.uk/entertainment/
http://market.android.com http://www.getjar.com OrangeWorld
http://mjelly.com/apps/tags/android http://www.goapk.com http://mobile.optuszoo.com.au/cocoon
http://mplayit.com http://www.handango.com http://www.nexva.com
http://open.app.qq.com http://www.handster.com http://emocion.movistar.es/mstore
http://promo.appcity.com http://www.maopao.com http://www.ubi-nuri.com
http://sc.hiapk.com/himarket http://www.mobango.com http://www.mmarket.com
http://slideme.org http://www.mobihand.com http://hyper.biz.tr/
http://soc.io http://www.mobile2day.com http://mikandi.com
http://store.handmark.com http://www.mobileapps.com http://www.lgworld.com/web.gateway.dev
http://storeoid.com http://www.mobiles24.com http://www.insydemarket.com
http://wandoujia.com http://www.mobspot.com http://www.esdn.ws
http://www.airtel.in/apps http://www.motorola.com/Consumers/US-EN/ http://droydmarket.com
SHOP4APPS/US-EN http://blapkmarket.com
http://www.androidpit.com
http://www.nduoa.com http://www.appstorehq.com
http://www.androlib.com
http://www.nn4d.com/appwarehouse http://www.apptown.com/Add_App.html
http://www.apktop.com
http://www.pocketgear.com http://www.92apk.com
http://www.appchina.com
http://www.samsungapps.com
http://www.appia.com
http://www.whiteapp.com


(73)


(Yes, I left out a
screenshot
so the grid ﬁt)


Some markets are for
speciﬁc places


Some are for speciﬁc
types of apps


Some are tied to a
carrier or manufacturer


Some are tied to a
free software ethos


I am an Android
hobbyist


K-9 is my
open source
hobby project


K-9 Mail


4-5 active committers


4 Google Summer of
Code students


There are around a
dozen forks of K-9 on
the Android Market


...like Kaiten Mail


Kaiten Mail is my
commercial
hobby project


Kaiten Mail


Kaiten usually gets
1-2 hours of my day


Kaiten earns
$5000-$6000
per month


90+% of that comes
from the Google
Android Market


My experiences so far


Amazon App Store


Initial Posting of K-9
took weeks


Every change needs to
be manually reviewed
and approved by
Amazon


Amazon edits
your prose


Amazon reserves the
right to discount your
app dramatically


Even if they give your
app away free, you still
get 20% of list price...


...except it looks like
mostly, you don’t.


App review time is
unpredictable


You can’t refund
unhappy users


Stats are very limited


There’s no provision
for an emergency
release


Posted Kaiten by
Amazon’s review
deadline for their App
Store launch


Kaiten appeared about
2 weeks after the App
Store launched


Initial Kaiten Mail
Release Price: $20


Initial sales...


...I had no idea.


Amazon’s sales stats
were down for the ﬁrst
2 weeks Kaiten was up


First two weeks...


I sold 5 copies


I dropped the
price to $5


...I put in a request that
Amazon drop the price
to $5.


It only took them 2
days to approve the
pricing change!


Sales picked up a bit


I sold 28 copies in the
second two weeks


Currently the #6 paid
communications app


I now make
$100-$300/month
from Amazon


Listing Kaiten on
Android Market


Sales sucked


I sucked


I did no marketing


I did no advertising


Slowly, Kaiten crept up
the charts


It got into the top 100
communications apps


Sales started
to get a lot better


Two things made for a
“good” sales day


A new release
improves sales


Functionality
doesn’t matter


Usually #30-40 paid
Communcations app


That’s 10 days with
no new upload


I did it for you guys


Currently #56 paid
Communications app


Tomorrow, time
for a new upload


Good, recent reviews
improve sales


★★★★★
★★★★★
★★★★★
=
SALES


★★★★★
★★★★★
★★★★★
=
SADNESS


Reviews with
comments matter


Past a certain point,
average rating
doesn’t matter


AndroidPIT


2nd tier App Market


They pay, but not
as fast as Google


They approached me
for a paid promotion
in September


For EUR1000, they’d
advertise Kaiten in
their weekly newsletter


They asked to discount
Kaiten from $5 to $3


Lots of people bought
Kaiten during the
promo period


(Saw an uptick on the
Android Market, too)


I made my money back
and then a bit


Nothing earth-
shattering


I sell a couple copies a
day on AndroidPIT


They just launched a
second Kaiten promo


Currently #2 paid
Communcations app &
#9 top paid app


AndroidPIT earns me
around $400-$600/mo


Motorola Shop4Apps


Country-speciﬁc app
stores


Automatic and manual
Vetting processes


Even less feedback than
Amazon


They used to have
Central- and South-
American app stores


They still have a
Chinese app store


I posted Kaiten with a
full Chinese listing


In 3 months,
I’ve sold...


...one copy


UPDATE!

I checked today


I’ve now sold...


three more copies!


SlideME


Others have had lots of
success with SlideME


It’s the place to take
your NES Emulator
when Google pulls
your account


Their UI is awful


Their performance is
awful


Their app selection is
awful


They have a weird,
complex “inventory”
scheme


I sell O(1) copy per
week there.


The warez scene


apktop


Kaiten often ends up
on apktop before
shows up on Amazon


Pirates are brazen


They write for free
tech support


...and then tell me they
had pirated Kaiten, but
bought the app because
the support was good


Other app stores I’ve
dealt with...


...are less awesome.


Many don’t support
paid apps


Many are operated by
shadowy, sketchy
companies


Not all of those are
Mobile carriers!


The app stores with the
tightest carrier
relationships seem to
be the most painful


It took months for one
of them to tell me they
hadn’t posted my app...


...because I was missing
a marketing asset


So, what do I
recommend?


A
a
s
s
a
a
S

Android
app
store
submission
as
a
Service

Please start
an AassaaS
company!


I Will Pay You


Don’t limit yourself
to the Google
Android Market


Amazon’s going to
become more
prominent


(I like safe predictions)


Pick a couple more
markets to try


F/LOSS Apps only


Based on APKtor


Some folks like GetJAR


(they don’t do
paid apps)


App store directories

• http://www.wipconnector.com/appstores/
• http://www.android-markets-info.com/


Thanks!

Jesse Vincent
@obra
jesse@bestpractical.com

Dancing App Stores - Android Open 2011

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