iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer • Hacker News Board

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#61

Post by baconner » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 2:50 AM UTC

dpcan wrote: post #41

baconner wrote: post #29

Another android dev with (much) lower volume here. Curious how you know about errors driving that 20% number. Is there a report somewhere with this detail or is it just inferred from customer emails? The only failures I ever see come through are declined credit cards or the regular cancellations from users who used the 15min refund window.

The orders show up as "Payment Declined" in the order inbox, or "Cancelled by Google". If a customer just refunds, then the order just says "Cancelled" and the details of the order say that the card was successfully authorized. It's those people that WANT to give you their money but get stopped because of a Payment Decline or Google Cancel that are ridiculous.

I don't see how you can hang payment declines on Google. Customers failing to enter valid credit card information is just an ecommerce fact of life.

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#62

Post by baconner » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 2:53 AM UTC

psychotik wrote: post #34

bignoggins wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

From the Google Checkout inbox. The 20% is just an eyeball estimate of errors/payment declined vs actual sales.

20% sounds about right based on my experience.

I agree. My all time rates are 18.2% returns, 2.5% payment declines. But that 18.2% as I understand it are customer initiated order cancellations.

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#63

Post by jtellier » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 3:06 AM UTC

I have actually found my Phone 7 has 4x my android, blackberry, WebOS, and iOS app sales combined.... Probably because the market isn't flooded yet. Android was my lowest, iOS next, then Blackberry, followed by webOS. If you can hit markets people do not yet find viable, that may very well be your key to success.

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#64

Post by jurre » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 5:07 AM UTC

smackfu wrote: post #12

switchrodeo720 wrote: post #7

It doesn't look like this is a fair comparison. If you ported your app from IOS to Android, then presumably the IOS version has had the opportunity to gain popularity already, which the Android version has not. I'm not a mobile app dev, but I assume that it takes some time before an app can gain popularity and hit it's sales peak. It may make more sense to compare the first two weeks of IOS sales to the first two wee…

I think it's an annual app, so the iPhone users need to rebuy it each year at the start of football season. So it seems a fair comparison.

I have to disagree, even though they have to rebuy it he has already had a year to build up a user-base.

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#65

Post by shinratdr » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 5:47 AM UTC

marquis wrote: post #13

There are huge issues buying content on iTunes. Apple doesn't fix it or tell you, or help you get in touch with the developer to work around it.

For instance?

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#66

Post by jwatte » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 6:27 AM UTC

Taking credit cards is hard. You get random declines from merchant banks all the time. I bet the app store simply doesn't tell you about it. Not a single decline in 15 months? Hardly likely. 20% of all attempted virtual purchases bouncing sounds not unreasonable if you compare to other markets (pc, game credits, etc)

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#67

Post by jwatte » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 6:34 AM UTC

dpcan wrote: post #41

baconner wrote: post #29

Another android dev with (much) lower volume here. Curious how you know about errors driving that 20% number. Is there a report somewhere with this detail or is it just inferred from customer emails? The only failures I ever see come through are declined credit cards or the regular cancellations from users who used the 15min refund window.

The orders show up as "Payment Declined" in the order inbox, or "Cancelled by Google". If a customer just refunds, then the order just says "Cancelled" and the details of the order say that the card was successfully authorized. It's those people that WANT to give you their money but get stopped because of a Payment Decline or Google Cancel that are ridiculous.

I bet at least 50% of failures are customers trying to use someone else's card, or habitual charge-backers. What is the experience for each channel 90 days in when actual chargebacks start hitting?

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#68

Post by bignoggins » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 6:50 AM UTC

jameyc wrote: post #60

psychotik wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I develop for Android and iOS too, and Android Market is terrible with declined purchases and "failed to deliver" issues. What's worse is that there is no good way to get information about what's wrong and who's affected. In-app purchases also have terrible bugs on Android - bugs like this http://code.google.com/p/marketbilling/issues/detail?id=14 open for months cause payments to just 'disappear'. The only thing wor…

So, I'm about to take the plunge into the market, and have been wondering about this exact issue. How do you deal with it when you get failed to deliver problems? I mean, you probably can't just give them the apk, that's its own can of worms... any tips?

the only thing you can do is tell them to try again at a later date. The problem is squarely in Google's hands so there isn't much you can do.

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#69

Post by bignoggins » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 6:51 AM UTC

edawerd wrote: post #51

Regarding #3, I wrote a script that automatically emails the 20% of customers who get their orders declined, asking them to purchase the app directly through me using PayPal. A surprising number of them do. It's not a perfect solution, but at least it recovers some lost revenue. You can have this feature available for your app through http://www.AndroidLicenser.com

wow that's pretty brilliant. I'll have to look into this.

Re: iPhone vs Android app sales: numbers from an indie developer

#70

Post by bignoggins » Sat, Aug 27, 2011, 7:00 AM UTC

acangiano wrote: post #50

bignoggins wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because the iPad version is a completely different app at a different price point, so it would skew the results. If I counted iPad/in-app/ad revenue it would nearly triple the iOS numbers.

Damn, you are doing well. Is it just you behind this operation?

only me full time. I hire contractors for graphics and some programming. Android is handled mainly by a friend of mine and we have a 50/50 revenue share.

I also have another iPhone app that sells much better but it came out recently so I haven't had a chance to port to iPad or Android yet.