Hi Pierre, thanks for your new inspirational article and your previous one. I have 3 kids and attempted the educational apps market 2 years ago, I didn't have nearly as much success as you. My games are not pure education either, so maybe that's my issue, but they are more educational than my competitors. Do you have any specific advice for my situation? Congrats to you!
My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
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Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#42A local school recently voted to introduce iPads into schools. Immediately following the vote, there was a huge backlash from the parents about why the school thought it was a great idea to give a platform for messaging and gaming to their kids. I wish more parents and educators actually understood the benefit and potential of computers in classrooms. Thank you for helping the cause in a huge way!
A school system in my area did it and got a lot more support, but had to stop for now because the kids broke so many of the iPads.
Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#43Hi Pierre, thanks for your new inspirational article and your previous one. I have 3 kids and attempted the educational apps market 2 years ago, I didn't have nearly as much success as you. My games are not pure education either, so maybe that's my issue, but they are more educational than my competitors. Do you have any specific advice for my situation? Congrats to you! http://www.littlefivegames.com
kid's game market (not "purely" educational) is more competitive, and you have to fight with big players like toca boca/disney/nickelodeon. So you have to innovate even more. I've seen great apps disapearing from the charts in 2 weeks. Did you try free with not consumable IAP ? Did you try to work on your keywords ?
Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#44which text to speech engine did you used? or is it your own?
it's Acapela. it's impossible to build your own text to speech engine if you want quality - it's years of R&D to have a very good one.
Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#45Let me know if you have questions (I'm the lucky indie dev who wrote the post)
No questions - but a thank you, as I'm one of the people who has given you money.
Your apps, if nothing else, are an excellent way to distract our kid if we go out for dinner :)
Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#46Hi Pierre, thanks for your new inspirational article and your previous one. I have 3 kids and attempted the educational apps market 2 years ago, I didn't have nearly as much success as you. My games are not pure education either, so maybe that's my issue, but they are more educational than my competitors. Do you have any specific advice for my situation? Congrats to you! http://www.littlefivegames.com
kid's game market (not "purely" educational) is more competitive, and you have to fight with big players like toca boca/disney/nickelodeon. So you have to innovate even more. I've seen great apps disapearing from the charts in 2 weeks. Did you try free with not consumable IAP ? Did you try to work on your keywords ?
I have my top two games Wood Puzzler and Exotic Pet Puzzler in the education category, they are geared towards learning the alphabet and have lots of extras. I recently tried keyword stuffing the title as I've seen others doing, but it hasn't had any affect. Both those games have paid and free-with-IAP, which works well. My most recent game below, we've done tons of free/paid marketing and cannot penetrate at all, maybe 1-3 sales per day. Thanks again.
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/exotic-pet-puzzler/id7178059...
Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#47Hey Pierre, Thank you for this post. First, because I use your apps with my kids and they love them. Almost certainly one of the reasons your applications sell is because they are very good. It was recommended to me by a relative who is a teacher and I know she recommends it to others. These types of applications are the reason I purchased a tablet device: I am a very stingy person, but if a tool will engage my child…
> I'm disappointed about the Android market, I hope it improves.
Based on some research that I have done, iOS revenue is about 2:1 for phone apps, with the gap closing quickly. If the app has strong international appeal, it is probably closer to parity. For tablet apps, iOS has something like a 10:1 revenue advantage.
I wouldn't write off Android if the app is designed to be used on phones, but for tablet apps, it is currently a waste of time for most indie devs.
That being said, this type of software is completely evergreen. You can't reach saturation because there are always new kids and new parents searching for apps. It is conceivable you could launch an Android app, make $10k this year, but then the app earns $100k five years from now.
The bigger problem is other devs poisoning the well with high quality free apps. Which is why I believe this type of post is a mistake if maximizing income is your priority. This type of post is an invitation for talentless hacks to hire people from elance to clone your app. All it takes is someone to figure out how to game the app store rankings better than you. I could probably pay $40k to clone an app, with the twist that modules are unlocked if you rate the app, and then out rank Pierre's apps.
Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#48First off, thanks so much for sharing your data PierreA. What I find really interesting is the massive gap between your sales down on essentially the iOS market vs the Android market. Do you have any idea why this might be the case?
Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#49Hey Pierre, Thank you for this post. First, because I use your apps with my kids and they love them. Almost certainly one of the reasons your applications sell is because they are very good. It was recommended to me by a relative who is a teacher and I know she recommends it to others. These types of applications are the reason I purchased a tablet device: I am a very stingy person, but if a tool will engage my child…
> I'm disappointed about the Android market, I hope it improves. Based on some research that I have done, iOS revenue is about 2:1 for phone apps, with the gap closing quickly. If the app has strong international appeal, it is probably closer to parity. For tablet apps, iOS has something like a 10:1 revenue advantage. I wouldn't write off Android if the app is designed to be used on phones, but for tablet apps, it is…
Nice feedback on Android market (yes the issue is that I sold mostly on tablet). I don't agree about cloning - what is difficult is to have a good/large user base and being featured. Cloning will not help you a lot for that. Gaming the app store (at least the ios app store) is not easy at all (or very expensive and not applicable for this kind of app). I don't think the trick you describe would work.
Re: My Experience in the Educational Apps Market – 2013 report
#50Thank you for the post, Pierre. It is very rare such figures appear for to be viewed by average Joe.
As one can see the consumer market is very much biased towards the US. Is it because of marketing or because EU markets are so small? Is Russia relevant as an app market?