From the profit chart it seems to me that there was a boost in Q2 and then in Q3 things essentially returned to how they were before.
How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
31–40 of 47 posts
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#32Didn't see this comment:
We have an 18mo and a 4yo we read books and play games with on the iPad. The 4yo gets to play games or read books on his own as well.
Any app that doesn't let us unlock everything to remove IAP or Ads gets uninstalled.
For one I don't want my 4yo racking up $$$. But it's also frustrating for both of us when he clicks a button and gets taken out of his app and doesn't know what to do now.
So for us at least it's not that "parents can't resist". It's that $13 or whatever isn't all that much to spend if our kids like it, and we don't want IAP buttons and/or Ads in front of our 4yo. Perceived "value" has almost nothing to do with it.
Apple generally gives a 10% discount for buying a season pass. I'd be fine with that. A greater than 50% discount is surprising.
A better model might be something like FarFaria, where we pay an iTunes subscription fee to unlock everything and get rid of the ads. So recurring revenue ($4/month). You might consider it.
I don't claim we're super typical but I doubt we're all that special in regards to letting our children play with Adware either.
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#33Good deal, I think I'll buy this. When it comes to buying games or apps me or our kids the "Unlock All" option is more than just a nice to have, it's a necessity. For me personally it doesn't have to do with convenience or perceived value: Rather it's because I feel that I am not buying into a scam. If I see item (X) on the market for "Free" + in-app purchases I'm flat out not going to spend any time on it. You offer…
Flipside: Not charging for the app allows the user to try the app without buying it.
If the content is worth paying for the user can choose how much to "invest" in it even though, generally, the in-app purchase model is going to cost way more than up-front purchase.
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#34Didn't see this comment: We have an 18mo and a 4yo we read books and play games with on the iPad. The 4yo gets to play games or read books on his own as well. Any app that doesn't let us unlock everything to remove IAP or Ads gets uninstalled. For one I don't want my 4yo racking up $$$. But it's also frustrating for both of us when he clicks a button and gets taken out of his app and doesn't know what to do now. So f…
You're not that special :-) I do the same thing. And I complain to developers that place buttons like "see our other apps" or similar on the main screen of their app.
There aren't many good apps for kids. If your app is good, I will actively search for other apps done by you — no prompting needed. This is how I purchased a number of Toca Boca apps, for example.
I also think most good apps for kids are priced too low. I'd have no problems paying $15 for an app like "Little Digits". In general, I think $5 is fine for apps which are just fun/games, $10 or more if the app teaches something useful.
I think smartphones and tablets have a lot of untapped potential as educational tools, but I'm worried we'll never get there with $1.99 apps.
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#35Earlier quoted context omitted.
What languages are you looking for? We have a Mandarin version and we're working on a French and Portuguese version.
The latter two. My observation of NY is that parents here don't have cars, so our conspicuous consumption is how many languages we force our kids to learn. I'm sold!
haha! I love it.
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#36Didn't see this comment: We have an 18mo and a 4yo we read books and play games with on the iPad. The 4yo gets to play games or read books on his own as well. Any app that doesn't let us unlock everything to remove IAP or Ads gets uninstalled. For one I don't want my 4yo racking up $$$. But it's also frustrating for both of us when he clicks a button and gets taken out of his app and doesn't know what to do now. So f…
That's a great idea regarding the subscription - we didn't think we'd be eligible because we're a game / book hybrid but I'll look into it again.
Regarding the "Parents can't resist" - I ment that in regards to School Apparel as that was their description. 97% of the parents that download our app can resist ;)
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#37Didn't see this comment: We have an 18mo and a 4yo we read books and play games with on the iPad. The 4yo gets to play games or read books on his own as well. Any app that doesn't let us unlock everything to remove IAP or Ads gets uninstalled. For one I don't want my 4yo racking up $$$. But it's also frustrating for both of us when he clicks a button and gets taken out of his app and doesn't know what to do now. So f…
[deleted]
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#38Didn't see this comment: We have an 18mo and a 4yo we read books and play games with on the iPad. The 4yo gets to play games or read books on his own as well. Any app that doesn't let us unlock everything to remove IAP or Ads gets uninstalled. For one I don't want my 4yo racking up $$$. But it's also frustrating for both of us when he clicks a button and gets taken out of his app and doesn't know what to do now. So f…
You're not that special :-) I do the same thing. And I complain to developers that place buttons like "see our other apps" or similar on the main screen of their app. There aren't many good apps for kids. If your app is good, I will actively search for other apps done by you — no prompting needed. This is how I purchased a number of Toca Boca apps, for example. I also think most good apps for kids are priced too low.…
re: "see our other apps"
You nailed it. Hate that. Thanks for the app tips. :-)
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#39Earlier quoted context omitted.
It's really because of Apple and their rules. Apple discourages Free and Pro versions of the same app (they may have loosened that up recently, but at one time, in an effort to combat app clutter and promote IAP, they would reject you). On iOS, there is no real way to try-and-buy without Freemium. At least in Android, and I think WP, you can get a refund within a certain time frame. Couple this with users generally s…
Ah. Yes, WP actually has built-in support for offering both a "try" and "buy" version of each app, allowing two apps to coexist as the same entry... but in practice, most follow the "free" and "pro" naming-convention and offer two separate apps. I hadn't realized that Apple's strict curating prevented these patterns.
You also can't return an app in iOS. If there is something grossly wrong you might be able to talk support into it, but in general that $5 purchase is final. I've heard that as a popular reason for the IAP model after people stopped buying apps after buying real duds for real money.
Re: How we tripled our revenue by adding one button
#40Thanks for sharing. From a technical standpoint I am wondering about the implementation and scalability of such an approach. Are people sensitive to having to wait to download content for their kid's apps? This app only has, as far as I can tell, ten items per subject. Download size is about 70 MB, which means all the content for the available subjects is contained in the one download waiting to be enabled. This is O…
The content is all contained in the base download so there is no wait for the user.
To serve from our own server there would be a delay - Apple also has a serve that lets you deliver assets from their server, still a delay, but much faster infrastructure than we could afford.