We all know that apps are the hip new thing right now, but there's a whole new side to their popularity
A developer decides to make the next great app or game. He did some research of course and found out that some people got a lot of money from a nicely done product on the App Store (or the Android market, but let’s focus on the former here – most rules apply to the Android market as well anyway). It didn’t occur to him that a lot of people win the lottery every year too. But let’s skip that part for now.
So he sits down, finds some more people and creates an awesome product. No, really. Let’s assume he did a great job. So he has a great product, and he knows what he needs to do – make good screenshots, write a nice description and think through his keywords. Then the upload day comes and the hopes are sky high.
And then comes the sad realization – there’s hundreds of thousands of apps out there, and his app falls down the charts so fast he doesn’t even notice when it’s nowhere to be found. No magic formula and no magic trick can save him now. Or maybe not?
So he goes to google and searches for ways to promote his app. And that’s where it gets funny. He finds many websites that review apps, but most of them want money for the review if he doesn’t want to wait forever-and-a-half. And then there are people who promise him a boost in sales by some unknown practices, but again – it’ll cost him. Another great thing is the free apps every day initiatives. There are plenty of ’em out there and usually they sort of work – boosting the downloads of the free version can result in a bump of the sales when it turns paid again. The catch? They charge so much that in most cases it won’t make a difference. Some say it’s $10,000, some say a bit less. But still it’s pretty expensive and of course there’s no guarantee it’ll work.
The review sites that want your money for a review (or sometimes even a favorable review which isn’t really anything other than an Ad) also don’t give you any guarantee it’ll change anything. The scamy “schemes” of other internet marketers are just that.
So what does it all come down to? We don’t want to fight those people, but we want to let our readers know that currently – there’s a whole bunch of people that get rich off of the App Store without any apps of their own. (even big respectable sites charge thousands of dollars for what later appears as a genuine news recommendation – so now you know why they write about some apps and skip the rest). Basically they earn more money in the long run than the developers they ‘help’. Just a thought.
We think that quality apps and games will sooner or later catch Apple’s attention anyway, so these kinds of promotions should be avoided, unless we want to pay someone’s rent with no guarantee ;)