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What is the growth curve?
- Thread starter cdrux
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It's entirely based on how visible you are. If you can easily be seen on the phone, you'll sell a lot. If you're only easily found on Itunes, it'll be less, but still respectable. If you're hard to find on either, you'll sell very little.
Others may have different opinions, but after being on the store for nearly three months, the above behavior is what I've seen.
It's not as easily defined as that. The entire time you're on the store, you will experience many peaks and valleys, all of them dependent on your price, reviews, and number of downloads, all of which affect visibility. If you're looking for the number of days before I hit a particular peak, that info really wouldn't apply to your app at all. I've had four different, well defined, peaks so far, all of which varied in duration. Every app is going to sell differently. However, what you can generally expect is sales to increase for a bit, then slowly drop back down again, unless you do something about it. There are exceptions, but not many.
Are you depending on what random spot you end up on the App store page?
Are you depending on what random spot you end up on some App store aggregation web site?
Did you get lucky with your initial App store reviews?
Are there similar apps already in the app store?
How rapidly are similar apps appearing the app store?
Are any similar apps changing their prices?
Is your app an Apple featured app?
Have you done any marketing? (press releases, promotional Ad Hoc copies, reviews on major web sites, buying Google adwords, product web site linking, other advertising, etc.)
Do you have a product tie-in with any other apps? (another Lite version, desktop client, etc.)
All of these will greatly affect your sales curve.
.
Are you depending on what random spot you end up on some App store aggregation web site?
Did you get lucky with your initial App store reviews?
Are there similar apps already in the app store?
How rapidly are similar apps appearing the app store?
Are any similar apps changing their prices?
Is your app an Apple featured app?
Have you done any marketing? (press releases, promotional Ad Hoc copies, reviews on major web sites, buying Google adwords, product web site linking, other advertising, etc.)
Do you have a product tie-in with any other apps? (another Lite version, desktop client, etc.)
All of these will greatly affect your sales curve.
.
If you are a dev and offer sales once in awhile or post and introduce it here, you will do better. There is a thread going that was originally about Apple loosening it's SDK rules that sort of became owned by this guy that made a landscape typing email app. His input into that thread (although he somewhat hijacked the thread IMO) definitely sold him apps.
There are a few other devs that made sales from being proactive, virtual pool comes to mind off the top of my head. I bought because he actively engaged potential users in a thread here.
There are a few other devs that made sales from being proactive, virtual pool comes to mind off the top of my head. I bought because he actively engaged potential users in a thread here.
Are you a part of the mobilchat team by any chance? Growth should increase through word of mouth if your app gets good reviews.
Me neither. Been out five weeks and week one was my WORST week (though this week isn't looking too hot... could be economy worries catching up ;P )
I've been on the store since the beginning of August, and have been as high as #12 in the Top 50 apps list, and as low as the bottom of the Top 100 games list, and all points in between. But I've never gotten down to first day numbers. But yes, I agree with you, this week has not been a pretty week for sales.
My first app had a gradual decline in downloads over the first 2 months, then a steep decline after two more similar apps hit the store. A few weeks later sales dropped off a cliff after a free, but inferior (in both functionality and graphics), app of similar nature hit the store.
Lots of people must still use my first app, because I see an enormous spike in update downloads every time a new version gets to the store. But almost no new sales any more.
.
Lots of people must still use my first app, because I see an enormous spike in update downloads every time a new version gets to the store. But almost no new sales any more.
.
My curve
My App ([app]Juxtaposer[/app]) has only been on the App Store for 10 days, but this has been my sales curve so far:
![salescurve.png]()
I fully expect a major drop in sales once I get pushed off the first page of the Photography category listing. But I'll see. Reviews have been excellent so far and I hope that word of mouth will be working in my favor. The app is easy to show off to friends and likely to wow them (at least I'd like to think so
).
My App ([app]Juxtaposer[/app]) has only been on the App Store for 10 days, but this has been my sales curve so far:
I fully expect a major drop in sales once I get pushed off the first page of the Photography category listing. But I'll see. Reviews have been excellent so far and I hope that word of mouth will be working in my favor. The app is easy to show off to friends and likely to wow them (at least I'd like to think so
).[app]Juxtaposer[/app] is a photo compositing program. It allows you to cut things out from one photo and add them to another. What makes it special is a nice multi-touch interface.
AppVee posted a video review a couple days ago. It nicely shows the basic functionality, although I wish they had demoed the zooming and had gotten the name of the app right. Oh well
I still have no idea how much such external reviews matter. It definitely didn't create a big spike in sales, but I assume it probably helps a little.
My app sales track record
From what I saw with my first App, Time Task Calc, I had an initial peak that lasted 3 days, then it dropped off to about 1/5 the peak, and dribbled along at that pace for a while. I experienced another peak when I released my bug-fix update, but it was only half of what my original peak was. I've sold at least 1 of TTC every day, but some days that's all I sold.
My new App, Informant, has a wider target demographic, and it has been VERY visible on my app sales. My first day of sales of Informant was more than my first week of sales for TTC. I'm on the third day, and it has begun to drop off already. Strangely I don't have even 1 review yet, so that might be hurting me.
I keep a close eye on my 'popularity' on the iTunes Store as a sort of gauge, but it isn't terribly revealing.
Each app seems to fare differently, depending on a bunch of factors.
From what I saw with my first App, Time Task Calc, I had an initial peak that lasted 3 days, then it dropped off to about 1/5 the peak, and dribbled along at that pace for a while. I experienced another peak when I released my bug-fix update, but it was only half of what my original peak was. I've sold at least 1 of TTC every day, but some days that's all I sold.
My new App, Informant, has a wider target demographic, and it has been VERY visible on my app sales. My first day of sales of Informant was more than my first week of sales for TTC. I'm on the third day, and it has begun to drop off already. Strangely I don't have even 1 review yet, so that might be hurting me.
I keep a close eye on my 'popularity' on the iTunes Store as a sort of gauge, but it isn't terribly revealing.
Each app seems to fare differently, depending on a bunch of factors.