How To Make
Money In the
Mobile Apps
Business
Mobile Monday Lansing
March 26th 2012
Let’s Make Some Assumptions!
 You
will or currently have apps on an app
store
 Mobile Apps will live on an app store
 They will be made publically available for
all
 We will touch on non-app store mobile
app opportunities
Quick Intro – Matt Tubergen
 10
Years in Mobile
 Made ringtones before ringtones were
cool
 Then mobile gaming took off w/THQ
 Learned that DIY agency life is hard, for
shizzle
 Mobile freemium gaming investment
 Back to MI, TechSmith lowers its
acceptance criteria
Quick Overview
 Market
Recap
 Top Business Models
 Discovery - Growth Mechanisms
 Best Practices for Any App
 Questions/Discussion
How Many Apps?

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Over 1 million apps in apps stores worldwide
59.6% of the apps are iOS
Android is 32.3%, Blackberry 4.4%
Est. 1,000 new apps added daily to iOS
Est. 1,400 new apps a day added on Android
market
Top categories include (By volume of apps)




Entertainment - 16.78%
Games – 12.36%
Lifestyle – 8.02%
Utilities – 7.13%
Where is the Demand?
Top Business Models
 88%
of top 250 grossing iOS apps are freemium
 Android piracy on the rise, advertising it is!
Paid = Premium
Some Aspects of Premium Apps:
 Higher retention rates of users
 Perception of value is controlled by price
and app store collateral
 Revenue is realized only once
 Paid apps are costly to promote
Premium – What Can You Control
 Price
Point
 Icon, Keywords, Description, Screenshots
 App Content
Premium – What Cant You Control
 Placement/Features
#
of installs
 Rating
Premium Best Practices
 Lower
the barrier to entry, make a free
version to drive visibility
 Launch with a high price point, never start
with a sale unless you have built in brand
awareness
 Cross promotion in all existing applications
Sales and Pricing

Pricing changes can drive discovery but do so
wisely

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No more then once every 30 days
Reduce price by at lease 50%
Off-sale pricing is not static, consider the market
Sales are not a pricing strategy, it’s a
marketing strategy
Have a reason for a sale

Tie sales to a change in content
Freemium – Free with Strings
Aspects of Freemium
 Barrier to entry is low
 Lifetime value is revenue measurement
 Potentially unlimited max revenue from
user
 Predictable ROI against paid marketing
Freemium – What Can You Control
#
of Installs
 Icon, Keywords, Description, Screenshots
 App Content
 IAP pricing, ad placements, frequency
 Retention
Freemium – What Cant You Control
 Features/Placement
 Ratings
Freemium – Understanding
Lifetime Value
 Know
your relative LTV and increase levers
it to increase revenue
 LTV is:

 In

Revenue per user by X period multiplied by
X periods
other words
Retention * Monetization = Lifetime Value
Freemium Best Practices
 Never
limit how much you will let people
pay
 Use Metrics to verify your business

Consumption, sources and sinks
 Incent
sharing and activity with virtual
goods/other value
Monetization Streams

In App Purchases

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Advertising
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Never allow for spending limits
Increase source/sinks
Banner
Cross Promotion
Incentivized
Branded Experiences
Subscriptions
Understand your “Whales”
Ad Revenue Characteristics
 Standard

$1-$3 eCPM
 Static

Full Screen Interstitial
$2-$10
 Video

Banner
Preload
$4-$25 eCPM
Watch your frequency!!!
Tricks to Retention
 Incent
return behavior/usage
 Give reasons to re-enter
 Focus heavily on the first minute of
experience
 Better to keep people then make them
stay
 Measure on day, week, month and other
Best Practices for Any App
 Know
your market, focus on fulfilling and
speaking to your app store category
 Time your launch per marketplace

Launch on Thursdays for iOS
Discovery – Best Practices for
Any App
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Build a checklist before you start
Prepare and submit promotional material for
each store
Prepare and submit promotional material for
targeted app review sites or relative blogs
Build a promotional calendar


Events or holidays to showcase content or price
Update icon, imagery, test, keywords
accordingly
Discovery – Best Practices
Continued
 Always


Leverage in app notifications
“Get More Apps” menu
 Barter

cross promote
with other apps, companies
Use a mediation layer such as adwhirl
What We Did Not Cover
 Paid
apps with IAP’s
 Subscription Pricing
 Payment Providers
Non-App Store $$
 Work
for hire development
 Mobile ads
 Consulting/Strategy
 Enterprise mobility is exploding
Questions?