The more data the better when you are making iPhone app marketing decisions.

Perhaps you’re asking:

Should I develop my iPhone app for the Blackberry or Android Platform or both?

If my app hits a top category ranking, how long will it stay there?

Where’s the best place to spend my mobile ad dollars?

Three reports help me find answers to these types of questions:

• Admob Mobile Metrics Report
• Distimo Report
• Millennial Media’s S.M.A.R.T. Report

Admob Mobile Metrics Report

Admob has a monthly metrics report that it’s been publishing since September 2007. It is based on data they collect from the over 18 billion ad requests they receive monthly.

So if you’re trying to answer: “Should I develop my iPhone app for the Blackberry or Android Platform or both?”

You may want to peruse their reports. By combining a survey they did to developers in mid March with their monthly report, I’d say Android is currently a bigger and faster growth opportunity for apps. 

Not that you should just follow the crowd, but this March survey suggests that more than 70% of iPhone app developers plan to develop for the Android platform in the next 6 months. On the other hand, only 15% of developers plan to develop for the Blackberry platform.

That’s just one data point of many that can help you form an opinion.

A couple of other points from the March 2010 metrics report:

• Admob is talking more and more about Android and less and less about Blackberry
• Android traffic on the Admob network has grown from 72M requests to 2B requests per month in the last year
• A year ago 2 devices represented 96% of the Android impressions, now 11 devices make up 96% of the Android impressions

I’m just barely scratching the surface here. Admob’s monthly reports are full of helpful information.

Distimo Report

Distimo, an app store analytics company, just recently put out an interesting report.

So if you’re trying to answer: “If my app hits a top category ranking, how long will it stay there?”

Free apps stay in categories on average this long:

• Top overall => 19 days
• Games => 21 days
• Business => 39 days
• Entertainment => 43 days

Paid apps stay in categories on average this long:

• Top overall => 27 days
• Games => 39 days
• Business => 59 days
• Entertainment => 38 days

This information, combined with some download estimate, can help you better forecast the revenue a new app may produce if it reaches a top category ranking.

Millennial Media’s S.M.A.R.T. Report

Millennial Media, a mobile ad network, has a report as well.

The latest, MillennialMedia-SMART-April-2010, might help you answer:

“Where’s the best place to spend my mobile ad dollars?”

Here is a screen shot from the report:

Some interesting facts from the screen shot above:

• Broad targeting is less expensive (makes sense)
• Cost roughly 8x in April to do a takeover ad versus a RON (run of network) ad
• Targeting by channel appears to cost roughly 30-40% more than by RON

This data can help me model how my tests might perform.

In Summary

Hope by using these metrics, you’ll make better marketing decisions! Best of luck.

My third case study today is on pricing. In the picture to the left, yet another an app developer prays for the money to role in!

He needs the right price for his app.

So…how do you decide your initial price?
And when and how should you lower the price of your app?

Initial Pricing

Here are two articles you might glance at to give you some good food for thought:

How to Price Your iPhone App
Price and Popularity

Here are some things to consider when deciding on price:

• Most iPhone apps are priced $.99
• Almost all highest grossing app are not $.99
• Aim high when price is concerned – you can always lower your price
• Look at the competition and compare features before pricing
• Consider having a free version and paid version, versus a $.99 version
• Do the math…how many sales needed at $1.99 compared to $.99?
• If you don’t have a great app and don’t get it in front of lots of people, the price won’t matter

Lowering the Price – When & How

Lowering your price can be an effective way to drive volume.

The “when” is when you’ve had enough time at the current price to see if you’re hitting the sales you were anticipating. Don’t over react and drop the price day one, but don’t leave your app at $2.99 for months, getting one sale a day.

The how is all about execution.

Say your app is $2.99. When and if you drop it to $.99 you should certainly see a lift. Users are getting a deal!

But that’s only one side of the equation. You need to have to get your promotion in front of people.

I suggest you consider a site like FreeAppADay when lowering your price. Make your app free for at least a day (they suggest 4-7 days) and pay them to expose it to their tens of thousands of visitors who are bargain hunting.

Why? I won’t make any money when it’s free?!?!

Here’s why the combo of free and FreeAppADay helps:

• Many of their promoted apps have landed in the top 100 free
• Because of this you get tens of thousands, sometimes over a million new users
• These new users can be very valuable (for ad revenue, launching others apps, etc)
• When you switch the app back to paid, you typically rank higher than you did
• Ideally 2-3 weeks after, you’ve got more revenue AND a user base for the future

Here is a case study on how FreeAppADay helped MouthOff. 

It’s pretty simple:

• Before promotion MouthOff was making $40/day
• They got over 175k downloads when free
• After they went back to paid, they made 8-9x revenue more than before free
• Plus the got picked as a iTunes staff pick after (could/could not be connected)

Quote on PocketGamer from Joe Bayern (CEO of FreeAppADay):

“The current model works. Around 80 percent of our developer partners are able to generate substantially more income following their FreeAppADay campaigns, but it’s no miracle. Quality is the key ingredient in this process.”

Hope that gives you some food for thought about pricing your apps!

Have you seen any other good information on app pricing? Add them in the comments.

Other Case Studies

Case study #1 – iPhone App Strategy
Case study #2 – Making Great Apps

Photo credit: kerryvaughan

You’ve heard of the story of “The Tortoise and the Hare”, right? The tortoise is slow and steady and the hare is fast and maybe a bit prideful.

The lesson is that slow and steady wins the race. The hare naps, while the tortoise plods along and finishes in first place.

In the iPhone app store, I think there are actually 3 different ways you can run the marketing race: the tortoise, the hare, or the eagle. Here’s how each of them works.

The Hare – Top 100

This is the main strategy I see talked about. Run fast! Get into the top 100. Sell millions of copies and quit your job (i.e. iShooter guy). It’s happened, but it’s getting harder and harder to do without a significant marketing budget.

The key to this strategy is marketing to lots of people in a short time period. You can use an existing user base or spend money to get in front of users, but in the end it’s got to be a big splash. 

The components to this strategy are as follows:

• Build a great app
• Test wisely
• Either spend $$$ or find some other way to expose your app to a crowd of people

But, if you don’t have at a minimum $3,000-$10,000 or a way to reach tens of thousands of people when you launch, you should probably consider the other two strategies.

The Tortoise – No Marketing Budget

No money. You are working nights and weekends to create an app. You have little or no money to market it.

Here are some keys to this strategy:

• Build a great app (once again)
• Not expecting success overnight
• No rest! Never stop using free app marketing
• Build a small, but faithful user base
• Rewarding that user base with updates and new apps over time

This strategy will not typically generate big numbers of sales, unless you strike lightning in a bottle. But done with a tortoise like persistence it could generate more and more revenue as you go.

The Eagle – Precision

I picked an eagle for this strategy, because eagles have great eyes. The can target a mouse from a long ways away.

You don’t have a huge budget, but you do have some money to spend. If you could make money along the way, you’d be fine. Your goal isn’t to “run” or “hop” into the top 100, it’s to be profitable and perhaps do well in a category.

This strategy combines the following:

• Great app at a premium price ($2.99-$6.99)
• Lite and Paid versions
• Ability to acquire customers through mobile ads < $1/free app
• Strong lite to paid conversion rates (15-30%)
• Understanding of how to test, test, and test again

Your numbers on a mobile ad campaign might look like this:

 NOTE: these numbers are just to get you thinking. Yours will obviously be different.

Summary

So there is the tortoise, the hare, and the eagle.  Hope that helps! Feel free to discuss in the comments.