I just went Pro!
TomCoffee
Member, PRO Posts: 175
After putting out three small .99 cent apps (that have made less than $100 total in the past six months) I finally decided to go Pro! Here's why:
I took one of my apps and made if free for three days and I watched the traffic skyrocket 100 times over the 99 cent sale price. I didn't have any ads on that app (I refuse to put ads on a paid app) but I learned some things about psychology and sales.
Here is my plan which I started back in May of this year:
Step 1: Investigate iPhone App builders and buy a Mac.
Step 2: ?????
Step 3: PROFIT!
Seriously, the idea was to start building apps, see how it goes and give myself about a year from starting to make back my money (originally it was just the Mac and the dev account)...
GameSalad impressed me the most as being the most approachable for someone with minimal programming experience (I was a wiz at Turbo Pascal 3.0 and Visual Basic... back in 90's)... The fact that I could use GameSalad for FREE sealed the deal. I bought my Mac on Father's Day and by that evening I had assembled a little $40 desk, set up the computer and immediately downloaded GameSalad.
GameSalad actually makes developing fun and gives FAST results... That's a great way to stay excited about your project.
My sales/development strategy is pretty simple for the moment: now that I have three paid apps (and one more just about done) I'm going to release free versions of them all with ads. Because I have a few different apps ready to go (I planned it that way) I can jump out of the gate, hopefully during the holiday season.
I also know that some people HATE ads, so they'll be willing to drop the .99 cent on the paid version just to get rid of the ads.
So now that I've gone "Pro" with GameSalad I'm changing my timeline a little bit and giving myself 12 months from today (so, really, about 18 months since I bought the Mac) to make up all the cash I put out. That means I have to make up the $500 I spent on Gamesalad Pro, make up the $1500 I used to buy a Mac to run GameSalad and make up the $99 for the developer's licence. So: $2,100 in income in 12 month's time.
That really sounds pretty darn reasonable. We'll see...
One side note: I've been impressed with the improvements I've seen in GameSalad in the last six months and I was really impressed that I plunked down my PayPal payment around 9:10pm and when I logged into GameSalad at 9:12pm I had all the Pro features... I was kind of expecting a delay, but it worked instantly and smoothly. By 9:20pm I had my new app with 3 links and a test Ads on my phone.. Very nice!
I took one of my apps and made if free for three days and I watched the traffic skyrocket 100 times over the 99 cent sale price. I didn't have any ads on that app (I refuse to put ads on a paid app) but I learned some things about psychology and sales.
Here is my plan which I started back in May of this year:
Step 1: Investigate iPhone App builders and buy a Mac.
Step 2: ?????
Step 3: PROFIT!
Seriously, the idea was to start building apps, see how it goes and give myself about a year from starting to make back my money (originally it was just the Mac and the dev account)...
GameSalad impressed me the most as being the most approachable for someone with minimal programming experience (I was a wiz at Turbo Pascal 3.0 and Visual Basic... back in 90's)... The fact that I could use GameSalad for FREE sealed the deal. I bought my Mac on Father's Day and by that evening I had assembled a little $40 desk, set up the computer and immediately downloaded GameSalad.
GameSalad actually makes developing fun and gives FAST results... That's a great way to stay excited about your project.
My sales/development strategy is pretty simple for the moment: now that I have three paid apps (and one more just about done) I'm going to release free versions of them all with ads. Because I have a few different apps ready to go (I planned it that way) I can jump out of the gate, hopefully during the holiday season.
I also know that some people HATE ads, so they'll be willing to drop the .99 cent on the paid version just to get rid of the ads.
So now that I've gone "Pro" with GameSalad I'm changing my timeline a little bit and giving myself 12 months from today (so, really, about 18 months since I bought the Mac) to make up all the cash I put out. That means I have to make up the $500 I spent on Gamesalad Pro, make up the $1500 I used to buy a Mac to run GameSalad and make up the $99 for the developer's licence. So: $2,100 in income in 12 month's time.
That really sounds pretty darn reasonable. We'll see...
One side note: I've been impressed with the improvements I've seen in GameSalad in the last six months and I was really impressed that I plunked down my PayPal payment around 9:10pm and when I logged into GameSalad at 9:12pm I had all the Pro features... I was kind of expecting a delay, but it worked instantly and smoothly. By 9:20pm I had my new app with 3 links and a test Ads on my phone.. Very nice!
Comments
-Max
- Alex
Good Luck!
I was on your exact same situation back in the summer of 2010. Bought a mac and got into iPhone programming. My goal was to make back the 3k I spend on all the equipment (I also bought a time capsule that has actually saved my life and work more than a few times).
I have made a little over 9k since Feb 2011 I know those are not the best numbers in here. Some people make that in a month or in a couple of months. But since it is a serious jungle out there, I am proud of that number and I am planing on duplicating it by the end of 2012
My advice to you is even thou iAds is a good way to make money. You need to get like 20-40000 downloads a Day to see real money in your account. In my experience the best way to make money is make a game that is kick ass, creative, original, with very polished graphics and hope Apples features on the N&N section.
If you get up there you'll make about 1000 bucks in the week you are feature sometimes a lot more and if Apple doesn't pick your game because sometimes it also takes a lot of luck. Do no loose courage go to www.prmac.com pay the 20 bucks for a press release and get good reviews from popular blogs and sites that will boost your sales and if that still doesn't work. again do no loose courage carry on to your next game and the next game until you knock it out of the park. It is bound to happen if you put enough effort to it
Hope that helps you.
Cheers.
Steve
I have to admit, I'm having fun at the moment... I haven't even really made any full out "games" yet...
Steve - so you really recommend using that PRMac service? I've avoided using press release services in the past (well, paying for them)... I have a number of online blogs and sites that also pull in some change on the side. Maybe I should look into a more general service I could use for everything... hmm..
I'll keep you all posted on progress... just submitted my first free/ad driven app this morning.