Marketing Apps

Drawing Your Ideas on Paper

Don't overlook the value of sketches on grid paper Getting your ideas down on paper is a quick way to map out the basic look and feel of your app. Designing a game that requires a completely custom interface Drawing your concept on paper may be your only rapid option, since this would be impossible to do with only the standard controls available in Interface Builder. Sketch it first by hand to work out the design kinks, and then construct the final custom artwork in Illustrator or Photoshop....

Mining Additional Revenue with Affiliate Programs

In Chapter 5's coverage of cross-promotional efforts, I briefly mentioned the use of iTunes affiliate links when sending users to the iTunes Store. For those of you unfamiliar with affiliate programs, the way it works is quite simple. Participating companies want to encourage software and web site owners to send traffic to their retail sites. As an incentive to do so, a small commission fee is earned for sales that are generated. This is tracked by using special URLs that include unique...

The Limitations of Wildcard App IDs

As convenient as wild-card App IDs are, they cannot be used to test Push Notifications or In-App Purchase functionality on your device. Those two major features can be tested only with application-specific App IDs. What does that mean Essentially, a wildcard App ID is assigned an asterisk as its bundle identifier, which is what allows it be used with any Xcode project. If you navigate to the App IDs section of the online iPhone Developer Program Portal in your web browser, you'll notice that...

When to Avoid Over Saturated Categories

When it comes time to submit your app to the App Store, you'll be asked to select an appropriate category to place it in. Sometimes the most obvious choice is not always the best choice. When researching similar apps in the App Store, take a good look at what categories they're located in and how well they are faring in those categories. Just this little bit of detective work alone can help you choose the best category that will give your app the greatest chance for exposure in the App Store. A...

Analyzing App Ranking Statistics

After getting a handle on how much competition is out there for your particular niche, it's also important to find out how your competitors are faring in the App Store. Are they ranked high in the App Store charts Have any of them broken out of their primary categories to rank well in overall downloads Do those apps perform better in some countries but not in others This information can also help you determine whether a particular niche is popular or profitable enough to warrant your own...

Step 3 Launch the Online Development Provisioning Assistant

If you closed your browser session from step 2 or skipped step 2 altogether with the WWDR certificate already installed , then using your iPhone Developer ID and password, log back into the iPhone Dev Center After logging in, click the iPhone Developer Program Portal link in the top-right corner of the page. On the main Program Portal home page, you'll notice the recent addition of a Development Provisioning Assistant see Figure 7-11 . Although the proper sequence of events in generating and...

Using Promotions and Giveaways to Improve App Discovery

Who doesn't love freebies Giving away something of value is a great way to draw attention to your iPhone app, especially if it's your app that's being given away for free Temporarily reducing your app's price to free for a single day or a weekend can help boost it higher in the App Store's Top Free Apps charts, especially if you notify all the iPhone news sites of this limited-time offer. Those sites love to report on price reductions and freebies, so the stunt should gain quite a bit of...

Whats in an App Name

While researching the competition, you undoubtedly performed a countless number of searches within the App Store. Along the way, you discovered that the words used in an app's name and related keywords can affect its placement in App Store searches. I'll discuss how to refine your App Store display name, keywords, and description in Chapter 9, so for now let's focus on your app name. Obviously, in the App Store, you're able to add short captions to your app's display name to help ensure...

Twitter and Facebook Connect

Beyond sending emails, you may want to also give users the ability to post messages to their Twitter and Facebook accounts. And although it's nice when users blatantly promote your app, another more subtle way to increase awareness for your app is to deeply integrate social networking with other core features in your app. For example, if you're building a game, enabling users to share their high scores via Twitter and Facebook will not only breed synergy among players but may also attract new...

Defining Your Differentiator

Now that you've done your homework, researching your competition, I'll talk about your app's feature set. Mimicking the same features as similar apps won't propel your sales ahead of the pack. You have to offer something more, something better than the existing solutions. What can your app do that makes it better than the rest of your competition If you're building a parked-car finder app, what makes your app different from the others You need to define one or more unique differentiators that...

App Store Identity Badge

The most common element you'll see on most iPhone app-related web sites is the official App Store identity badge that shows a little iPhone icon with the words Available on the App Store. To obtain this graphic, you'll need to log into the iPhone Dev Center at http developer.apple.com iphone and then navigate your way to the iPhone Developer Program Portal. Within the Portal site, click Distribution in the left menu, and then select the App Store tab see Figure 8-6 . You'll see the identity...

Participating in Interviews and Podcasts

It goes without saying that invitations by the press and the developer community to be interviewed for a story or a featured guest on a popular podcast should always be accepted when your schedule permits. This can have a similar effect to publishing frequent blog articles and Twitter posts, enabling consumers and peers to learn more about you as a person and business owner.

Google AdSense for Mobile Applications

Predicted to be a major player in the mobile space, Google's widely successful AdSense program definitely has a massive inventory of existing advertisers to offer. Its mobile AdSense platform was currently in beta at the time of this writing, but for those of you interested, you can sign up for it online. With Google AdSense ads already showing up in AdWhirl and Mobclix's network exchanges, as well as directly integrated within a few select, high-profile iPhone apps, Google AdSense for Mobile...