A Million-Downloads of Your iphone App – Is it possible?

In a previous post I talk about how my friend asked me if I would promote their suite of iphone apps. His main goal was, how to get a million downloads. This prompted a mini research project and post; one that I hope is useful information for developers.

One Million Downloads

The 10 billionth download from the Apple App Store took place on Saturday, January 22, 2011. Of the approximately 400,000 plus iphone apps available, how many individual iphone apps were downloaded at least a million times?

In the last ten months (April 2010 – January 2011), the top-five iphone app stories that sold / downloaded at least a million times were: Cut the Rope, Dominos, Motion Portrait, PayPal and Bubble Ball. To reach one million downloads; these successes took between 3 weeks and 3 months for two reasons:

The first and most obvious reason, these apps were launched by companies that are globally recognized, have a large budget, or have an established stake in the game industry — like Electronic Arts’ Chillingo, “an international marketer, publisher and distributor of video games.”

The second and most inspirational reason— the human-interest story about a 14-year boy and his mom from Spanish Fork, Utah. The boy went to the public library and found a SDK (Software Developer’s Kit) and spent a little over a month coding Bubble Ball while his mom helped in the design stages; his app surpassed Cut the Rope on January 24, 2011.

500,000 Downloads

In the last seven months (June 2010 – January 18, 2011), the top-five iphone app stories that were sold / downloaded at least 500,000 were: Argos, Pocket Frogs, Thumbplay Rocks, Bento and GoDaddy.

The time span for reaching 500,000 downloads is longer; between 5 days and 17 months, where the app that sold in 5 days was for the update release for the already popular game, Pocket Frogs. Again, established companies with big budgets launched these apps.

The Average Downloads

One article in particular that shared the actual sale numbers provided real insights on the realities of developing and marketing mobile apps.

Iphone App Sales Exposed (May 2010)
“… 96 developers who provided in-depth sales data and pricing metrics. The average total number of units sold was 101,024 copies within an average period of 261 days.”

My Two Cents

I come away from this research with three strategies:

One, create a bunch of apps you think will be purchased at least 100,000 times. Making sure that your ROI (return on investment… time and money… developing and marketing the app) is worth the effort.

Two, get a suite of apps developed and find an established distributor that will market your product (so that you get to do what you love… develop).

Or three, check out this guy that knows the business of mobile apps (or someone like him). If anything, educate yourself about the general landscape for business development and marketing – it’ll help refine and further your vision, while also prepares you when you’re looking for the right partner to execute marketing strategies.

Nicholas Lovell
http://www.gamesbrief.com/about/

What price an iPhone app? 19% less than last year (January 10, 2011)
http://www.gamesbrief.com/2011/01/what-price-an-iphone-app-19-less-than-last-year/

A lecture he gave at Edinburgh Interactive 2010: Part 1
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8BejCxzuc4

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