Applications
Wish Lists and Want Button Coming to Facebook
Source: Ina Steiner EcommerceBytes.com September 23, 2011
Facebook users will soon have access to shopping “wish lists” and “want” buttons. Payvment, one of the first developers to offer Facebook storefronts back in 2009, said it would integrate with the new just-announced functionality so that sellers can increase visibility for popular products. The new features will help online sellers by getting shoppers to share their products on the social networking site.
Facebook will allow developers to customize the actions within their app and the News Feed story generated by each action. Payvment’s integration will offer sellers an increase in visibility for the products that shoppers want, own and like and will make the News Feed experience more relevant and meaningful for shoppers and their friends.
When a user clicks a Payvment “Want” button, Facebook will add the item to their Wish List on their profile and will display a News Feed Story on that user’s wall that reads, “Jane wants a Falling Waters Mini Fountain at the Shopping Mall on Facebook,” for example.
According to Payvment, this also enables conversations and comments made on Payvment to be customized to drive more social discovery, such as “Jim reviewed” or “Jane loved” a particular product.
Payvment plans to customize the Wish List feature to enable creation of wedding and baby registries, holiday and birthday wish lists and more. And, no doubt, other storefront providers and retailers will follow their lead.
Retailers’ Apps Must Decide Strategy: Enrich Or Engage
Source: Online Media Daily, Mark Walsh, Feb 9, 2012, 5:57 PM
Most retailers have stumbled out of the gate when it comes to mobile strategy, creating weak, fragmented apps and mobile properties in their haste to gain a foothold in the mobile space. The problem is that companies have focused on the means — mobile — at the expense of the end — transactions and customer engagement, according to a new report from digital consulting firm Altimeter Group.
The key for retailers going mobile is to figure out which of those two goals — sales or building customer relations — is their main objective, and then build applications accordingly. While the report warns against rushing headlong into mobile development, it underscores that smartphones are rapidly turning consumers into mobile shoppers.
The average smartphone user spends over an hour a day interacting with the device, and one of the top three activities is shopping. “Smartphone users expect to be able to turn to their devices for every informational need and have it met immediately. When shopping, this means finding the quickest route to products and pricing,” states the study authored by Altimeter mobile analyst Chris Silva.
The report specifically pointed to apps by Abercrombie & Fitch and Longhorn Steakhouse as examples of offerings that are long on design and mobile tricks (3D graphics and motion-based effects) but short on utility and shopping-centric tools. Conversely, brands such as Starbucks and Best Buy have developed apps that aim to solve customer problems, like cutting in-store wait times or making product information widely available.
Altimeter boils down what approach retailers should take in mobile to two basic options: enrich or engage. The former is a strategy focused on driving transactions and measured in overall purchases, purchase size or frequency, and same-store metrics.
The other is geared toward building brand affinity. “The focus is on bringing shoppers closer to the brand to drive interaction — not just spend,” the report states.
Altimeter identified four types of apps that successfully either enrich or engage consumers: informational, buy/ship, multichannel “lite” and multichannel “heavy.” The first refers to apps designed to enrich the experience by providing information on retail outlets, high-level and non-product-specific information. Brands with apps in this category include Century 21, Hilton Hotels and Toyota.
Buy/Ship apps allow buyers to look up products and purchases for later offline home delivery. This is the most common type of app, and strong brands in this area include Amazon, Wine.com and Zappos.
Multichannel apps are designed to assist in-store shoppers, with “heavy” ones allowing deeper interaction and the option of purchasing products through the app. In addition to Starbucks and Best Buy, the two multichannel categories include apps from Walmart and Walgreens.
Loyal Users Generate 25% More In-App Purchases
Source: Localytics, 2012-01-18
In-app purchases are the lifeblood of many apps, and although it may seem like getting users to the sale proposition quickly is ideal, a new Localytics study finds that building relationships with app users and fostering long-term usage are more important. Of all users in Localytics’ study who made an in-app purchase, 44% did not do so until they had interacted with the app at least ten times. On average, a user who makes an in-app purchase will do so 12 days after first launching the app.
In research from last year, Localytics found that 26% of apps are used only once after being downloaded. As a result, the app publisher community has made a concerted effort to shift away from incentivized downloads and towards engagement and overall customer lifetime value (CLV).
With this new data, that shift is shown to be even more important. With a high correlation between highly engaged users and in-app purchases, developers and publishers with a goal of maximizing CLV have even more reason to obsess over user retention. The more your users interact with your app, the more likely you are to get a chunk of the $5.6 billion in in-app purchases expected by 2015.
Engagement leads to higher CLV
Even more, the users who wait and interact with an app multiple times before making their first in-app purchase are more valuable in the long run, making 25% more in-app purchases over their lifetime as a customer. First session purchasers will make an average of 2.8 purchases in a given app during their user lifetime, compared with 3.5 purchases for all other purchasers.
While moving users towards a purchase as quickly as possible is often considered the primary objective, this data suggests that turning purchasers into loyal, repeat users should be a top priority. While a first-session purchase is an excellent result, our data found that only 16% of users who make a purchase their first app session will go on to engage with that app 10 or more times, compared with 26% of overall app users. Thus, it is imperative that app developers and marketers pay special attention to their analytics solution’s loyalty features.
Grow customer lifetime value
By building your app’s engagement and your brand’s presence in a user’s mind, you can generate better overall revenue based on a loyal base of repeat users. Given the 12 day average time between downloading an app and making a purchase, driving loyalty across a period of weeks will often generate greater revenue.
At Localytics, we help app developers and marketers build more successful and profitable apps with the highest possible CLV through retention analysis and using funnel analysis to optimize in-app purchases. To enable these analyses, app publishers track each purchase and the steps taken to complete the purchase. For the purposes of this study, Localytics analyzed nearly 30 million users’ in-app purchasing to extract patterns publishers can use to benchmark their own apps’ performance.
Increase In-app Revenue With User Loyalty
Source: Getjar
In the last post, we wrote about the huge future the freemium model for mobile apps (65% of all mobile revenue by 2015). But setting up a successful freemium model is easier said than done. GigaOm had some statistics in an article that came out yesterday. Essentially, using data from Localytics, GigaOm shows that the longer a customer uses your app, the more likely they are to purchase in-app content. This should be a surprise to anyone that’s played a freemium game. Once you’re hooked, it’s difficult not to spend a buck or two to keep playing.
Essentially, you need to focus on loyalty over quick sales. After all, according to Localytics, 26 percent of app users abandon an app after one try.
You’re goign to lose that 26% no matter what, so focus on giving the remaining 74% a great experience. Ideally, such a great experience that they’re willing to buy some in-app content. It takes an average user 12 days after the first use of an app before they’re willing to whip out their wallet. On top of that, only 22% of users make a purchase on their first try of an app, and 33% buy something between two and nine uses. But here’s the kicker: 44 percent make their first purchase after 10 or more uses.
But this begs the question, how do you hook someone without being manipulative or too aggressive? There are a number of ways, but for starters, look at your barriers. For arguments sake, you have a fishing game. In this fishing game, there is a certain high value fish that swims by on a set interval. If a user wants the fish to swim by sooner, they can pay for that with in-game currency. If your set interval is too small, say a few minutes, the user will never pay to speed up the process. However, set you interval too high, say a few days, and the user may feel manipulated. Asking a user who is unwilling or unable to purchase an item to come back in a few days is unreliable at best. At this point you’re going to start losing potential paying customers.
Another issue could be your in-app currency exchange rate. In your hypothetical fishing game, the in-game currency is called Fish Bucks. A user can earn Fish Bucks, or they can purchase bundles within the app. If you price fish bucks at a one to one exchange real world dollars, a user can put a real dollar amount on the purchases. If a feature costs 2 Fish Bucks, is costs 2 real life dollars, which can be harder for a user to justify. However, if you change the conversion rate so that 1 real life dollar is equal to, say, 1000 Fish Bucks, it comes harder to compare to real world money and thus easier to spend. There are many real life examples of this: Arcade tickets, Disney Dollars, gift certificates, etc.
Being successful in this space is all about walking a fine line between providing an engaging experience and getting paid for your hard work. What works for your? Let us know in the comments!
Smartphone App Riches Linked to In-App Purchases
Source: Mobile Marketing Watch, January 17, 2012 — By Michael
The path to smartphone app riches seems pretty clear. If you don’t possess an in-app purchase strategy, there’s a good chance you’re going to make less money than those who have one.
According to the latest information and analysis provided Tuesday from IHS Screen Digest, the best way to make money in the smartphone apps market is to give the apps away for free-and and then generate revenue on subsequent sales of in-app purchases.
The new projections published today from IHS show that in-app purchases will rise to account for 64 percent of total market revenue in 2015, up from 39 percent in 2011.
Revenue from in-app purchases will increase to $5.6 billion in 2015, up from $970 million in 2011, according to the IHS Screen Digest Mobile Media Intelligence Service.
“Smartphone users overwhelmingly prefer free apps to paid apps, as we estimate 96 percent of all smartphone apps were downloaded for free in 2011,” noted Jack Kent, senior analyst, mobile media for IHS. “In 2012, it will become increasingly difficult for app stores and developers to justify charging an upfront fee for their products when faced with competition from a plethora of free content. Instead, the apps industry must fully embrace the freemium model and monetize content through in-app purchases.”
IHS Screen Digest calculates that 68 percent of the top-grossing U.S. applications featured some form of additional content or functionality available via an in-app purchase.
Do you have as much faith in the business model of in-app purchases as all the analysts and mobile experts do? Please weigh in with a thought or comment below.
How to make money with mobile apps
Our two cents:
It’s important that people understand the four ways to monetize apps:
- Paid downloads
Set a fixed price for your app, customers purchase it, and the transaction usually ends there - Exclusive sponsorships
May establish yourself enough to make your next app a success, but not always economically feasible - In-app purchases
Customers may not pay anything at the beginning (”freemium”), but will have the opportunity to make purchases within the app to enhance the experience - Advertising
Provided you have a good match between app and advertiser and an installed base large enough to support the volume of impressions needed for profit
By Ed Burnette | January 16, 2012, 7:51pm PST, ZD Net
Summary: You too can be a success at building and selling mobile apps. Read Gregory Kennedy’s advice on how to develop a successful app and turn that success into a career.
As director of global marketing at mobile ad network InMobi, Gregory Kennedy has learned a thing or two about helping developers make money with mobile apps. In this Q&A, Gregory offers some advice for app developers of all platforms.
What’s the key to success as a mobile developer?
[Gregory] Focus on providing customers a great value proposition. If you’re making games, they need to take maximum advantage of the mobile experience. Angry Birds is the best example of this. The gameplay is simple and you only need a few minutes to play to the next level. It’s ideal for mobile. Sustaining success in digital media is more challenging, we’ve seen huge companies rise and fall in only a few short years. Being flexible enough to evolve is key, but you also need to develop a strong sense of what works in digital and stick to it.
Once you have an idea that works, then what? How do you turn that into profit?
There are four—and only four—ways to make money with apps. The most obvious is through paid downloads, in which you set a fixed price for your app, customers purchase it, and the transaction usually ends there. You could also seek an exclusive sponsor for your app. It’s not the most economically sustainable method of monetizing, but it might help you establish yourself enough to make your next app a success. Then, there are the increasingly prominent in-app purchases, in which your customer might not have to pay anything at the beginning (”freemium”), but will have the opportunity to make purchases within the app to enhance the experience.
[Read: Survey says: Mobile gamers prefer free games that are full of fertilizer]
And finally, you can sell advertising space within your app. Provided you have a good match between app and advertiser and an installed base large enough to support the volume of impressions needed for profit, this can actually make you more money than you can with a pay-per-download model. I always recommend developers mix and match models to their particular app business. The more monetization strategies you can employ, the more money you will earn.
What about marketing?
With over one Million apps in the world, competition is fierce. You can have the greatest app in the world, but if you can’t get the word out about it, nobody’s going to download it.
Should I worry about piracy?
If you’re developing apps for iOS only, you won’t really need to worry about it. Apple is committed to copyright and has done a good job at protecting the eco-system. But of course Apple isn’t the only player in the game, and piracy is becoming an issue with Android apps. Here at InMobi, we’re actually working on a technology that will still display ads in pirated apps, so that you continue to make money from your advertisers.
If you don’t develop for Android you’re missing out on a huge segment of the market. In a recent Mobile Insights Report, which covered August through October of 2011, we found that 31.1% of mobile ads were displayed on an Android device. Piracy is also not an issue if you focus on ad supported apps. Plus, unlike iOS apps, Android apps are available through multiple stores worldwide, so your potential for exposure can actually be even greater.
Before joining InMobi you spent many years as an artist and creative director. Why did you transition to high-tech marketing?
I was always good at that strategy and concept aspect of advertising. I found my clients responding positively, so after a while it just made sense for me to go onto the business side full-time. I like to jokingly say that a good creative director is 85% marketing manager, 10% high school principal, and 5% creative. When I transitioned, I only had to give up that 5%.
iPhone Apps finder – A handy tool for finding the right app
Not only do these guys neatly bucket apps by category, they have reviews of them as well. This is especially helpful for the pricier apps that may be somewhat unproven. They do not accept money for the reviews, but they do have advertising on the site.
comScore Reports November 2011 U.S. Mobile Subscriber Market Share
One-third of Mobile Subscribers Access Social Networking on Mobile Device
RESTON, VA, December 29, 2011 – comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today released data from the comScore MobiLens service, reporting key trends in the U.S. mobile phone industry during the three month average period ending November 2011. The study surveyed more than 30,000 U.S. mobile subscribers and found Samsung to be the top handset manufacturer overall with 25.6 percent market share. Google Android continued to capture share in the smartphone market to reach 46.9 percent market share.
OEM Market Share
For the three-month average period ending in November, 234 million Americans age 13 and older used mobile devices. Device manufacturer Samsung ranked as the top OEM with 25.6 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers (up 0.3 percentage points), followed by LG with 20.5 percent share and Motorola with 13.7 percent share. Apple strengthened its position at #4 with 11.2 percent share of total mobile subscribers (up 1.4 percentage points), while RIM rounded out the top five with 6.5 percent share.
| Top Mobile OEMs 3 Month Avg. Ending Nov. 2011 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending Aug. 2011 Total U.S. Mobile Subscribers (Smartphone & Non-Smartphone) Ages 13+ Source: comScore MobiLens |
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| Share (%) of Mobile Subscribers | |||
| Aug-11 | Nov-11 | Point Change | |
| Total Mobile Subscribers | 100.0% | 100.0% | N/A |
| Samsung | 25.3% | 25.6% | 0.3 |
| LG | 21.0% | 20.5% | -0.5 |
| Motorola | 14.0% | 13.7% | -0.3 |
| Apple | 9.8% | 11.2% | 1.4 |
| RIM | 7.1% | 6.5% | -0.6 |
Smartphone Platform Market Share
91.4 million people in the U.S. owned smartphones during the three months ending in November, up 8 percent from the preceding three month period. Google Android ranked as the top smartphone platform with 46.9 percent market share, up 3.1 percentage points from the prior three-month period. Apple maintained its #2 position, growing 1.4 percentage point to 28.7 percent of the smartphone market. RIM ranked third with 16.6 percent share, followed by Microsoft (5.2 percent) and Symbian (1.5 percent).
| Top Smartphone Platforms 3 Month Avg. Ending Nov. 2011 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending Aug. 2011 Total U.S. Smartphone Subscribers Ages 13+ Source: comScore MobiLens |
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| Share (%) of Smartphone Subscribers | |||
| Aug-11 | Nov-11 | Point Change | |
| Total Smartphone Subscribers | 100.0% | 100.0% | N/A |
| 43.8% | 46.9% | 3.1 | |
| Apple | 27.3% | 28.7% | 1.4 |
| RIM | 19.7% | 16.6% | -3.1 |
| Microsoft | 5.7% | 5.2% | -0.5 |
| Symbian | 1.8% | 1.5% | -0.3 |
Mobile Content Usage
In November, 72.6 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers used text messaging on their mobile device, up 2.1 percentage points. Downloaded applications were used by 44.9 percent of subscribers (up 3.3 percentage points), while browsers were used by 44.4 percent (up 2.3 percentage points). Accessing of social networking sites or blogs increased 2.1 percentage points to 33.0 percent of mobile subscribers. Game-playing was done by 29.7 percent of the mobile audience (up 1.2 percentage points), while 21.7 percent listened to music on their phones (up 1.0 percentage points).
| Mobile Content Usage 3 Month Avg. Ending Nov. 2011 vs. 3 Month Avg. Ending Aug. 2011 Total U.S. Mobile Subscribers (Smartphone & Non-Smartphone) Ages 13+ Source: comScore MobiLens |
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| Share (%) of Mobile Subscribers | |||
| Aug-11 | Nov-11 | Point Change | |
| Total Mobile Subscribers | 100.0% | 100.0% | N/A |
| Sent text message to another phone | 70.5% | 72.6% | 2.1 |
| Used downloaded apps | 41.6% | 44.9% | 3.3 |
| Used browser | 42.1% | 44.4% | 2.3 |
| Accessed social networking site or blog | 30.9% | 33.0% | 2.1 |
| Played Games | 28.5% | 29.7% | 1.2 |
| Listened to music on mobile phone | 20.7% | 21.7% | 1.0 |
