Hot answers tagged mobile-apps
8
Why not have the best of both worlds? Offer in-app subscriptions at $1.50 per month and yearly subscriptions via the website at $12. Don't offer annual subscriptions in-app.
This way customers don't see any price differences between the website and the app. All they see is that a month by month subscription is $1.50 and that you offer a better price for an ...
7
My answer is "Yes" as well. This is really a problem with Apple where you've got only 100 beta testers.
Don't forget that Lean Startup is not just about testing several versions of the product - but is a kind of ideology which you could apply in your startup.
Your first step should be an MVP (minimum viable product) which should get you some testers. You ...
4
YES, It can
The principles of the Lean Startup can most definitely be applied. You can launch a MVP quickly and iterate from there. (Sure it might take a week or two extra to go live, but that's part of the game)
When you run a beta, it truly is a beta. Users will have to give you their UUID's and you'll have to install software but software like ...
4
I've written a number of WP7 apps and have been reasonably successful in the market. I took the plunge and decided to convert one of the apps over to a W8 Metro app. There's some stuff you really need to know going forward...
First: Technical
Metro apps are using a subset of .Net 4.5. Windows Phone uses a version of Silverlight, so these are using ...
3
First of, where the owners (investors) live really has nothing to do with "doing business".
Doing business in a state (USA) generally is taken to mean some sort of physical presence. This could be an office, warehouse, manufacturing plant, data-center etc. It could even be a hot dog cart that you stored in NJ and brought into NYC during the day. In this ...
3
Eric Ries does a great job in his book of showing through case studies how the Lean Startup approach has worked in various industries and established companies. The key is to stick to the fundamentals: MVP, smaller batches, testable hypotheses, etc. Considering that many lean methods come from manufacturing (e.g. Toyota), this is definitely not just for the ...
3
iPhone has a good edge for a first platform for several reasons:
Market share (Google demographics of mobile market and I think you'll see your target user is heavily iPhone centric).
Do a little informal market research. Walk into several local restaurants and spend 15 minutes counting the number of iPhones vs other platforms. I believe iPhone will ...
3
There've been valid points made for both Android and iPhone. I've led development and defined the business case for iPhone, Android, BlackBerry and java versions of our product, and based on that I have some perspectives:
my iPhone apps let me sleep well. The dictatorial rule of the app store make it easier for me to know my apps work, by and large. The ...
3
AFAIK Apple don't allow you to have "In App" purchases without using their system and giving them their cut. Doing so is a ToS violation and could get your app pulled.
As far as I can work out you can do a simple link to a web page from your app.
Even Amazon had to comply
...
3
It is not a "gold mine" or a "lottery". It is a business like any other.
Build something people will pay for and market it, you will make money if you execute well enough.
Mobile apps are really not so different to any other software or any other business. Don't get hung up on Apple's cut, I know I wouldn't have bought 75% of the mobile apps I have ...
3
It depends on quite a lot of parameters. I will try to answer this in a general way.
If you have a family or some other responsibility where finances are quite important? This could be a risk.
How easy is it for you to find a new job?
I feel over a long run finances become more important as the work gets pretty static in nature. Do you see this as a long ...
3
You will always get a lot more people saying they will test than actually testing. With this in mind, make sure you get a lot more committed to testing than you need.
As for paying, I wouldn't have them pay and I wouldn't pay them. I don't think payment is the answer to this problem.
You need to inspire them with the vision of your product and you need ...
3
(disclaimer: not knowing what your product does nor what your customer group is, this will be a more generic answer)
Alpha-testing
This is very often an incomplete stage of the cycle and IMO will require experienced testers that is familiar with the development process as there could be missing some functionality. Ideally alpha-testing should be done ...
3
Those kinds of services are almost always trouble. I would personally stay away. Find the smallest demographic and number of people needed to get critical mass in an area, and promote it like crazy. If that's your own town or city, then get your friends using it. If you're really after female runners, then talk to the local running store and running clubs ...
2
If you're talking about a native app that needs to be in the "store" (IOS/App Store, Android/Play) there are platform restrictions to consider. Apple wants you to use their store for most uses (and takes a 30% cut). There are companies like parse that make the in-app purchase handling process simpler.
HTML5 apps are browser based and free of these ...
2
This doesn't sound like a startup to me. You're saying company has 20-40 employees, no outside investment, and is profitable.
That's a founder's home run.
Anyhow, usually, stock options are part of the risk premium of joining a biz that has a dangerous future.
But in this scenario, there's way less risk!
How many stock options would this engineer get if ...
2
It's perfectly acceptable to change your business model, but definitely be aware of backlash.
Recently Chargify, which makes a Web-based system that small companies use to manage billing, made some major changes to their model and it pissed a lot of people off. To me, the problem was in communication.
I don't mean communication when they made the change, ...
2
You've got limited time and limited resources. Instead of thinking about the market at large, think about the market segments and companies where you have the highest probability of generating a deal. Use LinkedIn and other social media tools to find connections with anyone you can find at the companies you are contemplating, then narrow the field down to a ...
2
IANAL and IANAA
The best answer I could find on the subject of doing business in a particular state is here
If you have employees in a state or own or lease property in a state, you're probably doing business in that state. That means you'll be liable for income taxes and other filings. On the other hand, if your only connection with a state is that you ...
2
Apple in-app purchase is only for (and required for) non-tangible goods. For that, they get 30%.
IF you are selling tangible goods (shirts, etc) use other services like braintreepayments or zooz
2
I have no idea how to estimate the amount of sales you are going to get, but I suspect with so many variables there just isn't a way to have a number with any relevant level of accuracy.
If you just want a number to make you feel better than choose a number that does that. If you want to an actual number that's realistic so you can make decisions based off ...
2
If you're not able to estimate this for your market for your product, then
People outside of that market and that product won't be able to, and
You need to get some understanding of the basics of product
lifecycle.
There are fairly basic processes around product lifecycle, evaluating ideas, protoptyping, gathering feedback, evaluating markets, performing ...
2
CPM rates vary by vertical according to the number of advertisers. The more advertisers there are, the higher the price.
For example, there are dozens of online brokers promoting a trading account/platform, so anything related to stocks or investing will have a high CPM. On the other hand, there are fewer grocers advertising online, so those ads cost (and ...
2
Sam: Is there a compelling reason to have a native app vs an HTML5 app? If you could leverage your current site and make it "responsive" (ie. provide mobile specific enhancements) then you wouldn't have to go through the hassle of creating an IOS / android app. Also consider that an IOS app requires a 30% vig to apple.
2
I would stop making Windows Phone 7 apps immediately and move on to Windows 8.
Windows Phone 7 Apps will run on Windows Phone 8, but in legacy mode. And Windows Phone 7 will not be able to upgrade to Windows Phone 8, so it is basically dead.
More people use Windows than Android and iPhone combined ... so there is a huge marketplace.
Windows Phone 8 ...
2
Well as far as when to use it, the question is simple. ALWAYS!!!
This explains to people what they can and can not do. Even if you distribute the software free, have your sources exposed, and put no restrictions on redistribution, just state that. Otherwise you're leaving things too open. People won't redistribute or extend for fears of copyright violation. ...
2
Typically your web application is full featured, giving you every possible capability on the website. Mobile applications are usually created for convenient access to critical features that you may need to get at from anywhere. For a marketplace exchange it may be convenient access to messaging, or ability to look at products you are selling or buying and ...
1
Using Parse or Cloudmine is perfectly viable, and does indeed allow you to focus on the product rather than a complex backend. In many situations, such a flexible solution might actually be preferable to creating a backend that may need to change significantly as the product changes during it's early stages.
1
Great question and good point about focusing on the app itself. There are more and more BAAS companies every day, and it might be a good idea to consider them, although I haven't looked into their prices.
On the other hand, if you want to prototype fast, and cheap in the same time, why don't you just forget about the scalability issues of your backend ...
1
I guess you could try it and see how it goes. The downside seems to be that it becomes harder for advertisers to discover the opportunity to advertise on your app. Advertisers in general are looking to advertise their stuff on any app or site that's relevant, so they go to (say) Google AdWords and enter the ad, and then it's displayed in a bunch of places ...
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