How to earn $80,000 a month on the App Store?
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Apple announced at the World Developers Conference that it had paid $70 billion to its app developers, with 30% of that total ($21 billion) paid last year alone. This amount of money is not only huge, but also astonishing. As for myself, my friends and I did not spend significantly more on apps last year. Of course, my personal example is not representative, so we can't help but wonder: where does the revenue of these apps come from? So I opened the App Store and looked at the Best Sellers. Step 1: Follow the smell of money Taking the US App Store as an example, if we open the "Rankings" category, we can easily find many apps developed by big companies, such as Dropbox, Evernote, and Microsoft OneDrive, and there is nothing wrong with that. But when you see the tenth best-selling software in the US App Store on June 7, 2017, you will be surprised. But when I saw its hilarious "summary", I couldn't help but break out in a cold sweat. (Translation: Abstract Full of features: -Quick Scan: Automatically scan to copy contacts, merge or delete. -Full Scan: Scan repeated names, phone numbers, emails, no names, no phone numbers, no emails. Since it was full of red flags, I didn’t download it. I looked at the reviews for this app and found some vague and fake five-star reviews: (Translation of the second review: Excellent virus removal recommendation) Step 2: Be two-faced Out of curiosity, I downloaded this "so-called" best-selling app. This is what appeared when I first opened it: Translation: This app needs to "cccess" (misspelled) your address book to scan the address book first. Yes, "This app needs to ask for your address book to scan it first." And the only option here is to click "Agree." Then iOS asked me if I agreed to "Mobile Protection" and "Screen Protect" my contacts. I personally refuse. After skipping the steps above, the app said my device was at risk. I fully agree with this. It also told me that I could now do a Device Analyze (syntax error), a Quick Scan, a Full Scan, and Protect My Network, which was exciting. Selecting "Device Analysis" shows my iPhone's total and available capacity - a useless and irrelevant feature. Clicking Quick Scan and Full Scan will display: "The address book has been cleaned. No duplicate contacts were found." It seems that there are no duplicates except the "duplicate" in "duplicate". If you click on "Protect My Network", this "ad" will pop up. It tells me that I can play Bubble Bobble without downloading it. I clicked the X in the upper left corner because I wasn't interested. Then there was this scene: It says: "Use all smart antivirus immediately" and "Cancel at any time". So I clicked the "Free Trial" button. The next thing that pops up is Touch ID. The first half of the text reads: "Use Touch ID to try the Full Virus, Malware scanner for free?" First of all, no app can scan the iPhone for viruses and malware because each app can only use its own data. The text in the lower part is even more shocking: "You will pay $99.99 for a 7-day subscription, effective June 9, 2017." Luckily I stopped in time, otherwise I would have to subscribe to this weird service which costs $100 a week. Otherwise, I'd be paying $400 a month just to have my web traffic go to a third-party server, which is not worth it. I was lucky, at least I read those few tiny lines, but would others be so lucky? Step 3: Focus on the money, don’t panic Suddenly it dawned on me that this is how this software makes $80,000 a month. If each person pays $400 per month, the software only needs to defraud 200 users per month, which means the software can make $960,000 a year. Apple will take a 30% cut, which comes to $288,000—and that’s just the profit from this one piece of software. You might ask: Even though it only takes 200 users to be deceived, will anyone actually download this app? Judging from its appearance and text description, everyone should be dismissive of it. Maybe you and I will never download this software, just like I have never clicked on Google 's ads. But Google's Adwords (Google's main advertising service product and Google's main source of revenue) is worth $700 billion today. To get 200 subscribers out of 50,000 downloaders, all it takes is a shaky hand from 0.4% of them. This 0.4% may just be a conservative estimate, because this app will automatically renew its service, so the number of subscribers will increase every month. Can you really guarantee that some of your "electronically illiterate" relatives won't accidentally (or deliberately) order this app for virus protection? But how did this app have 50,000 downloads? I once read that many apps are discovered through the search function in the App Store. Therefore, maybe this app has excellent search optimization mechanism. For example, I searched for “virus scanner” in the App Store: It appears that these apps are taking advantage of Apple's relatively new and immature App Store search advertising system. They exploit the fact that Apple does not filter and approve ad content, and these ads look indistinguishable from real search results. Sometimes, the entire first page of search results is taken over by ads. After that, I investigated further and found that these spam ads were not isolated incidents. They dominate the App Store's "Best Sellers" charts. And their keywords are not just "Security". “Wi-Fi” is an example. Type in "wifi" and the top search result is also an advertisement: "WEP Password Generator", a simple string generator with a subscription price of US$50/month. Even though it was only listed in April, it is now making $10,000 a month. Not only that, because the advertising review loopholes are huge and the junk apps are profitable, they even started to copy each other. Start with me and save the App Store Faced with the rampant spread of these junk apps, are we really helpless? No, we can probably: 1. Teach your friends and family who are not very good with electronic products how to check and terminate the renewal service. If you have already ordered, seek a refund from the official. 2. Report spam apps through the Contact Us form in iTunes Connect. Select "Feedback & Complaints", then select "Report False Information". 3. Retweet to support this article. How can Apple save the App Store? It's hard to believe that Apple officially has no idea about the current state of the App Store. Maybe they think the current situation is not a big deal, or maybe they think these junk ads are making them a lot of money. Anyway, here are a few suggestions: 1. Remove spam ads and refund victims : This may be the simplest and most direct approach. Apple could have someone actively review app rankings on a regular basis and remove spam. For users who have been deceived, Apple should automatically refund the full amount. 2. Better user interface and Touch ID payment method : Don’t display the app price in small fonts on the Touch ID interface. App prices must be prominently displayed, and there must be a delay of at least five seconds after the price is displayed before the purchase can proceed. During these five seconds, the latest/most valuable reviews of the app can be displayed. 3. Stricter subscription review mechanism : Why does an in-app purchase called "Full Virus, Malware scanner" cost $400/month? Why are features claiming to be “Free Trial” actually “Buy Now”? Apple needs to conduct more stringent scrutiny of in-app purchases. 4. When deleting an app, it prompts you to "cancel your subscription at the same time" : Many one-star reviewers said that they were still charged even after deleting the junk apps. It's hard to imagine how Apple could justify doing this. Apple should prompt users to cancel their subscriptions when they delete an app. 5. Easier cancellation service : Subscription services are difficult to cancel. On iOS 10, canceling a subscription is a nine-step process, which is more complicated than installing a third-party keyboard (six steps). 6. A more responsible search advertising system : Loopholes in the search advertising system are one of the reasons why these junk apps are rampant. Many people don’t even know they are clicking on an ad. Apple needs to at least check whether the ad content is true before approving it, and more clearly mark that the first search result is an ad recommendation. 7. Penalty policy and legal measures : This suggestion is placed last because Apple is unlikely to adopt it. Apple has no incentive to root out junk apps. At most, Apple will cancel the accounts of bad publishers - however, this will not have any substantial effect. The makers of junk apps still have their vested interests, and as long as they register another account, they can run rampant again. Final Thoughts App developers create value for their products through their innovation. These apps help improve people's living standards, and consumers are happy to buy such apps, which is a win-win situation. Not only that, a successful app requires excellent design, sophisticated R&D, outstanding sales promotion , and hard work. Therefore, junk apps not only defraud consumers, but are also extremely unfair and unethical to other app developers who are working hard in their respective fields. Why would a scammer who writes a useless junk program and preys on innocent consumers earn more than other hard-working developers? Mobile application product promotion service: APP promotion service Qinggua Media advertising The author of this article @Evan compiled and published by (Qinggua Media). Please indicate the author information and source when reprinting! Site Map |
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