iTunes App Store: Lessons from the first 30 months TOC: February - - PowerPoint PPT Presentation

iTunes App Store: Lessons from the first 30 months

TOC: February 2011

Ben Lorica twitter.com/BIGDATA twitter.com/DLIMAN

Data for this talk: U.S. iTunes store (Jul/2008 - present)

ALL-TIME Rankings - Downloads through mid Jan/2011

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PAID FREE

# of Apps on All-time Rankings

Top 100 iPhone iPad Top 10,000

ALL-TIME Top PAID Apps - Share of GAMES

53% 36% 52% 35% Top 1,000 38% 26%

Challenge: “App discovery” in light of “Sturgeon’s Law”

<“Just like the Internet: high-volume of low quality stuff.”>

• User-Interface
• Taxonomy
• Lists: top-sellers, curated
• Software tools
• Search
• Recommendation Engine
• Third-party tools ; startups
• Lists, reviews, social

App Discovery Tools

List of “Hits”

• n the

iTunes App Store

Top Paid Top Free DEVICE iTunes Top Grossing Top 50 Overall Top 200 Overall Category Top 200 Overall Category

Top Charts - Jun/2010 to present

“Velocity of Hits”

Initial app store appearance Debut on Top 200 List

# of Days

Days until debut: Overall Top 200 Charts

MEDIAN Age in Days on Top 200 Debut

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iPad iPhone

Top 200 lists since June/2010, and apps that launched after the launch of the iPad.

Duration on Top 200 Long-term Hit =>30 or more days on Top 200 List

Duration - What share of ‘hits’ last a month or longer?

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Share of Top 200 apps that spent at least 30 days on Top Chart

Apps that have appeared, in the main Top 200 charts, since Jun/2010.

iPad iPhone

MEDIAN Duration: Top 200 Paid iPhone & iPad Apps

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MEDIAN Unique Days in Category Top 200 Paid iPad & iPhone Apps List (since June/2010)

iPad iPhone

For Paid apps: Effectiveness of simple “Pricing” experiments

iTunes Pricing: Overview

Quick Visual Comparison of Large iTunes Categories

Average Median Variation “Middle 50%” 25th percentile

to 75th percentile

MEDIAN

75th percentile 25th percentile

Variation (Interquartile Range)

Middle 50% , Median, and the Interquartile Range

Games => Median $0.99 ; Middle 50 = [$0.99 to $2.99] Reference => Median $1.99 ; Middle 50 = [$0.99 to $4.99]

iPhone: ALL-TIME Top 500 Paid apps in each category Price of All-time Top 500 Paid iPhone Apps in each category

Games => Median $1.99 ; Middle 50 = [$0.99 to $3.99] Reference => Median $2.99 ; Middle 50 = [$1.99 to $9.99]

iPad: ALL-TIME Top 500 Paid apps in each category Price of All-time Top 500 Paid iPad Apps in each category

Price ($)

Rank 100 200 $2 $4

Revised Experiment

Analysis of Top 200 iPhone apps that cut their prices

In some categories: A price decrease, leads to a rank decrease ... on day of price change

But, the effect of a price cut disappears within days.

Curated Lists remain very influential

New & Noteworthy What’s Hot Overall DEVICE iTunes Overall & in Category Staff Favorites Overall

Lists of Featured Apps - Jun/2010 to present

• May/2010 survey of 96 developers
• “Being featured by Apple is the

greatest contributor to spiking sales.”

• “ New and Noteworthy produced

slightly less gains than Staff Favorites or What’s Hot ”.

App Discovery and Featured Apps

App gets Featured

Rank 100 500

Revised Experiment

BEFORE AFTER

Featured Apps and Rank - Sep/2009 to May/2010

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Degree outperformed “Expected” Rank

+60%

(Ranks compared on days immediately after being featured.)

Becoming a Featured App - “Tips” from devs

• What’s Hot
• Consistent sales over a period of time
• “fast-movers” in terms of sales rank
• Popular apps that have been updated
• New and Noteworthy
• Use new features of device
• Uniqueness, Quality, Clean design

MEDIAN Age at debut on “Featured” Lists

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What’s Hot New & Noteworthy

MEDIAN Age in Days when an App gets Featured

U.S. App Store (Jun/2010 - present)

AVG # of Apps in the Main “New & Noteworthy” List

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MEDIAN Weekly # of of Unique Apps

• n the Main “New & Noteworthy”

List

U.S. App Store (Jun/2010 - present)

iPad iPhone

Wisdom of the crowd: Top 200 Paid Top 200 Free Top 200 Grossing

Wisdom of Apple: New & Noteworthy What’s Hot Staff Favorites

Final Tip: Consolidate paid & free apps

• Oct/2009: Apple allows “in-app”

purchases for Free Apps

• Freemium model => unlock

premium features (demo-to-pay)

• Develop, maintain, & market, ONE

app

In-app Purchases and Free Apps

“Free” Top 200 Grossing Apps - since June/2010

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Share of FREE Apps

iPad iPhone

Category Top 200 Grossing Apps (Jun/2010 - present)

Share of Free Apps has risen steadily

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Oct/2009: In-app purchases for Free Apps

Questions?

twitter.com/BIGDATA twitter.com/DLIMAN