Marketing Spam?

Silky · October 17, 2012, 12:35pm

I’m getting various emails from people/companies claiming that for a price, they will get my app more ratings/reviews. At first thought, this seems like a big scam, but I wouldn’t know. Has anyone ever tried this service? [import]uid: 114389 topic_id: 32057 reply_id: 332057[/import]

Omnigeek_Media · October 17, 2012, 2:26pm

Some are scams, some are real business models. But before you sign up with any of them, make sure you understand the deal and how much you will really make out of it.

If you have a 99 cent app in the Apple iTunes store, you’ get $0.70 (the other markets, $0.69)… If someone says for $5000, they guarantee you 50,000 clicks, then you’re paying $0.10 per click. If everyone bought your app, that would be $0.60 per app, a pretty reasonable conversion rate. But if those 50,000 clicks only turn into 5,000 sales. Suddenly you’ve paid $1.00 to make $0.70 In other words you have lost money.

I have yet to see one of these type sites where the math worked out even with a 25% conversion rate. In our example 25% of 50000 clicks that works out to paying $0.40 to make $0.70 (though one could argue that the $3,700 in cash in profit isn’t too bad. But to most people that would be an atrocious cost to acquire customers.

Another type of invite that will come your way is to pay for “Expedited Reviews” on review sites. First it’s a pretty unethical practice. As a journalist, could you imagine if you picked up your newspaper and the articles written there were done with the reporter getting paid by the person they are reporting on? At the least you would have to treat it as a fluff piece and not a fair unbiased report. But that seems to be the norm in the app business as a way to get information about your product out. You are in effect paying for advertising, which is where people can ethically get away for this since there is the understanding that app review sites are just paid ad sites. You will get a reach of several thousand people via people who follow the review site, their twitter and face book posts. But no one can confirm a conversion rate which seems to be very, very low. So lets say the review site is charging $100 for an expedited review and you want your cost to get a sale to be no more than 10 cents out of your 70. You then need to move 1,000 units from that $100 buy. If you have a 10% sale rate per click, then you need 10,000 clicks. Most banner ads on websites are only getting a 2-3% click through rate and who knows what the real rate is for these review sites, but lets be generous and say they can get 10% of their audience to click through. You need a site with 100,000 viewers to get 10,000 clicks that sell 1,000 units to get a 10 cent per app sold marketing cost. Still $6000 for 1000 units isn’t bad from a $100 investment, but if those very generous numbers break down, like a 3% click through rate, then 100K audience is only 3000 clicks that you might get 300 sales from and now that’s 30 cents to get that customer.

So do your math first and do your research.
[import]uid: 19626 topic_id: 32057 reply_id: 127754[/import]

Omnigeek_Media · October 17, 2012, 2:26pm

Some are scams, some are real business models. But before you sign up with any of them, make sure you understand the deal and how much you will really make out of it.

If you have a 99 cent app in the Apple iTunes store, you’ get $0.70 (the other markets, $0.69)… If someone says for $5000, they guarantee you 50,000 clicks, then you’re paying $0.10 per click. If everyone bought your app, that would be $0.60 per app, a pretty reasonable conversion rate. But if those 50,000 clicks only turn into 5,000 sales. Suddenly you’ve paid $1.00 to make $0.70 In other words you have lost money.

I have yet to see one of these type sites where the math worked out even with a 25% conversion rate. In our example 25% of 50000 clicks that works out to paying $0.40 to make $0.70 (though one could argue that the $3,700 in cash in profit isn’t too bad. But to most people that would be an atrocious cost to acquire customers.

Another type of invite that will come your way is to pay for “Expedited Reviews” on review sites. First it’s a pretty unethical practice. As a journalist, could you imagine if you picked up your newspaper and the articles written there were done with the reporter getting paid by the person they are reporting on? At the least you would have to treat it as a fluff piece and not a fair unbiased report. But that seems to be the norm in the app business as a way to get information about your product out. You are in effect paying for advertising, which is where people can ethically get away for this since there is the understanding that app review sites are just paid ad sites. You will get a reach of several thousand people via people who follow the review site, their twitter and face book posts. But no one can confirm a conversion rate which seems to be very, very low. So lets say the review site is charging $100 for an expedited review and you want your cost to get a sale to be no more than 10 cents out of your 70. You then need to move 1,000 units from that $100 buy. If you have a 10% sale rate per click, then you need 10,000 clicks. Most banner ads on websites are only getting a 2-3% click through rate and who knows what the real rate is for these review sites, but lets be generous and say they can get 10% of their audience to click through. You need a site with 100,000 viewers to get 10,000 clicks that sell 1,000 units to get a 10 cent per app sold marketing cost. Still $6000 for 1000 units isn’t bad from a $100 investment, but if those very generous numbers break down, like a 3% click through rate, then 100K audience is only 3000 clicks that you might get 300 sales from and now that’s 30 cents to get that customer.

So do your math first and do your research.
[import]uid: 19626 topic_id: 32057 reply_id: 127754[/import]

qiangcheng · November 10, 2012, 12:03am

Marketing is an essential tool in branding yourself. You must not simply blend in with everyone else in your thinking or approach for it will not set you apart from the rest.
You must explore all of your options and display as much ingenuity as possible if you truly want to be recognized as an expert in your field.
These is a skill that takes persistence to sell your self as a bona fide professional that is appealing to an employer. Thanks a lot.

Regards,

Law Creative [import]uid: 188828 topic_id: 32057 reply_id: 130529[/import]

efgames.net · November 10, 2012, 1:17am

yep, all - scam.

Advertise your apps via your other apps, or your own resourses. If you have extra money - use inMode, TapJoy, Apple Ads. Dont use others - price for active users there are bigger.

And for buying ads - you should understand how much worth your install base. Then if buying ads - is a profit - then you should do that. Buy minimum volume(100$-500$) to check if that works for you.

If someone offering you a “super” deal - ask for test-run for free. If they refuse - that is a scam. [import]uid: 90911 topic_id: 32057 reply_id: 130532[/import]

qiangcheng · November 10, 2012, 12:03am