Sales stats for the Android Market: not so good | Hacker News Reader

Sales stats for the Android Market: not so good

mobilephonedevelopment.com

30 pointsblub16 comments

I don't think one can generalize so strongly from a niche app like this (it seems to be a personal DB that you can use to catalog your CD collection or other lists).

It would help if there were sales numbers for the same app at the same price on the iPhone, but instead I wonder if the low sales are due to low demand rather than Android customer demographics/spending habits.

I agree. I was hoping for more generalized information to justify the general statement made by the submission's description.

Yeah, it's a SQLite front end which is an interesting concept, but it's not something you're going to download unless you have a specific need for it. It also looks a bit complex for normal users.

My $0.99 Android app had 216 sales in its first 11 days, and is coming up on 1000. It's a "fun" app (although potentially useful in some cases) and much more of an impulse buy. Nowhere near enough to quit my job, but it's a profitable hobby.

Bullshit called.

This article is talking about an application that few people, even geeks, would ever consider running on a mobile device: a database application. Plus, it's not even a particularly nice looking database application. This is not the Android equivalent of Bento. This is basically the most rudimentary possible GUI you could slap on a SQLite database. Poor sales? Shocking.

He could have at least compared it to a similar iPhone app.

Agreed. That is one rather ugly and unfriendly looking app. I don't think most smartphone users (iPhone or Android) are looking for general purpose database tools (although there may be a nitch for tools for DB administrators...). IMHO, most phone users are looking for very specific targeted tools. Stuff you can whip out of your pocket and get something useful out of in under 5 minutes.

If you'd try to sell a crap app on the iphone platform I'm sure you'd get more sales but that would not say much about the iphone either (just that there are more people that have one).

This would be a good test when taking a 'best of breed' application and as clean a port of it to the android platform and comparing sales figures. Like this it is pretty meaningless.

Here is a direct link to the application:

http://www.androiddatabase.info/

It looks like a 90's style card file.

Are there certain classes of apps that sell well on android?

Looking at the top paid apps list in the Market it's mostly utilities & clocks:

1) Beautiful Widgets (weather + clock) 2) Weather & Toggle Widget (no useful description) 3) ServiceTime (a GPS tracking app for Jehovha's Witnesses) 4) NewsRob Pro (also no useful description other than it's an upgrade to the free version) 4) Advanced Task Manager 6) Touiteur Premium (no useful description, an upgrade to the free version) 7) Power Manager Full 8) PicSay Pro (photo editor) 9) Apps Protector Pro (no useful description) 10) SetCPU for Root users (overclocking tool for rooted phones)

I can't seem to find an equivalent in the iphone app store for #3, does that mean apple nixed it? Is there a list of equivalence between say the top 100 apple app-store applications and the android apps?

It would be nice to see how the two markets compare and what kind of applications flourish on the android platform because it is 'open' vs the more 'closed' approach used by apple.

11 days of one niche app on the market is also not a big timeframe to pass judgement on the Android Market as a whole. It takes time for apps to gain traction. My app benefited greatly from exposure from a free version first, then adding the paid version later.

The other problem with Android Market is that the methods for app discovery are a mystery. Search results aren't really sorted by rating or popularity, so it's hard to figure out how to get high standings. And as always, media promotion plays a major role in app purchases.

Overall, I agree with most of the other comments. Simply putting an app on the market and watching the numbers is NOT a valid judge of the Android Market. There are infinitely more factors to take into account.

Weren't we getting lots of reports about how unprofitable the iPhone app store was at this stage in the iPhone's evolution?

Also, it still seems like the app store does more to benefit established players and Apple than it does someone just developing some random app.

For those interested in the specific app, here's a QR code to the listing on the Android Market:

http://chart.apis.google.com/chart?cht=qr&chs=230x230...

I have two Android apps out (one displays Mint traffic analytics on the home screen, the other displays Clicky analytics). Collectively they've sold about 50 copies since Christmas, nothing spectacular.

That being said though, they're two apps for really niche markets and I put no marketing into them whatsoever.

Isn't the demographic of iPhone owners vs. Andriod different? Like PC vs Mac demographic. Mac demo is more affluent and more likely to spend their discretionary dollar(paying for music) over PC owners.

I'm not sure how the nexus one is doing, but before that the Droid was easily the fastest moving android device, and while its launch sales didn't rival the 3GS it was also US only and in a completely different landscape. That said it moved quite well and at the same price on contract (and I think off) as the 3GS. While the second part I think is probably true, with Droid users slightly less willing to make the small purchases, I don't think it has anything to do with affluence. Thats just the impression I've gotten from the numbers I've seen and my experience with people who own/want Droids vs. iPhones (actually about equal numbers in my circle).

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