Developer Income Report #5 (Gave up a day job)
kreci.net
kreci.net
Keep up the good work!
Plug: This is the sort of thing we'd like to see more of at the next indieconf! :)
It always seems like HN and several other places are heavily skewed towards charging end users directly. But that's only one option open (And IMHO, it's not quite as scalable and fun as advertising income). If you look at what business models 'power' the web, it's still majority earning their revenue through advertising.
Well done :)
As for fun, money is money. I'll take it in any form.
So with advertising, you can get 10x the traffic, and not need any more resources. It's truly scalable. With a 'paid for' offering, you're more likely to need to scale up customer support, handling charge backs payment issues refunds etc etc.
My comment about 'fun' was more about the overhead and pain required in managing premium payments. Cancelations, mess ups, people wanting refunds, credit card issues, etc. That's not fun (IMHO).
I've always found making money from advertising ridiculously easy compared to trying to charge people.
I doubt he'd get higher profit with paid apps.
Parent sounds like genuine curiosity and not condescension, and when in doubt, be charitable! :-)
One question I have I haven't seen answered. Most would agree that some apps are more ad friendly mediums than others. Since you're targeting ad income and making a variety of applications, are you picking application types or making design choices based on their ad potential? Any thoughts to share along those lines about designing for ad revenue?
From my own experience, I strongly recommend NOT to quit your day job. Try to run it at least for a year, then you will make a way better decision.
Did you pay your taxes already ? I wonder what
would be your after-tax income ? Again, $2.5k
is still very low even for Eastern Europe.
And if we are talking about non-EU member like Ukraine, Russia, Belarus or Moldova $2,500/month puts you firmly into the ranks of the higher class (except maybe in Moscow).
I am always a fan of a safety net but in the case of kreci the upside of continuing his path surely beats dedicating his resources to a full-time day job.
Cheers and good fortune!