I Made My First Sale and Made It to #7 on the App Store
apps.apple.com
apps.apple.com
About a month and a half ago, I decided to make Dark Hacker News a paid app at $1.99. I felt at this point it had enough features and I've never had a paid app on the app store so I decided to just go for it!
In the first month and a half as a paid app, its been able to generate $42 in sales! I've never made money off of an app I've built so its been awesome to see those sales come in.
At one point in June I even made it to #7 on the list of top paid news apps!!! (I'm not exactly sure how the app store algorithm works, but hey I'll take it) Up to this point I really haven't done any marketing so I'm considering getting the word out there to see how it would impact sales.
All in all, it's been awesome to make my first real dollars as an Indie Developer!
> At one point in June I even made it to #7 on the list of top paid news apps!!!
So being #7 for sales in a whole category on Apple's all store (famously the easier market in which to make money as compared to Android) means only $42 in sales? Are the economics of making apps really this tough?
Maybe that's why everyone just tries to make a game app? Is that the only way to make money?
Also, looking at the list on my iPad, I‘m sure the top lists aren’t global. They seem local by country (and might even be personalized, but that would surprise me)
Market is a big part of app success which is why we see games and companies with real budget making the $$ in the App Stores. Gotta market to those whales!
Furthermore, users expect a very high quality mobile app these days and often don't want to pay for features. Got a great app with a few amazing paid features? Expect some negative app reviews. Everyone, app developers included, expect amazing, free, mobile apps. It's unrealistic.
I wonder how much difference it would make to have a free trial for a week. I don’t mind paying for apps, but I also don’t like paying for something I’m not sure I’ll be using. Especially when I’m already using an app with (from what I can tell at least) pretty much the same features. Once I try it it’s possible I’ll change my mind and actually buy it.
For crying out loud, you earned 42$ for a year of work with it and he's on a tech minded forum.
+ If they don't like it, they can request their money back afterwards.
From building this a year ago to today, I've learned so much more about React/React Native and in general my technical skills have gotten much better. There are definitely things I can refactor to make more performant that I'd like to do.
I'd also like to make a pass through the code to convert any remaining React class components to functional components using React hooks. I'd also like to update to React Navigation 5 which recently released.
Let me know if you have any technical questions about some aspects of the app and I'd be happy to answer them. Thanks again for the download!
I've been using the "Hacker News (YC)" app on iOS written by Dharmesh Patel, and it works good, but it hasn't been updated in over 2 years, and unfortunately it has occasional display formatting issues on the iPhone 11 Max Pro.
That's one of the reasons I really wanted to make it a paid app so I had more of an incentive to support it long term and keep it updated.
If there's any suggestions you have or features you'd like to see added just let me know. Enjoy!
Best of luck with the app, you did a great job!