tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-37861596879861204042011-04-21T17:02:38.308-07:00iPhone Analytics is a real street report from a developer of iPhone game development.Shekhar Yadavhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14348077743390978870noreply@blogger.comBlogger11100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3786159687986120404.post-67464320640992578012009-01-05T12:35:00.000-08:002009-01-05T22:05:10.058-08:00<a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_qcomkiSLF2s/SWK1d52ZUGI/AAAAAAAAAAM/NoaD6kBuKdk/s1600-h/703909_track_and_field.jpg"><img style="margin: 0pt 10px 10px 0pt; float: left; cursor: pointer; width: 200px; height: 300px;" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_qcomkiSLF2s/SWK1d52ZUGI/AAAAAAAAAAM/NoaD6kBuKdk/s400/703909_track_and_field.jpg" alt="" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5287988437836189794" border="0" /></a><br /><b>Who am I, and why should you be listening to me?</b><br /><ul><li>I have been on the appstore from Day 1 </li><li>As a independent developer, I have been really successful. </li><li>I had bit of controversy with (iDemocrat and iRepublican apps), and a lot of unfriendly visitors. But I am still up and running </li><li>I have more than 20 applications on Appstore </li></ul><ul><br /></ul><p></p>This does not make me any authority on iPhone application development and appstore, but I have definitely got a lot of battle scars that I can share with everyone.<br /><br />My first topic in this series is -<span style="font-weight: bold;"> "Can I compete?". </span><br /><br /><br />This is the first question all of us will face when deciding to launch into AppStore. I also had this dilemma, so even though I was accepted for the AppStore way back in March I did not start developing anything till end of May, very close to the AppStore launch date. Everyday I used to debate and say, what credentials and skills I have to compete with EA and likes. At that time I had barely used GIMP, never used Mac and had no experience whatsoever in game design. Finally one day, I said to myself if I don't get even one sale so be it, but this is the best market ever created for independent developers like me, and how hard will be it do game development with so many years of server side experience. And with fresh MBA from Columbia I can not miss this trial ground.<br /><br />With only 4-5 weeks before the launch of AppStore, I started my development.. the first application I started developing was fortune cookie application. It is a very simple application that takes a file with all different fortunes, and then randomly displays one line from file on a static background. It took me almost 10 days to implement this and at the end of it, I felt it was pathetically done. I was depressed and I was almost at verge of dropping out. But then I said to myself, no point going back now.. having done so much I need to try again; by then I had gotten familiar with Mac World; and I found that there were few videos out on youtube about application development with Xcode. So things were lot easier than before. I redid the fortune cookie application and it took me only 2 days this time. I still had 3 weeks before I can start submitting applications. But I did not know what other applications will be launched, what if there are 50 fortune cookie applications on first day? I can not bet my life on one application.<br /><br />So I decided to develop few more applications, but I need to be strict with how and what I develop given the time I had.. so I came up with these rules:-<br /><ul><li> No application development should take more than 10 hours. Note , I was working only from 8PM-2AM in night after my days work at a very aggressive startup, also I was a part time student at a very prestigious business school and I have a family.<br /></li><li> I will be doing all graphics, logo, documentation, QA. No extra cost before I know if it works. </li><li> I will not be judge of how good an application is; I will let the consumers and market decide so.<br /></li></ul>In next few days I did more than 15 applications, and on first day of AppStore launch I had 9 applications, and within a few more days all others were also approved.<br /><br />For first 3 weeks I had a very successful run, I had 4 applications in top 100 at one point in time; and in the first month I grossed more than 10,000 unit sales. After that sales have dropped but I have consistent revenue for last 6 months; and it has been decent.<br /><br />So lesson learned - <span style="color:green;">there is nothing too bad for you to not try; what worse can happen but failure. There is always the next day.</span><br /><br />I had a friend in my engineering school who used to say - "2-3 blows would not kill you, so go for it.". There are always few so called guardian's of quality who will frown at you and say look how bad you and your product is? Take the feedback, and move on. What is disgusting to you might be gold for someone else.<br /><br />Do not worry about how well you will do, just go ahead and do it. You will get plenty of time to improve if you take that first step.<br /><br />Coming up next - Does anything if at all helps to market an Application?<div class="blogger-post-footer"><img width='1' height='1' src='https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/tracker/3786159687986120404-6746432064099257801?l=whohasiphone.blogspot.com' alt='' /></div>Shekhar Yadavhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/14348077743390978870noreply@blogger.com0