You say your motto is not to fool your clients yet I respectfully have to wonder how it is that you think exposure to the top 100 of a given category is worth anywhere NEAR $4,900?
There was a time, in the early days of the app store when that may have been the case, I submit that it no longer is.
Hey, I am open to being wrong on this, I will throw it out there to others who have had more experience both timewise and appwise on the store....
how valuable is a position on the top 100 of your given category?
Is a banner on toucharcade worth $2500 and more? I don't know their prices now (can be seen on BuySellAds.com), but we have paid way over $2000 for a banner on their main site over a year ago and it generated 50(!) - yes fifty - clicks in one month. So... let's talk about prices and scam...
Is a FAAD campaign worth $5000 even if they spa...erm... inform 6 million users of your app by email (like they say)?
Maybe it is really "worth" by today's internet advertisement standards (I mean having 6 million email addresses for spamming), but useful is it not, that's sure.
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Last edited by Promo Dispenser; 12-21-2011 at 02:21 PM.
Hey, I am open to being wrong on this, I will throw it out there to others who have had more experience both timewise and appwise on the store....
how valuable is a position on the top 100 of your given category?
We've been in the top100 photography US pretty much constantly since July.
Ranked around
#50 will generate around $100 worth a day,
#90/100 about $50
#3 generated $2500 (So that's not the case otherwise they would have called it: Top 3 or Top 5 or Top 10)
Everybody charging $4900 for a typical $100 revenue is fooling his customers, and knowingly so. This is the sad part of the story.
They are also taking the p**s in their description saying: "If the goal is not reached we will refund you half of the money", LOL, so you just waisted $2450, how happy would you be?
The more we read people's thoughts in this thread the more we realize that you guys should open your own app marketing agency, with this experience and knowledge of the right marketing services pricing you can easily take this market with a storm. Seriously.
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Artyom Diogtev - New Media Manager
The more we read people's thoughts in this thread the more we realize that you guys should open your own app marketing agency, with this experience and knowledge of the right marketing services pricing you can easily take this market with a storm. Seriously.
So please justify why gaining exposure to the top-100 of a given category, where someone just gave an example that it gets them around 50 dollars or 50 users, is worth paying FIVE GRAND for.
So please justify why gaining exposure to the top-100 of a given category, where someone just gave an example that it gets them around 50 dollars or 50 users, is worth paying FIVE GRAND for.
Just for the sake of theory:
1. They can do it (can they?), you can't. Knowledge is money.
2. If it would cost $50 everybody and their brother would want to use it, but you can't put 20 people into top 10 or 300 into top 100. It's logical, isn't it? Why does FAAD cost $5000? Because they can promote only 1 app per day. If they could promote 100 apps a day with the same effect, they would be cheaper probably... or not...based on their greed.
3. being in top 100 is better, than not being in it, even if it means only 50 more downloads a day.
Think about what i.e Chillingo does for you?
They sell you their name for the HOPE, your app will be successful due to it.
They don't take $5000 but your soul and probably all the rights and all the saying about your app and at least 30% of you revenue.
You would give them all of these things within an eyeblink if they would ask you, wouldn't you?
For the sake of theory, Ziocleto has done it and I wonder if he spent 5 grand or the equivalent of 5 grand in man hours actively marketing to do so.
I also wonder if he or anyone else who got into the top 100 under their own steam thinks this would be worth it.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Promo Dispenser
Just for the sake of theory:
1. They can do it (can they?), you can't. Knowledge is money.
2. If it would cost $50 everybody and their brother would want to use it, but you can't put 20 people into top 10 or 300 into top 100. It's logical, isn't it? Why does FAAD cost $5000? Because they can promote only 1 app per day.
3. being in top 100 is better, than not being in it, even if it means only 50 more downloads a day.
Think about what i.e Chillingo does for you?
They sell you their name for the HOPE, your app will be successful due to it.
They don't take $5000 but your soul and probably all the rights and all the saying about your app and at least 30% of you revenue.
You would give them all of these things within an eyeblink if they would ask you, wouldn't you?
For the sake of theory, Ziocleto has done it and I wonder if he spent 5 grand or the equivalent of 5 grand in man hours actively marketing to do so.
I also wonder if he or anyone else who got into the top 100 under their own steam thinks this would be worth it.
I did it too. Not only once. I wouldn't pay so much for this too, but I think, if there is a demand, a service like this can have its right to exist.
If there is no demand, they will disappear anyways.
So your crusade against them is an absolutelly waste of time.
Think about what i.e Chillingo does for you?
They sell you their name for the HOPE, your app will be successful due to it.
They don't take $5000 but your soul and probably all the rights and all the saying about your app and at least 30% of you revenue.
You would give them all of these things within an eyeblink if they would ask you, wouldn't you?
I wouldn't, but there's a huge difference between being in $X in profit and being $5k in red.
It's a different proposition, one is revenue share and the other one is a loss
For the sake of theory, Ziocleto has done it and I wonder if he spent 5 grand or the equivalent of 5 grand in man hours actively marketing to do so.
I also wonder if he or anyone else who got into the top 100 under their own steam thinks this would be worth it.
As I stated many times I haven't spent a dime on PR agencies, we did it all by ourselves. Actually, the only thing we did was to send a press-release with PRmac, which I praise a lot for their quality of service.
We've been in the top100 photography US pretty much constantly since July.
Ranked around
#50 will generate around $100 worth a day,
#90/100 about $50
#3 generated $2500 (So that's not the case otherwise they would have called it: Top 3 or Top 5 or Top 10)
This is probably a really stupid question, but I just want to clarify. A spot in the top 90/100 of the photography section usually generates around $50 a day, and top 50 usually generates around $100 a day? And is this based on a standard .99c app?
LOL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Some categories take 10 downloads to break into there. I can do that by asking my friends to download it. Which is free...
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Haters gonna Hate
Likers gonna Like
@ComboApp - I think if you're being honest, you shouldn't track just the position of the apps you helped promote, but also the effects of being in the Top 100.
How many of your customers were happy with your service? Can you provide us some success stories? Do you follow up after the campaign is over?
With a service like yours, I'd expect you being able to say "20% of our customers at least broke even on the promotion." Then I'd expect you to analyse why some of your customers broke even, while some others didn't and advise the ones who didn't - provide some good case practices, etc.
This isn't hard to do, and if you're not doing it, then, my assumption is, it's because you're afraid of the results. Or you know the results already.
Thats the exact same thing I am waiting to hear from them!
Quote:
Originally Posted by merlin
@ComboApp - I think if you're being honest, you shouldn't track just the position of the apps you helped promote, but also the effects of being in the Top 100.
How many of your customers were happy with your service? Can you provide us some success stories? Do you follow up after the campaign is over?
With a service like yours, I'd expect you being able to say "20% of our customers at least broke even on the promotion." Then I'd expect you to analyse why some of your customers broke even, while some others didn't and advise the ones who didn't - provide some good case practices, etc.
This isn't hard to do, and if you're not doing it, then, my assumption is, it's because you're afraid of the results. Or you know the results already.
The more we read people's thoughts in this thread the more we realize that you guys should open your own app marketing agency, with this experience and knowledge of the right marketing services pricing you can easily take this market with a storm. Seriously.
LoL!! I think this is the most telling quote of all... Everything the critics are saying is obvious to anyone with a bit of experience in the App Store. This shouldn't be news to ComboApp.
It's a tough market out there, but hiring PR firms is going to be of little to no benefit to the average independent developer. To really drive traffic you need good coverage in real national media, not just some big iOS review sites. You're not going to get this for 5k, and the people who could provide this would surely rather work with big established companies.
I'm sorry if I come off overly harsh to app store PR guys, but the way I see it these firms prey on the inexperienced developer who is doing his first app and thinks if only it has the exposure he will be the next angry birds. The complete disconnect from reality that the Comboapp top 100 category pricing is at really seems to reflect this.
We Worked with a similar company like Combo App, wich is called Apalon...
It is just Davejas69 Says.
We released Figaro Wig for the iPad on November 29, and they promise that we will reach top 50 on our category (games/kids) and hey! we reached top 9 on that cathegory. They charged us 4000 thousand $ for the service and we realised that in order to reach that goal, all we needed was 100 downloads in a single day as a payed app... off course, this is different on an iPod, remember that iPad is less crowded. The next day we sunked in the app store.
It is not that our game is bad, you can try it for free if you want (Figaro Wig), it is because big names like sega and others, keep pushing updates, promotes a lot on websites, etc. and your app gets into the botton on the app store.
They even requested to release the app at 0.99$ in order to achieve that record easier.
If you need help, please contact me, i will give you the same advices this market enterprises offer for free... it is not worth 4000 thousand $, maybe 500$ bucks is fine.
BTW, we made the 100 hundred sales just by telling our friends to buy the app, once we reached that place, apalon stopped giving support... as Davejas69 says, they did their part of the deal, it is just like if i fix your car and you ride it 1 mile, and it doesn't work anymore. For the price Is better to get a site skin on AppSpy if you aske me.
LoL!! I think this is the most telling quote of all... Everything the critics are saying is obvious to anyone with a bit of experience in the App Store. This shouldn't be news to ComboApp.
It's a tough market out there, but hiring PR firms is going to be of little to no benefit to the average independent developer. To really drive traffic you need good coverage in real national media, not just some big iOS review sites. You're not going to get this for 5k, and the people who could provide this would surely rather work with big established companies.
I'm sorry if I come off overly harsh to app store PR guys, but the way I see it these firms prey on the inexperienced developer who is doing his first app and thinks if only it has the exposure he will be the next angry birds. The complete disconnect from reality that the Comboapp top 100 category pricing is at really seems to reflect this.
Would you clarify what "a bit of experience in the App Store" means?
You have a valid point about media exposure you can expect with $5,000 budget, the problem is that not many developers can afford expenses to be highlighted national wide. Would you propose them to do not develop apps at all?
I can speak to this subject...
Around a year ago, Combo-App had a promotion for their top-100 campaign that was not $4,900 but still very expensive. They did what they said they would and I got what I paid for. They got me into the top-100. With that said, I was naive and I thought that being in the top 100 would create enough momentum to sustain itself and they told me it is up to the desirability of my app as to whether or not it stays or gains position. Fair enough.
My problem is this whole notion of the value of being in the top-100 is VERY MISLEADING. Even a great app needs more than the top-100 exposure to attain success and they market this service as if it is worth almost 5 GRAND??? Yet Combo-App and company's like them play on the hopes and the naivety of new developers and are happy to take their money when they know damn well that
exposure in the top-100 is next to worthless. This was true a year ago and with each passing day and new iPhone/iPad/iPod sale, it becomes even more true.
Hey. Buyer beware. As I said. Combo-App did for me exactly what I hired them to do. Shame on ME for not doing my homework. With that said, had they been honest and really gave me a strategy for the app store that was fairly priced, I would still be giving them my business today. After my experience, I have no desire whatsoever to deal with Combo-App or any other app-marketing company. The fact that they place a 5,000 value on top-100 placement is all you really need to know about their scruples. Ask any developer on here with any experience how much being in the top-100 is worth.
If I am wrong? I'd love to see testimonials from Combo-App clients who paid for top-100 service and at least made their investment back. I won't hold my breath.
Anyone seriously considering dropping 5 grand for this?? Take the money and hire a damn good graphic designer and pump up your visuals, take the money and hire people to QC your code and make it flawless and crash proof. Take the rest of the money and put it in the bank!
Thanks for sharing your experience Dave. You really saved our money. Can you please tell me, do you have any experience with flurryappcircle, tapjoy or w3i Cost Per Install campaign? Is flurryappcircle really worthy for an app of $0.99?
Just curious, has anyone used ComboApp Marketing services to promote your apps?
The prices for their services are rather high. Is it worth? What do you think?
Thanks.
for getting review for your site you can find many gigs on fiverr.com
Promoting an app in this world has become very expensive.... You have to target out some country first for your app promotion like USA, china, Japan, Uk etc.... that will be a structured and proper promotion.... But after all this you app should have potential otherwise it would be unable to get high gathering....
Hope i helped you regarding your post... ---------------------------------------------------------------------
You can see the discussed app here : App Store - TRICKY BUBBLES
Thanks for sharing your experience Dave. You really saved our money. Can you please tell me, do you have any experience with flurryappcircle, tapjoy or w3i Cost Per Install campaign? Is flurryappcircle really worthy for an app of $0.99?
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