Lotto Fever Grips Nation: Hatchi Grips App World

A Half-Billion New Features (OK, Maybe Not That Many) For Your Little Monster

(London, England) – Driven by its extreme popularity, the Hatchi universe just exploded, with new features, platforms and an exciting new fan art contest. The first addition you will notice is the Hatchi store, a place where you can buy coins to accelerate your Hatchi’s evolution, fill its stats, change its gender, and much, much more.

The new mini-games are proving to be a huge hit with Hatchi owners. You can now play Hatchi Squares and Hatchi Catchi, just to name a few.

Hatchi is now also available on the iPad! You can enjoy all the great things you love about your virtual pet on the larger format screen.

What’s sure to be a hit with Hatchi’s huge on-line following is the fan art competition! You can visit the Hatchi Facebook page to learn more and to download the template you will need to create your very own monster. The winning design will be incorporated into the app!

All of these additions are on top of what is already receiving tremendous reviews… and creating quite the community. The Hatchi reboot that launched earlier this year, brought everything you love about virtual pets right to your iPhone. Your Hatchi monster will go through several stages of growth (if you are a nurturing parent!), and will develop differently depending on the quality of care the player provides. A successfully raised Hatchi monster will be smarter, happier and require less attention.

Notifications remind pet owners when their little monsters need attention. You can also share Hatchi experience through social media sites like Facebook and Twitter.

Portable Pixels Ltd is a privately owned iPhone, iPad and Android development agency based in London with clients including Wallpaper* magazine, Audi, Alfa Romeo and Imperial College London. We believe in high production values and creating apps with charm. All development is done in house at our Camden Lock offices.

As well as the quality of our apps being recognized by Apple and displayed on in store iPads, our Wellnote app was recently highlighted in a speech by UK Secretary of State for Health, Andrew Lansley.

Links:
http://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/hatchi/id489479624?mt=8
http://hatchiapp.com/
http://portablepixels.com/
https://www.facebook.com/hatchiapp

###

 

Sunshine for the Dodgers. Partly cloudy skies for the Cowboys. Rainstorms for the Knicks. Now sports fans and novices alike can track their favorite teams in the same way they’d check the daily weather forecast with the most unique and functional sports app ever created for the iPhone, Discover Motion’s “Fan Misery.”

With football kicking into high gear, baseball heading into the post-season, and the basketball and hockey seasons just around the corner, sports fanatics are stretching themselves thin attempting to follow their favorite teams over four different leagues.

For the sports-obsessed, there is a dire need for the power to track the strengths and weaknesses of their top teams, to check each painstaking statistic from their latest wins, to catch up on the latest trades and signings, and to see what fellow fans are thinking. NFL, NBA, NHL, and MLB sports fans, rejoice! The “Fan Misery” app for the iPhone and iPod Touch gives you this power and more.

Fan Misery stands apart from other sports apps because of its one-of-a-kind “Fan Misery Index” (FMI). How does it work? Think of it as like an S&P 500 for your favorite team. The FMI is calculated based on both statistics (the performance of the team on the field) and opinions (the effect of the team’s performance and other factors outside the stadium). Out churns a value between 0 and 10, where 0 indicates the bliss of winning the World Series and 10 represents the misery of losing LeBron and with him, the prospects of taking home that glorious NBA Championship.

“Fan Misery is different because it features statistics that capture what we call ‘fan moments’—events that happen on the field which can infuriate fans or make them ecstatic,” said Jeff Cole, CEO of Fan Misery developer Discover Motion. “It features opinions based on fan votes—in a sense quantifying talk radio and all the opinion-based news sources that we as fans are inundated with. All this tied nicely together by the FMI, something that they can check in on each morning like they’d check their stocks or the day’s weather forecast.”

You don’t have to be a diehard sports fan to enjoy Fan Misery. The easy-to-use interface is straightforward enough for those who don’t know the difference between goaltending and a goalpost. Since weather symbols are used to help users quickly visualize the day’s FMI, anyone can understand that a 1 with all sunny skies is good for a team and a 9 with storm clouds depicts a gloomy outlook for that organization. Fan Misery even includes a “Current Conditions” ticker so that users can view the FMIs of rival teams.

Of course, Fan Misery provides enough options and statistics to keep even the most crazed fans happy and informed. In addition to checking the daily FMI, users can scan the news on their beloved teams in real-time from a variety of national and local sources, track a comprehensive set of interesting statistics after every game, look up game schedules, and gain total insight into opinions swirling around their teams, while voicing their own opinions as well. With Fan Misery, sports aficionados and novices alike can become expert analysts of their favorite teams.

Fan Misery is available for free in the iTunes App Store and includes a free preview team; additional teams, all teams within a certain league, or all teams in all four leagues can be purchased within the app. Fan Misery is compatible with any Apple mobile device running iOS 3.0 or higher. For more information and updates, follow Fan Misery on Twitter or Facebook or visit the Fan Misery website.

About Discover Motion, LLC

An avid Cubs fan raised in hostile Red Sox country, Jeff Cole is the founder and head of Discover Motion, a full-service App and Web development studio based in Carrabassett Valley, Maine, and Boston, Massachusetts.

For the latest, follow Fan Misery on Twitter and Facebook.

So you’ve published an iPhone app, and an iPad app, and are looking to expand your market. Or maybe you arnt such a big fan of Apple and simply want a different platform to publish on. The natural choice for many has become the Android operating system. What is it? What is the market like? Can I make money as an app developer on Android? What are the rules for Android apps?

There are a number of great articles and research that have been published online about this, but it does not seem to all be in one place, so the team at Appency decided to gather as much relevant Android information as possible and put it all down in one place. Mind you – most of this is copy/paste directly from other articles, and we have made sure to provide links back to the original information. Enjoy!

What is Android?

Android is an operating system for mobile devices such as cellular phones, tablet computers and netbooks. Android was developed by Google and based upon the Linux kernel and GNU software. It was initially developed by Android Inc. (a firm later purchased by Google) and lately broadened to the Open Handset Alliance. Android apps are sold on the handset via the Android Marketplace, as well as online in a number of third party app stores.

List of Android Devices: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Android_devices

Device Market Size:

According to NPD Group, unit sales for Android OS smartphones ranked second among all smartphone OS handsets sold in the U.S. in the first quarter of 2010. BlackBerry OS holds 36%, with Android at second with 28%, and iOS is ranked third with 21%. A Nielsen report for the second quarter of 2010 placed Android’s share of new U.S. sales in second place with 27% of the market, behind BlackBerry OS (33%) and ahead of iOS (23%).
In terms of existing share however, RIM holds the lead with 35% of smartphones while Apple is a close and growing second at 28%. Android trails far behind at only 9% of the share, a distant fourth place.

App Market Size:

According to Engadget, Android Market has approximately 70,000 live applications which makes it the second largest app store. Distimo however reports however that almost 57% of those apps are free, compared to Apples 25%. The average price of paid android apps is similar to Apple at $3.27 to Apples $3.62. There are approximately 3,005 new apps per month in the Android Marketplace to Apples 14,000.

The number of developers for the android platform is less than a fourth of that developing for the iOS platform, with a very small component developing across platform.

Selling Apps:

Developers of priced applications receive 70% of the application price, with the remaining 30% distributed between carriers (if authorized to receive a fee for applications purchased through their network) and payment processors.

Revenue earned from the Android Market is paid to developers via Google Checkout merchant accounts. T-Mobile, the first carrier with an Android device, recently began Android Market update with Google to allow apps to be billed to the account and show up as a charge on the bill.

Only nine countries are allowed to distribute Android paid apps currently because of Google checkout restrictions, points out Hoogsteder. Consumers from only 13 countries can get access to paid content.

Countries with access to Paid Applications:

• Australia
• Austria
• Canada
• France
• Germany
• Italy
• Japan
• Netherlands
• New Zealand
• Spain
• Switzerland
• United Kingdom
• United States   
  

The full country list that is updated by Google is here.

Larva Labs’ Matt Hall notes that even high-profile, highly rated Android titles generate “much lower” revenue than iPhone equivalents. Despite having one sustained top-selling $5 game (Retro Defense), a consistent fifth place seller (Battle for Mars) and being highlighted by Google, the company’s daily average revenue was just $62.39 for all its apps combined.

In relation, an iPhone app with a fifth place position in the App Store is predicted to earn about $3,500 per day, or more than what the same Android title would generate in 56 days. Android apps’ sales figures are only likely to be worse for apps that rank lower, Hall adds.

Submission Process:

There is very little approval process in the Android market, however Google has been known to pull apps (namely the tethering apps for T-Mobile phones). You simply go to the android market page at market.android.com/publish and submit your information. The account registration fee is $25.

Once you’ve set a price for an application, you may choose to change it at any time, however if you have previously published an application for free, you cannot change it to have a price. You’ll need to re-upload a new APK and add a price.

Allowable price ranges:

• USD: $0.99 – $200
• GBP: 0.50 GBP – 100 GBP

The Android Marketplace  defaults to showing free apps first and forces users to enable viewing paid apps themselves.

Once you’ve registered, it’s easy to upload your application to Android Market. From the home screen, select “Upload Applications.” You’ll be asked to fill in the following information for your app.

• Language: This is to denote the language of your application. Default language is US English. More languages will become available as Android-powered devices become available in those languages.
• Title: The name of your application as you would like it to appear in Android Market. You may add one per language.
• Description: The description of your application as you would like to appear in Android Market.
  • This description can only be 325 characters long!
• Application Type: Android Market is divided into 2 major applications types: “Applications” and “Games.” Please choose one.
• Category: You must select a category for your application. Available categories include:

Applications

• Comics
• Communication
• Entertainment
• Finance
• Health
• Lifestyle
• Multimedia
• News & Weather
• Productivity
• Reference
• Shopping
• Social
• Sports
• Themes
• Tools
• Travel
• Demo
• Software libraries

Games

• Arcade & Action
• Brain & Puzzle
• Cards & Casino
• Casual

Publishing options in the Android Marketplace

• Copy protection: Copy protection helps prevent applications from being copied from a device. Increases the amount of memory on the phone required to install the application. (You may also implement your own copy protection scheme.)
• Locations: These are the locations in which you may distribute your applications.
  • Not all locations listed currently have users with Android-powered devices.
  • You may select locations one-by-one or choose the “All current and future locations” option. This option means that, as we add more distribution locations, these locations will be enabled for your app. Before you check this option, please brush up on Export Compliance.
  • Note: At this time, you may only sell applications to users in these locations.

Contact information

• You must pick one support channel for your app – Website, Email, or Phone
• This information is viewable to users from Android Market
• You may choose to offer multiple channels for support

Other Distribution Methods:

Andspot: Currently in a private beta, Andspot is an alternative Android marketplace that will offer developers 80% of the download profit from their apps instead of Google’s 70%. To sign up for the beta, you can go to http://andspot.com/index.cfm

SlideMe: (From their site) Have an application that Google prevents you from stocking in the Android Market, leaving you and your app stranded? Are there users desperate to buy your application but they don’t have access to Google Checkout or the Android Market? Do you want to show off your app but feel limited by not having screenshots or video in the Android Market?

If so, then you’ve found the right place at SlideME, the Original Market for Android (We launched our portal and mobile client in April 2008). What we do for the developer is simple. We provide a way to market, deliver and download content to users that you wouldn’t have access to in your traditional channels.

From the moment you stock an application, we provide you a web page where you can add a description, screenshots and videos showing off your application. You can have a discussion with your users or they can review your application right on your page.

Your application also shows up in SAM, our mobile client for discovery and download of Android applications. You can include up to three screenshots and a YouTube video within the mobile catalog, giving potential users a good idea of what your app does. No more trying to cram that into a 325 character description with ascii art.

SlideMe does not take a revenue share from the applications and is negotiating deals to pre-load their app store onto handsets around the world. Currently they hav ea relationship with Vodaphone Egypt to do this. The SlideMe app store will also be on Sony Ericsson’s Xperia X10 phones sold in the middle east.

SlideMe also provides their “SlideSlock” program to help prevent free distribution of your app files.

AndAppStore: Another royalty free distribution service created by UK company Funky Android Ltd.  The site still looks extremely beta and should be watched for growth. http://andappstore.com/AndroidApplications/

Handango: Once your application to register as a Software Partner is approved and you submit software for sale, Handango retains 40% of the revenues (excluding taxes) for products sold through the main Handango Web site at www.handango.com. For products sold through our Value-Added channels, we retain 40% of the revenues (excluding taxes), and their commission can increase only if they perform.

GetJar: GetJar is your one-stop shop for publishing all your mobile content to reach a global, mass-market audience. With more than a billion downloads coming from 200+ countries. (More then 2MM downloads a day)

GetJar provides:

• Easy sign up and zero cost to upload your content and get started.
• Fast Time to Market with a two (2) business day approval process.
• Global reach to more than 25 million consumers.
• Promotion and hosting to boost your user growth

Your applications get published on GetJar.com and our mobile site m.getjar.com but also across all our premium channels including:

• Mobile operators like Vodafone, Virgin, Optimus, Sprint, Reliance and others.
• Handset providers like Sony Ericsson and Blackberry.
• 3rd Party channels like Opera Mini and Others.

External Links

• Android Market

Other Android App Distribution Channels:

• SlideME - Alternative/Complementary Android Marketplace (no country restrictions)
• AndAppStore
• AndSpot
• Handango

App Listing Sites:

• AndroidZoom
• Androlib
• AppBrain
• AndBOT
• AppAware - Social Market for Android
• appazaar – Recommender System for Apps on the Android Market

Montreal, Quebec – Dlux Studio today is pleased to announce the release and immediate availability of elasticr 2.0 for iPhone, iPad and iPod touch. An Alien invasion, a clumsy janitor, a vat of rubber and a burst of radiation lay the groundwork for the latest release of “elasticr, the Stretchiest Superhero” game for the Apple iPhone.

The games hero elasticr could very well be the distant cousin of Mr. Fantastic of the Fantastic Four or Helen Parr, aka Elastigirl with his powers of super body elongation, allowing him to fling himself acrobatically around a room to avoid evil aliens, devious traps and sharp spikes as he struggles to save the human race.

In the latest version of elasticr, Dlux Studios has added twenty additional levels along with a level chooser, full OpenFeint integration, and significantly more hair gel to manage elasticr’s super sized pompadour. The elasticr app’s physics engine creates realistic flying, bouncing and stretching effects unparallel in the app store.

Fun for kids from five to one hundred, elasticr’s is rated 4+ and is both suitable and enjoyable for children. Higher levels will test the skills of gamers of all ages as elasticr encounters increasingly difficult obstacles such as disappearing hand holds, spinning blades and numerous chances for electrocution. Please ignore the smell of burning rubber…

To experience the most fun with rubber since the first rubber band was shot across a room at a co-worker, find the elasticr arcade game in the iTunes app store for only $0.99. elasticr is compatible with all iPhone’s and iPod touch devices running iOS 3.0 or higher. Go ahead and run it on your iPad too… elasticr is more than happy to stretch onto the bigger screen for you.

Device Requirements:
* iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad
* Requires iOS 3.0 or later
* 9.7 MB

Pricing and Availability:
elasticr 2.0 is only $0.99 USD (or equivalent amount in other currencies) and available worldwide exclusively through the App Store in the Games category.
Elasticr 2.0
Purchase and Download
Media Assets
YouTube Video

Founded in 2004, Dlux Studio is a privately held company with a staff of over 2 people… corporate giants beware! Purveyors of fine iPhone applications, Dlux Studios offers mobile applications with advanced graphic, web, interface and game design with a philosophy of finding the most simple, elegant and convenient solution to any problem without losing the purport. Even their proposals rarely exceed two pages. The Studio’s headquarters is situated in Montreal, Quebec. Copyright (C) 2010 Dlux Studio. All Rights Reserved. Apple, the Apple logo, iPhone, iPod and iPad are registered trademarks of Apple Inc. in the U.S. and/or other countries.

Budding fashion designers and fashionistas alike are being granted access to the most comprehensive clothing design tool to ever hit mobile phones with XMG Studio’s new iPhone App “Style Studio”.

Toronto, Canada - XMG Studio today announces the perfect app for anyone with the ambition to start their own fashion label, or simply those that love to play dress up. “Style Studio” for the iPhone and iPod Touch takes XMG’s powerhouse customization engine and applies it to the world of fashion, allowing the user to create a full line of women’s clothes from dresses to tops, outerwear, pants and skirts.

“Style Studio has the most extensive customization engine for clothing design ever seen on the iPhone” said Ray Sharma, Founder of XMG Studio. “While there are a few apps out there that allow you to apply colors to pre-set clothing items and mix and match them, Style Studio is the first app that actually allows the designer to choose different materials, make alterations, customize prints and apply add-ons or decorative elements to each piece of clothing.”

You don’t have to be a fashion student to enjoy Style Studio. The easy to use interface is simple enough for the younger user, but provides options to keep even the most experienced seamstress entertained. Users can choose from thousands of materials, prints, belts, buttons, zippers, bows, pockets and accessories that have been pre-loaded into the app, or upload your own graphics and photos from your device. Clothing can be tried out on any of the five models within the application, or designers can upload a photo of themselves or friends to try on the new fashions.

Once clothes have been designed, they can be showcased on fashion magazine mockups or turned into an entire fashion show. Designs can be shared with friends through Facebook, Twitter and Email integration into the app. Additional styles, materials and accessories can be purchased through the in-app store with more content being added all the time.

Style Studio is available in the iTunes app store for $2.99 for any Apple mobile device running OS 3.0 or higher. For more information and updates, follow @StyleStudioApp on Twitter and Facebook or visit the XMG Studio website.

About XMG Studio

XMG Studio is an award-winning developer of hit games for mobile devices and a leader in the areas of Customization and Augmented Reality (AR). XMG creates fun and entertaining games that appeal to a wide variety of audiences by incorporating unique gameplay, deep social network integration, and compelling game graphics. XMG’s game portfolio includes: Pandemica, the World’s first multiplayer AR game and winner of Best AR App of the year (2009); Drag Racer Pro Tuner, the top drag racing franchise on the app store; and Marine Sharpshooter, our first multi-million download sniper game.

Belgium based company Vision Smarts announces the rerelease of pic2shop, a free real-time barcode scanning application available now in the iTunes store. Pic2shop boasts faster and more accurate barcode scanning allowing consumers to compare competitor prices on millions of items. Interested in books? Check not only retail prices, but public library availability for more than one billion items.

[youtube]hC8yrQZ58Ro[/youtube]

Belgium – Vision Smarts, developers of cutting-edge image and video analysis software, announced today the re-launch of pic2shop, a free real-time barcode scanning application for all generations of the popular Apple iPhone (many similar products are limited to working with the iPhone 3Gs due to its auto-focusing camera). Using the iPhone’s camera, users are able to scan barcodes and compare tens of millions of products online. US users are also given access to local prices for items based on their current location, conveniently displaying them on a map for quick access. Going beyond just retail, Pic2shop will also tell you if a scanned book is available at your local library.

Why pay money… to save money? Pic2shop is the #1 free barcode scanning application in the iTunes store. Pic2shop’s success lies in its lighting quick speed and incredible accuracy along with its ability to draw real-time search results with Krillion and WorldCat databases. Retail database Krillion provides localized search results for thousands of products in over 40,000 U.S. locations. As a result they are able to accurately assess product location and availability for consumer products. WorldCat is the world’s largest compilation of library content and services and is able to work seamlessly with pic2shop to let you know not only which local libraries contain the desired item but also where in the library it’s located and if it’s been checked out.

Pic2shop features include:

ALL IPHONES: Not just the 3GS, scans barcodes on the first-gen and 3G too!

GLOBAL COVERAGE: Pic2Shop is in more than 30 countries around the world!

ONLINE SEARCH: Thousands of online retailers help you get the best prices

LOCAL SEARCH: Don’t want to pay for shipping? We can tell you if the store down the street has it

LIBRARY SEARCH: Why pay when you can check things out? Pic2Shop searches local libraries for what you are interested in and will even tell you if it’s checked out (and when it’s due back!).

EMAIL: Send the last entry… or the last 20 entries to yourself or a friend via email

Pic2shop is a free download available now in the iTunes store and is compatible with iPhone OS 3.1 or higher. For more information search pic2shop in the productivity category or visit pic2shop.com to see it in action.

iPhone apps at AppStoreHQ

About Vision Smarts

Vision Smarts is a Belgian SPRL (LLC) that develops, distributes, and supports software libraries for image recognition and real-time video analysis. The company strives to make cutting-edge technology that is easy to integrate and is affordable. Vision Smarts founder, Benoit Maison has helped develop and patent new products for several high-tech companies. His interests range from Artificial Intelligence and Statistical Machine Learning to Web-Enabled Business and Mobile Applications. For more information go to www.visionsmarts.com

If there was any city in Europe that an international iPhone conference should be held at – its Amsterdam. No, not because it has an infamous red-light district and liberal policies towards the recreational use of cannabis, but because Amsteram represents some of the same values of free expression that makes the iPhone what it is today. Before the iPhone – mobile development was considered by many too difficult or cumbersome to deal with. Technology was limited, access to carriers for distribution was limited, and most of the deals were done behind closed doors.

While we may still have a ways to go before we reach mobile utopia (many would say that the Android platform is the next step in the right direction), the coming together of developers and thought leaders from around the world in a global conference is a step in the right direction.

Later this month (November 25th – 27th), the iCE Amsterdam conference will open its doors to those same developers and thought leaders to come together and share their knowledge and insights into the most exciting mobile platform on the planet. Some of those people include:

• Jonathan Wight, Chief Technology Office of Small Society, most notably on app projects like myStarbucks, WholeFoods and Obama 08.
  
• Keith Shepherd and Natalia Luckyanova co-founders of Imangi Studios, the team that bought us the popular “Harbor Master”
  
• Paran Johar, JumpTap’s head of global marketing activities
• Dom Sagolla of San Francisco who helped create Twitter in 2006, He is also the founder of DollarApp, and the co-founder and host of iPhoneDevCamp
• Mike Lee, known by some as “the World’s Toughest Programmer”, has worked on some of the best known titles on the App Store, including Obama ’08 and Tap Tap Revenge.

Just to name a few.

During the Pre-Conference day on Wednesday 25 November the iPhoneDevCamp will part of the program. iPhoneDevCamp is a not-for-profit gathering to develop applications for iPhone and iPod Touch using both the native SDK and web standards. Previous iPhoneDevCamp events have been held at Adobe Systems in San Francisco, July 2007 and August 2008. The last iPhoneDevCamp was at Yahoo in Sunnyvale, August 2009.

The event is actually sponsored by the city of Amsterdam itself, and if my “Convert” app from Polar Bear Farm is correct, cost ranges from $732.45 for one person to $294.46 per person if talk four of your closest friends into going with you.You can register for the conference here.

Yesterday, AT&T announced that iPhone users could finally make VoIP calls over their 3G network, not just over WiFi.  I can call my friends using my Skype app – and it will only cost me airtime!  Or better yet, I can call my friends abroad and pay Skype’s long distance fees (MUCH cheaper!) vs. AT&T’s fees.  Love it.  Really, it’s all about me. But wait, this story turns out to be bigger than me. 

At the heart of it – it’s really about Apple vs Google. In July, we all remember the big controversy surrounding Apple "rejecting" the Google voice app from the iTunes store. Apple said, "The application has not been approved because, as submitted for review, it appears to alter the iPhone’s distinctive user experience by replacing the iPhone’s core mobile telephone functionality and Apple user interface with its own user interface for telephone calls, text messaging and voicemail."   And then in August Google CEO Eric Schmidt resigns from the Apple Board.   Hhmmmm…  Let’s face it, this is war.

Yesterday Verizon announced that they are teaming up with Google to bring a bunch of Android based devices to the #1 carrier in the country.  Plus Google is already working with T-Mobile and Sprint.  Rut rho for AT&T and Apple. As of now, Apple has one device on one network in the US – and Google is working with the other 3 major carriers.  Can Apple really compete against Google? So was AT&T’s announcement yesterday that they reversed their policy and will allow VoIP over the 3G network just a stab in the back to Google?  Sure seems to be. Look, I love Apple.  I have 3 Macs at home, 4 iPods, and even my kids have an iPod Touch so they can play games and be like Mommy & Daddy.  But I can’t stand the reception I get on my AT&T iPhone.  I’d love to switch to Verizon, but I can’t stand their hand-sets.  I’m hoping the iPhone will go to other carriers.  But I have a feeling that Google may not let that happen…..

Have you been thinking about getting your app reviewed by a popular review site like 148apps.com or AppGirlReviews.com? I’ve had a few of my customers come to me concerned because there might be another app in iTunes that happens to be slightly better, done by a large company like EA Mobile or Digital Chocolate, or has more features. Reviews by their very nature are suppose to be unbiased, so – like every 14 year old acne faced boy, they ask themselves the same question:

“What if they don’t like me?”

The fear that a bad review will hurt sales can be justified, but as CNNMoney reports – even bad reviews can drive sales!

Take their example of a the product website AlpacaDirect.com, a purveyor of Alpaca products such as sweaters, socks and yarn, considered by many as an alternative to cashmere.  Recently, they hired PowerReviews, a company that provides the tools which allow consumers to leave ratings directly on your website – both good and bad.

Not all the reviews were good! Take for example this post from a customer in Santa Cruz about a pair of alpaca socks:

As many of you already know, Apple and AT&T will finally have MMS capabilities for the iPhone this Friday, September 25th (Announced on their Facebook page here).

While many iPhone developers may let this come and go without a second thought – my clients – and other smart developers will be taking this opportunity to implement a strategic price drop

Whats the connection? Traffic. Every time there is a major new update for the iPhone, a significant jump in traffic is seen in the iTunes app store. Many of the consumers who are coming to get their update, will also take a few minutes to browse around the store (even if its harder to do then it use to be) and will choose a few new apps to try out. Typically developers do not have good advanced notice of when an update will be – there is alot of buzz but when it finally happens everyone is scrambling to adjust their marketing accordingly.

In a great presentation by Pinch Media, one of my favorite iPhone analytics engines, we can see the effects of a well timed price cut, even without the advantages of the increased traffic.

Users who may have been looking at your app before but not wanting to pay full price may take notice of your app and finally take the plunge. There are also a number of sites like 148apps, AppShopper, and FreeAppAlert (if you are dropping from paid to free) that track price drops in apps, alerting a waiting public to sales they can take advantage of.  All of this translates into free eyeballs… and more downloads for the in-the-know developer.

Knowing ahead of time also allows you to get a media buy in place, however with only 48 hours before the event, I’m afraid it would be hard to get your ad and buy together in time. Besides… my clients already got the good spots

To learn more about promoting your iPhone app, click on Marketing Services or contact me at aaron@watkinsmobile.com