

Ask HN: White Label Pricing My iPhone App? - sfalbo

I've had a request to license a white label version of one of my iPhone apps and update it with new artwork that will be provided to me from this client.<p>Personally, I charge $.99 for the app but for this client it will be part of a marketing campaign and given away for free.<p>I know the details are a bit vague but what strategies have you used to determine a license fee for white label versions of your apps/software?<p>Do you use past sales history and factor in premiums for the risk removed for the client (it's already developed and proven)?<p>Do you use other methods to determine a reasonable cost?  Thanks in advance for the advice.
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clscott
I'd charge a standard consulting fee for the effort involved in rebranding and
building the client's version of the app and charge them $.66 (your price -
apple's cut) per download for the lost sales.

Now, if you think one of the following may be true: 1) there may not be many
downloads 2) there may be issues getting paid regularly I'd get a lump sum to
cover the lost download revenue.

The marketing campaign should have a targeted # of impressions (i.e.
downloads) so you should be able to get that number from your client and
multiply by the $.66 to come up with the lump sum.

If you want to take Aqua_Geek's approach which doesn't take into account your
lost income going forward I would see if I could add a differentiating feature
to the original app and release it soon after their version of the app goes
live, this way there is a reason for someone to purchase your app even if they
have already installed the other one.

EDIT: fixed some grammatical errors and removed some duplicate information

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Aqua_Geek
Figure out how much time the original app took to build and multiply that by
the going rate for iPhone development. This will give you a ballpark figure of
quotes this client might have been given for the app. Then charge a percentage
of the estimated cost that you think is fair, keeping in mind that it's a huge
win for them: there is little technical and timeframe risk as 99% of the
development is already done. Worst case scenario, their campaign doesn't do as
well as they would have liked.

