

(Android) Developer Income Report #9 - kreci
http://www.kreci.net/reports/developer-income-report-9/

======
ajhai
Inspired by these reports, I started learning android this January and
successfully released two apps (Picpuzz and SmartCat), both small puzzle
games. While I totally enjoyed working with android SDK and coding these apps,
they failed to attract the users . Here is a quick list of reasons why I think
my two apps failed (in the context of games)

\- There are not many levels in the game

\- Hard to finish the puzzle / user gets bored before finishing the puzzle

\- UI is not great. You'll need a decent UI when developing games

\- No regular updates. Important way to increase downloads is to push regular
updates. With an update, app appears in the "Just in" section of the android
market and gains visibility

And not to mention with such less downloads, the ad revenue is pretty bad
($1.52 so far). Even though the total number of impressions that are being
served on both the apps together is between 1k-2k per day, there are only 1-3
clicks per week. My best guess is that this has something to do with the way I
place ads in my apps. Almost all the free apps (games) that I'd seen till date
place ads over the game distracting users. I hate that. So, during game play,
I'm diving the screen into two parts, one that displays the game and other
displays ad impressions. This won't draw the attention of players and I think
is the main reason for the low CTR

~~~
dpcan
1) Your screenshots need to show what you actually do in the game for picpuzz.
You have a screenshot of your main menu and some pictures. No screenshots of
the puzzle being played.

2) Why on earth does a game like this need to modify SD Card storage? Be VERY
cautious of the requirements your app needs. Remember, your user is going to
wonder right away why a simple puzzle game that hasn't been downloaded very
much wants to access their SD Card.

If it's to grab pictures from your phone - have a screenshot that says "Use
photos in this game right from your SD Card". That explains the permission,
and shows a feature all in one.

3) You have a big icon that looks like a cat cut into puzzle pieces that is
awesome, but for the smart cat app, you have a creepy looking distorted cat
that makes your app look like app-spam. I wouldn't even look at the details of
the app after seeing that icon normally.

4) The smart cat game is a derivative of a game that's been around for a long
time. It is a really fun game by its nature, so are you coming up in the right
searches?

5) I have learned from experience that a key to getting found is coming up in
searches people actually use.

6) Do the Titles of your games say enough about what they are?

7) Are you writing long descriptions for your apps so they come up in a ton of
different searches? You get 4000 characters now, you can really go to town.

8) Do your games give a really nice "how-to" tutorial before the first time
the user plays so there's no question about what they have to do?

It's not just about updating. It's about improving.

~~~
ajhai
Thanks dpcan for taking a look at my apps and giving feedback. I agree with
all your points and must confess that I took lightly the user experience part
of the apps. Yes, it's about improving.

------
xiaoma
It looks like you're slowly, but steadily gaining momentum! I remember seeing
your second report when you were making more like 1500. Well done!

One thing that continues to amaze me is the performance you get from
istockphoto. I always figured that with the number of people out there with
digital cameras getting into photography that the prices would fall rapidly
for this sort of thing. But it's remained a reliable earner for you.

~~~
ovi256
Surprisingly, making well lighted, non-cluttered, non-amateurish photographs
is something that takes more than having the right camera :)

Everyone can download vi and Python. Not everyone can write good software.

~~~
patio11
You also have to understand what people who buy stock photos need. (Pretty
girl in a headset, yes. Five coeds of a variety of races sitting in a circle
on a lawn, yes. Black guy and white guy in similar suits shaking hands, yes.
Ethernet cables splayed against a white background, yes. Still life of a
banana and a yogurt cup? Probably not, regardless of how beautifully you can
execute on that.)

~~~
elliottkember
If I were writing a health food article, I might disagree with your last
example.

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acangiano
This shows the advantage of living in a relatively inexpensive country.

I make between $3-6K/mo extra through technical blogging in my spare time, and
I couldn't afford to quit my day job as a result of that revenue alone (not
that I want to). Conversely, if I was living in Poland, I'd be king of Warsaw.
:-P

That's the beauty of income from the Internet. It can be virtually independent
of where you live, so if you reside somewhere inexpensive you can acquire a
ridiculously good lifestyle for much less money and effort of your North
American peers.

~~~
dpcan
Ther are MANY great and beautiful places to live in the U.S. where $3-6k per
month is a substantial living. Check Spokane WA or most of Idaho.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
Same here in France. For the record, we reduced our expenses to one third of
what we did before, by moving from Paris to a small village.

~~~
patrickaljord
What village do you live in and how much do you spend each month more or less
if I may ask? How much is needed to live comfortably? I'm thinking of going
back to Europe but I'm afraid I may have got completely spoiled at how cheap
life is over here in Arequipa, Peru.

~~~
thibaut_barrere
I'll reply by email!

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mootothemax
_But as you may see from the numbers I have almost tripled my monthly day job
earnings!_

Purely out of interest, is that before or after tax? I only ask as I'm also
based in Poland, and 3,000 PLN (i.e. your original monthly earnings) before
tax sounds painful!

~~~
kreci
It was my salary before tax. So now it really looks better (it is before tax
as well - it is my total income).

------
heliodor
Making significant money off mobile apps is a little more complicated than
just releasing a clean app.

Here's what comes to mind to be able to produce a decent advertising revenue:

\- the app needs to be useful on a daily (or so) basis

\- the app needs to provide regular notifications to remind people of the
app's existence and to draw them back into the app

\- the app needs to have inelastic, strong demand. To give you an example of
what I mean, I built the 'Spy Camera' app. That's the kind of product that has
a strong demand. I've been charging $6 most of the time, and people buy it!
I've made $25K over two years without have any of the above elements. Strong
demand goes a long way. But this works for selling apps, not for advertising
revenue. The revenue from the ads in the free version of Spy Camera is barely
noticeable.

Click-through rates are much higher when the user starts the app on his own as
opposed to getting there via a notification. Quantity vs quality.

Also, if you take a look at the OG's apps, he places the ads right next to the
buttons. That kind of stuff won't fly in Google Adsense. It does on mobile,
for the moment. Google will fix that in AdMob, then every other network will
do the same or risk losing the advertisers. Nobody wants fake clicks.

Finally, notice the OG's profitable apps are random catchy stuff that appeals
to the general population.

Clearly, the OG has done his homework. Don't think money will land in your lap
by just releasing a shiny app.

------
ja27
Is the Android ad income growth just a result of more users/traffic? Or did
you release more apps or do some more substantial marketing of your apps?

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nixy
It looks like a nice hobby income, but even using your best month ever as an
average, you're still only at ~$31000/yr. How much would you make working for
a medium-sized or large company in Poland, doing Android development?

~~~
kreci
I used to make about $1000 minus taxes and had 8 hour work day. Now it is
about 3-5 hours per day and income as you see.

~~~
roel_v
But that salary included health insurance, pension and holiday allowance, no?
How much are you paying/budgeting for those now that you're self-employed?

~~~
mootothemax
_But that salary included health insurance, pension and holiday allowance, no?
How much are you paying/budgeting for those now that you're self-employed?_

Be fair - this is a huge pay increase, and by the average standards of pay in
Poland is truly gigantic leap. Just for the sake of argument though:

 _health insurance_

I've seen quotes in the region of 2,500 PLN/year for individuals, and that's
for pretty damned decent insurance. That's just under $900 USD at current
rates.

 _holiday allowance_

Call that 20 days/year, essentially a month off. He's earned that this month
if he was on his former wage at least ;)

 _pension_

Default pension payments are close to nothing - maybe a few hundred zł/month,
so let's call that $100.

I think kreci should be congratulated, by my eyes he's on the path to well
exceeding normal paid employment. Keep up the good work!

~~~
roel_v
"Be fair - this is a huge pay increase, and by the average standards of pay in
Poland is truly gigantic leap."

I don't know, that's why I asked. Someone going from €1000 in a job to €2500
self-employed here in the Netherlands has made progress, but not remotely as
much as it seems at first. Of course it seems that kreci is also working much
less, so per hour he's ahead, I'm just trying to make a real comparison.

I'm not trying to put kreci down here, I'm just saying that the earnings of a
business owners are not even close to the gross profit of the company.

"<health insurance 2500 PLN / 900 USD / 630 EUR/ year>"

That seems very cheap. [http://www.justlanded.com/english/Poland/Poland-
Guide/Health...](http://www.justlanded.com/english/Poland/Poland-
Guide/Health/The-Polish-health-care-system) lists the self-employment
contributions, for the special discounted rate that is only valid for the
first 2 years, at 300 PLN = 108 USD = 75 EUR _per month_. After that, it's
three times that. It's not clear to me either if this includes unemployment
insurance. That costs several thousand euros a year in itself, easily (here in
the Netherlands, I don't think it's 10 times cheaper in Poland - 50% cheaper
at the very best, comparing the other numbers).

"<holiday allowance>"

20 days / year is 7% of the total amount of working days, assuming the 20
includes everything - holiday, public holidays, sick days etc. That has an
influence on total income, and 20 days including everything is not a lot.

"<pension>"

<http://pension3.com/pl/> says that just under 20% of a persons taxable income
is by law required to be put into a pension fund (for employees, that is).
Depending on how kreci has structured his business, he may not be obliged to
do so (I can't really tell from the page, either). Anyway it's fair to assume
that at least 10% (and probably more) of a person's gross earnings needs to be
put into a pension fund (or alternative savings vehicle) to be able to get a
pension comparable to what employees get (70% of average salary it seems).
Quite a bit more than you're implying.

Look, I do think too that he should be congratulated. I just don't want to see
him think he's rich all of a sudden and then be screwed when the tax man comes
around, or when he gets sick, or whatever. But I guess he thought about all of
that, he seems like a smart guy - and in that case, I wish he would include
those numbers in his reports so that people can get a more accurate idea of
his _net earnings_ , rather than _his companies gross profit_. The two are
related but not even close to the same!

------
revorad
How easy or hard is it to get accepted to istockphoto?

~~~
kreci
It looks hard with no any experience (it was my case). I have send them photos
edited a few times before getting accepted. But after you will know what can
be problematic it does not look so hard any more. It is the same with each
added photo as it is being checked each time you add something new.

~~~
revorad
Thanks. What camera do you use?

~~~
kreci
Canon EOS 400D (in US known as Canon Digital Rebel XTi).

------
chrislomax
Congratulations, not only on making it a success but having the balls to do
it. I had the chance once when I was made redundant and had a hefty payout to
go out on my own. I had enough to keep us in food and house for around 5
months so it was a good chance. Alas, I did not do it. I couldn't face risking
everything. I had just had a child and couldn't face it if I didn't do it. I
am the bread winner as they say, if I hadn't found my market soon enough I
would have failed.

I presume you had the distinct advantage to plan your move into working from
home though, I was forced with only really two weeks to get something sorted
and rolling.

Anyway, not to detract your success, well done!

------
yhlasx
Really like it. Will give it a try this summer. Inspired and encouraged by
your income reports :)

~~~
kreci
Thanks. Good to hear that!

------
wildmXranat
Wspaniałe wieści! Getting into paid apps on Google market might the next big
source of income. Is it still unavailable in Poland? If you would consider a
proxy publisher/partnership in North America pm me and we can always discuss
it. cześć.

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s00pcan
Lots of negative reviews on your apps on the android store, (which is to be
expected for "just for fun" apps) but that's pretty much irrelevant so long as
you're making money and getting experience. I wish I could say I was doing
either.

------
kreci
As usual comments are welcome and very desired!

~~~
gpambrozio
What ad network do you use on your android apps?

Very nice reports. Very encouraging. I'm and iOS developer with some paid apps
in the app store. Now I'm thinking about some free ad supported apps

Keep up the good work

------
jbverschoor
Somehow, our game www.damianfiligree.com only makes about 20usd revenue per
month.

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kahawe
> _Working at home is not as easy as it may seem as you have much more other
> things in your head that often sounds a lot more interesting than a work._

While working at home or in a secluded office is amazing for getting something
done, don't forget all the social interaction, communication and contacts you
are missing.

Do you account for that somehow and monitor how that develops over the months?
How do you counter it?

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danssig
The blog has a comments section, why do we need to see every single report
here? Are Android developers who make money really rare or something?

~~~
18pfsmt
What's rare is someone who is willing to share this information over the
course of time. It's the detail and consistency that count.

For those of us that have been following along (I've only read the last 3
reports), it is fascinating.

------
Derbasti
Why is it big news that an Android developer is making some money?

~~~
anthony_franco
Chris has been very open with his earnings since he first quit his job last
year ([http://www.kreci.net/blogging/i-gave-up-a-day-job-to-
make-a-...](http://www.kreci.net/blogging/i-gave-up-a-day-job-to-make-a-
living-from-online-income/)). It's been inspirational to see how far he's
progressed each month.

~~~
kreci
Thanks Anthony! I do not want to argue if it is important news so it is good
to know from others that it is not so bad... :)

~~~
Nate75Sanders
I think the voting system figures this out for us. Your reports are
consistently at/near the top of the list for a while, so people are clearly
interested.

Getting real-world stats on what it takes to make a particular amount of money
in a given context isn't terribly easy to get and you make it transparent.
Thanks.

