作者：David Amador

约11个月前，我注册了App Store开发者帐号，想让《五色奇石》入驻iPhone平台。

Vizati from xgdown.com

我以前从未接触过Mac，甚至连iPhone或iPod也没有。我只是听说很多人因此获利丰厚，越来越多人投身该平台。所以我也加入其中。

应用入驻平台便能创收误区

我犯下的首个大错误是认为“应用只要投放平台，便能受到关注。”App Store刚问世头几个月，情况确实如此。如今局势大不相同。推出新游戏，发布当天或许小有成绩，因为游戏处在新发布游戏之列，但很少有游戏会因此呈蓬勃发展之势。

所以勿忘iOS广告的重要性（游戏邦注：如论坛，微博、邮寄名单）。头个月，我每天发送许多邮件至网站、报社和杂志，有些取得成效，有些则不然。

周四发布产品方能成为苹果当周推荐应用误区

虽然这样有可能增加你的胜算，但我们是周五发布游戏，它两周后获得了App Store推荐，这说明只要是有吸引力的好东西，在其他时间发布游戏也同样奏效。

0.99美元策略误区

这非明智之举，不要一开始就把价格定在0.99美元。合理评估作品价值，开头定价稍高，这能够确保你在开展促销活动时保持盈利，无需采取免费策略。

很多厌倦面对无数游戏的消费者只瞄准高价位作品，因为从逻辑判断，这些游戏会略胜一筹。若你认为自己的应用不值0.99美元，那么就重新定价。劣质应用定行不通，100款劣质应用的销量也无法匹敌5款优质应用。

低价应用同时能够吸引众多用户，他们给出1星级评价，仅是因为你5个月内都没有更新内容。购买高价应用的消费者更具宽容之心，更体现其敬重态度。

促销活动误区

头2-3天这能够行得通，但最终还是回到原来的销量水准。除非你有内置付费渠道，否则这并非可行策略。只有你希望向好友吹嘘应用下载量高达10万，完全不考虑价格，这才行得通。

我采取这个策略3次，每次都瞄准时机，成功获得更多下载量，但当3天后产品回归正常价格，形势也逐步也回归正常。

根据促销时间，你最终的营收同没开展促销活动大同小异。此外，你会发现你的等级下降1颗或半颗星（游戏邦注：开发者需要牢记的是所有族群都会下载作品）。

反馈推动销量误区

显然添加需求度高的功能会让消费者开心，他们因此会愿意向好友推荐。不要满足消费者所有要求。找准立场，为自己辩护，向他们表示有些细节是你有意为之，并非失误造成。

消费者会购买各式各样的作品，只是为了晋升等级。

的确如此，但他们购买某款不尽人意的应用并不意味着他们不会抱怨这个持续15分钟的作品。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

So what have I learned after eight months on the App Store?

by David Amador

Around 11 months ago I registered my App Store developer account. The idea…put Vizati on the iPhone.

I’ve never worked with Mac’s before, didn’t even have an iPhone/iPod or whatever. I just read that a bunch of people got rich and many more where making a living out of it.So here I go.

Just placing an app there will sell

My first BIG mistake was the general conception that “just placing an app there will sell”. That’s probably true on the very first months the App Store opened. Not now, trust me. You release a new game, will probably have a few sales on the 1st day because it’s on the new released games and that’s it, only on very rare conditions will the game start selling very good with just that.

So keep in mind advertisement on iOS is mandatory, forums, twitter, mailing list, whatever.The first month I was sending dozens of emails every single day to websites, journalists, magazines, some paid off, others didn’t.

Release my app at a Thursday to be featured at that week’s App Featured Apps

Although this might increase your odds, we released Vizati on a Friday, 2 weeks later it got a feature on the App Store, so it can still happen. Just create something cool and appealing.

$0.99 is the way to go

Wrong, don’t EVER place your app at $0.99 right from start. Evaluate it well, start higher. Having a higher price will help to distinguish it from others, will give you margin for promotions without making it free.

Many costumers, tired of the enormous lists of game will only seek higher priced games because logic mandates that they are indeed better. If you think your app is not worth more that $0.99 go back to the drawing boards. There’s no sense in having crappy apps, 100 bad apps may not sell as much as 5 really good ones.

Selling at a low price will also bring all kinds of customers, they will give you a 1 star just because you haven’t updated the app in 5 months or so. Customers that buy pricier app are more forgiving and respectful.

Making a Free promotion will help boost sales afterwords

True, for the first 2-3 days. Then you’ll get back to whatever you where selling. Unless you have some in-game purchases it’s not worth it. Well only if you want to brag to your friends that your app got 100K downloads no matter the price.

I’ve tried this 3 times, each time I place it at a smarter occasion getting successfully more downloads, thing is that after 3 days of getting back to regular price things would slowly return to normal.

Depending on promotion amount of days you may end up with the same money you would have not making the promotion. Also usually you will see your rating decreasing half or a full star, keep in mind, all kinds of people will download it.

Answering to customers Feedback helps sales

Obviously implementing a highly demanded features will make them happy thus recommending to friends. Just don’t go making all the changes they ask. Choose a position and defend it, show that things are the way they are because you choose so, not because of some mistake.

People will buy all kinds of crap, just place one level.

Also true, but just because they bought a “fart app” doesn’t mean they wont’ complain about your 15m duration game.（Source：gamasutra）