日前在英国敦提市举办的第一届国际应用开发大会（International App Development Conference，简称AppCon）上，包括YoYo Games首席技术官罗素·凯伊（Russell Kay）、手机用户体验专家理查德·乔斯（Richard Joos）、Tag Games总经理保罗·法利（Paul Farley）等在内的不少业内人士，在小组会议中对手机应用商店及其产品的未来发展趋势发表了许多颇有价值的看法，现将主要观点摘录如下：

app stores

1.跨平台投放产品

原来只有一家叫App Store的应用商店，现在我们都得在前面添上“苹果”二字加以甄别，因为现在的手机应用商店真是不胜枚举。

除了谷歌的Android Market、微软的Windwos Market、诺基亚的Ovi Store、三星乐园（Samsung Apps）、黑莓的App World、Palm公司的App Catalog、独立应用商店GetJar、PocketGear、Handango，就连手机运营商也扎堆赶来凑热闹，更不要说还有一些即将开业的其他应用商店，比如说Adobe公司的InMarket、英特尔的AppUp、Amazon公司的Android等。

因此，手机内容仍然会大量流向苹果App Store，因为App Store是目前为止最透明、最便捷、规模最大的应用商店，但多数开发商要想真正获得丰收，就要涉足多个应用商店，才能使所获营收最大化。

对手机内容开发商来说，跨平台发展战略是他们在2011年的头等大事。

2.发挥快闪族的消费号召力

应用商店的平台、运营商、零售商或其他因素都可能影响用户的消费欲望，而且这些应用商店还有不少限制性政策。要克服这种具有分散性的不利因素，开发商最好在用户中部署一个类似于快闪族的无组织性群体。

这种群体所能带来的好处就在于，他们可以在短时间内，闪电般地影响周围人，让大家形成一个购买暴走族，怂恿更多熟人购买你的热门游戏，这一点非常有利于克服应用商店限制性壁垒对产品销售的不良影响。

所以，要重视这类群体，让他们追捧你的游戏。

3.滞销不能怨商店

大多数游戏和应用开发商认为，产品曝光率是他们在应用商店遇到的最大难题。

但这种看问题的角度是错误的。事实上，只有开发商本身的促销推广活动获得成功，产品才有可能在应用商店中获得更多曝光率，这一点在任何应用商店都一样。

应该把应用商店看成是一个纯粹的、可以让用户搜索到游戏的实现途径，它是开发商在传统公共关系和市场营销、病毒式推广、品牌传播、价格促销和产品出色创意等方面的一种成果体现。

应用商店从来就不会扼杀一桩生意，即使是最蹩脚的应用商店也有可能让你中头彩，只是你站错了位置，看到了错误的假象。

4.品牌是成功的积累和沉淀

苹果App Store和其他应用商店，既没有《星环》（Halo）、《现代战争》（Modern Warfare）、《荣誉勋章》（Medal of Honor），也没有《神鬼寓言》（Fable）、《古墓丽影》（Tomb Raider）等著名的掌机游戏品牌。

但是它们却有一些为手机平台量身定造的游戏品牌，比如说《愤怒鸟》（Angry Birds）、《怪物吃糖果》（Cut the Rope）、《Parachute Panic》、《水果忍者》（Fruit Ninja）、《扔纸团》（Paper Toss）、《Words With Friends》、《宝石迷阵》（Bejeweled）等作品。

如果你创造了一个手机游戏品牌，可以尽量在多个应用商店进行推广。这样，即便它本身没啥活力（品牌定义是死的，但却有创造高利润的价值），用户也会因为它的广泛传播和大众知名度而受到影响，获得信心保证。

5.免费游戏具有无可争议的优势

现在许多开发商都铆足了劲，面向市场推出免费游戏。

他们曾眼睁睁地看着自己倾注满腔热情的游戏，最后即使售价99美分也仍然无人问津，这种滋味实在不好受。当然，这种情形未来可能有所改观，但至少在往后这六个月内，免费游戏（广告赞助或采用内置付费功能的游戏），仍然是所有应用商店默认的最有竞争力的选择。

所以，如果你还是不准备推出免费游戏，那么无论在哪个应用商店，都将难以虏获用户，久而久之，大家也就不乐意玩你的游戏了。

这一点一定要斟酌。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，转载请注明来源：游戏邦）

Opinion: 5 steps to successfully moving from today’s app store into tomorrow’s unknowns

Ending the first day of the first International App Development Conference (aka AppCon) in Dundee, we had a panel session called Today’s App Market, Tomorrow’s Unknown, which for better (or perhaps worse) was moderated by one Jon Jordan of PocketGamer.biz infamity.

Yet, thanks to a quality panel consisting of Russell Kay, CTO of YoYo Games, Richard Joos, a mobile user experience expert, Lyan van Furth of Moblio (and Vuvuzela 2010 app fame), and Paul Farley, MD of Tag Games, and questions from the audience, we managed to pin down some significant points.

1. There are a lot of app stores. There are going to be a lot more

Once upon a time there was the App Store. Now we have to call it the Apple App Store.

Now there’s also the Android Market, the Windows Market, Ovi store (Nokia), Samsung Apps store, BlackBerry App World, Palm’s App Catalog, GetJar, PocketGear, Handango, plus all the carriers’ app stores, plus the soon-to-launch Adobe’s InMarket, Intel’s AppUp, Amazon’s Android store, and no doubt a dozen more.

For this reason, content will still gravitate to the Apple App Store, because it’s the cleanest, easiest and biggest app store, but real success for most content companies will come as they earn additional, if marginal per store, revenue releasing on all the others.

Cross platform deployment will be the most important thing for content developers in 2011.

2. Flash mob

App stores are boring. Whether defined by device, operator, retailer or other brand, they are also restrictive. To overcome this fragmentation, you must deploy the amorphous concept of community.

Community is a fairly meaningless term used by journalists and marketing managers to define a group of people who could have a common interest, but might not yet be aware of the fact.

The good thing about this amorphous group however, is they can very quickly, and for short periods of time, be converted into a buying mob, which, like a wave, will overcome the restrictive barriers of app stores, encouraging more of their acquaintances to buy your hot, hot, hot game in the process.

Make communities love your game.

3. The app store isn’t your enemy. It can be your friend

Most game (or app) developers thinks discoverability on app stores is their major problem.

This is looking at the problem the wrong way around however. Instead, visibility on any app store is the result of your success when it comes to promotional activities elsewhere.

An app store should be viewed purely as a fulfillment channel; a frictionless mechanism by which people who want your game, get your game. In this context, an app store is the method by which your success in terms of traditional PR and marketing, viral community effort, branding, price promotion and the sheer brilliance of your idea is revealed.

An app store has never killed any business. Even the worst app store has the potential to be your personal one-armed bandit jackpot. To-date you’ve just pulled the wrong levers.

4. Brands are the impressive skeletons of previous successes

Apple’s App Store – and by default hence all others – seems to be moving away from big console brands. There’s no Halo, Modern Warfare, Medal of Honor, Fable or Tomb Raider. They invoke the wrong colour financials when it comes to return on investment as EA Mobile’s 4 percent drop in quarterly sales demonstrates.

No. App stores love the brands created within them – Angry Birds, Cut the Rope, Parachute Panic, Fruit Ninja, Paper Toss, Words With Friends, Bejeweled.

Once you have created a mobile brand – or using this metaphor, stumbled on a skeleton of a long dead beast – you can continue to reskin it in as many app stores as possible. People will be impressed, if not by its vitality (brands by their definition are dead, yet highly profitable) then by the publicity it entails, and its solemn bone-white reassurance.

5. It’s increasingly hard to argue with free

Most developers are now positively enthusiastic about releasing their game for free.

They’ve experienced the pain of pouring their heart into a game they love and then seeing it fail because people won’t buy it, even at 99c. Of course, things may change in future, but for the next six months or so, free games (whether monetised via ads or in-app purchases), are the default option when it comes to all app stores.

So, if – for whatever reason – you’re not planning on releasing a freemium game, your audience – on whichever app store – will likely be playing such, and hence are unlikely to be playing your game.

Think about it.（source:pocketgamer）