App Trillionaires: How To Become An App Developer: Enjoy Life, Make Money, and Live Your Dreams! (2013)
11. THE APP LIFECYCLE
In order to market apps successfully, you must understand the app LIFECYCLE!
In general most apps that are launched tend to decline in popularity to a point where they can only be found via an app search, which is what I like to call App Oblivion because it is no longer in the charts. In general at this point, the app sales volume decreases greatly, when compared to the initial launch and thus it is only findable via an app search.
The app lifecycle in general goes through the following:
1. Launch
The launch of an app can last anywhere from 1 to 3 weeks depending on how powerful you started your marketing. In general without marketing, chances are you’ll hit app oblivion faster. Keep in mind, there are times with an app where an app may just hit oblivion immediately. That can be painful, so make sure you do some form of basic marketing (spread the word via social networks like twitter or facebook or on message boards, etc.) and try and increase the odds of a longer launch period.
2. General sales gain and increase
As word starts to spread, if you did a good job and have a good app, then you should start to see sales rise over time. At any moment however as always, your app can hit oblivion, but an app can have a lifetime of around 1-6 months before it dies out into oblivion in general. Some apps don’t reach oblivion for a long time and first hit what is known as Terminal Velocity or Plateau.
3. Terminal Velocity / Plateau
This is the point where everyone has learnt about the app or already has the app and is kind of getting sick of the app. Either the app is now outdated or is just no longer popular because everyone already has it. Angry Birds is currently in Plateau and is starting its decline now. Everyone either already has it or is getting sick of it and is just waiting for the next big hit. This stage is pretty much the HIGHEST sales you can expect for an app without any other forms of advanced marketing.
4. Decline
At this point the app is loosing its steam and heading right into Oblivion and there is pretty much no stopping it unless you start some advanced marketing techniques as I outline in Chapter 12.
The App Lifecycle
ZOMBIES
You may see in the diagram a little doodle of a zombie. These are apps that suddenly become popular and gain life again in what appears to be some RANDOM growth (Hence the term zombie - Coming back to life)!
There are reasons for this, however and will keep you going in the long run. Sometimes apps are SEASONAL, so you may see an app hit oblivion through the summer months and then in winter months pick up again. When an app goes Zombie, you want to help it get ALL the sales it can by doing a marketing push or using advanced techniques like you will learn in Chapter 12. Zombies need help to grow and can easily become heavy hitters for quite some time.
A great example is our fireplace app called Intimate Fireplace. Our app goes Zombie during the winter and Christmas months. During that time we like to put marketing dollars behind it because it will just come right out of app oblivion because everyone is looking for a fireplace. It starts gaining a rank again on its own and we can then take that Zombie app and grow it.
Other reasons why an app may go Zombie could be specific NEWS or POLITICAL events! Let’s say you have a soccer app, and every 4 years is the world cup, all of a sudden during the world cup year, your app goes zombie!
If you watch the news and prepare yourself, you can help your zombies out so they can gain more downloads and increase your overall app infrastructure.
“Habits can make or break you. List your bad habits down and replace them with good ones! Change will lead to success!”
— Abhinav Gupta