Making (Some?) Money as an Indie iOS Developer

Is it possible to make a living as an indie iOS developer? Recently there has been a lot of discussion on blogs and in podcasts about the feasibility of making a living from making, selling and supporting your own iOS apps. In this presentation I highlight some points made on the topic recently and gather some tips that may improve a developer's chances of making it as an indie dev.

(Tokyo iOS Meetup, 9th August 2014)

Transcript

1. Making Money as an Indie iOS Developer Tokyo iOS Meetup - 9th August 2014 5QOG! Stefán Hafliðason http://stefan.haflidason.com @styrmis
2. Quick Introduction • I am an independent software developer (Rails, Django, iOS), but not quite an indie developer. • Three paid apps in the iOS App Store, each with very modest revenue. • My income primarily comes from consulting and building/hosting online B2B software.
3. My Apps Buddha's Brain $4.99 (Dec 2011)
 
 A companion app to a popular meditation/neuroscience book of the same name.
4. My Apps PatternCraft $4.99 (Feb 2013)
 
 Makes experimenting with colour schemes in patterns easy.
5. My Apps LearnTheNotes $1.99 (Aug 2013)
 Sight reading exercises to help people learning to play the piano.
6. Why Did I Make Them? • Buddha's Brain: to do something a little different after finishing my PhD and to learn iOS programming. • PatternCraft: initially made for a family member while home for Christmas. • LearnTheNotes: made again for a family member, and to learn more about making graphical / interactive apps.
7. Revenue • Buddha’s Brain: low five figures (USD), sells consistently • PatternCraft: low four figures, sells consistently • LearnTheNotes: low three figures, very patchy sales
8. Indie Developer (n) A person making all (or almost all) of their income from creating and selling their own software products (rather than through employment, contracting, consulting, freelancing or teaching, etc).
9. Discussion Points • Q: Is it feasible to make a living as an indie iOS developer? • Q: Is there anything we can do to increase our chances of success? • I’ll be summarising some of the points raised in the iOS blogosphere in recent weeks.
10. What May Possibly Be The Truth • Generally, iOS developers make money by making apps for other people, not from apps of their own. • The companies they make apps for likely don't make a profit on them. • The apps are likely to be incidental to the company’s main product rather than their core offering.
11. Why do we make software?
12. Some Reasons Why We Might Make Software • Because it’s fun • For the intellectual challenge • We enjoy solving problems • The freedom to build (and possibly sell) with few restrictions, what we create (Compare this with being a structural engineer or architect) • …and many more.
13. Lesser Reasons • Software developers can potentially make a lot of money • If this is the only reason why you do it, you won’t last very long…
14. Success on the App Store • What does “success” in this context even mean? • Can mean very different things to different people • Could be $3,000 in sales per month • Could be $30,000 in sales per month • Consider a 3-man team in Poland vs. a lone indie dev in SF
15. “...you make money on the App Store by selling small things — its very nature is a bitesize marketplace.” Benjamin Mayo
16. “Most of the successful new indies in the coming cycle will be those who are able to keep at it by sheer perseverance and diversification, going slow and steady, and committing to the long term.” Cezar Pereira
17. “I have shipped somewhere around 80 unique app concepts over the last five years... With each attempt (in success or failure) I learned something new about what makes an app great.” David Smith
18. “Efficiency is key. And efficiency means doing more (or all) of the work yourself, writing a lot less custom code and UI, dropping support for older OSes, and providing less customer support.” Marco Arment (Instapaper)
19. “The more I read from people I respect who have made a living in this industry, the more I realize that those who have succeeded at our thing are by and large the people who were patient, who didn’t take the easy way out, who built great products but also realized that wasn’t all there is to it, and who, most importantly, bothered to learn a lesson or two about business along the way.” Joe Cieplinski
20. “Maybe indie devs need to stop chasing the normals (who think everything should be free anyway) and just charge a fair price from the folks who care.” Robert McGinley Myers
21. “My basic strategy is to make a useful quality product, and sell it at a fair and sustainable price. If your app is quality, it will find customers. And then those customers will tell their friends, and the news sites will notice it. And since you're charging a fair price a virtuous circle will form.” Gus Mueller (Acorn, OSX)
22. Some Suggestions • Make apps for people who normally don't get software made for them • Partner up with someone from another domain who has a captive audience • Buddha's Brain sells, and commands a decent price because it is a companion to a very popular book. • Most reviews are favourable because the users were already fans of the original work. • Avoid basing your app on things that can change at any time, e.g. pulling app store revenue numbers, interacting with external APIs.
23. • Give products time to breathe: release, wait, and gather feedback. Every product has a natural pace, largely determined by its audience. Leave it be, and refresh yourself by working on something different. • Make something that you want: worst case scenario is you have something you like using that works as a portfolio piece, and you will have learned from the experience. • Charge a little more for your apps, they’re worth it! Some Suggestions
24. Underserved Markets • Make software for people who normally don’t get software made for them. • 1,001 todo apps already, so make something for: • Women? Cookpad (40M, 1.3M paying), Ravelry (4.3M), Bingo Card Creator (300k+) • My own app PatternCraft: • Sold from day 1 with zero marketing, not even a website • 1,230 copies sold, now priced at $4.99 • An uncrowded section of the market with a large market base (think Ravelry) • More on this from Patrick McKenzie (link)
25. Put it in the Store • And make it very easy for people to email you • The app may flop (initially), but your customers may point you in the right direction • This has been my experience with PatternCraft and to a lesser degree with LearnTheNotes • Some apps can sell consistently with zero marketing (underserved markets!)
26. A Final Word • There will always be people who say the sky is falling, the industry is in decline, the show is over. • The gold rush may be over, but so what? Gold rushes only serve to pull you into a position that isn't sustainable some years down the line. • Solving real problems never goes out of fashion; focus on quality and be wary of anything that looks like a bandwagon or a "gold rush". • “Define what success means for you, before you start building” [David Smith]
27. Discussion Stefán Hafliðason http://stefan.haflidason.com @styrmis Also happy to discuss these topics by email any time • Q: Is it feasible to make a living as an indie iOS developer? • Q: Is there anything we can do to increase our chances of success?