AppStoreGems.com
In the App Store, one of the problems developers are facing is getting more attention for their apps. We’ve run into this and even though we’ve had some good results the past week or so through various efforts, we’re continuing to push things as hard as we can. A few weeks ago infamous Mac developer, Austin Sarner was brainstorming with me about how we could get more exposure for our apps, especially since he just released his Pennies budget tracking app for the iPhone.
One of the things we came up with was a co-operative advertising campaign. So we explored the possibilities and started a medium-sized campaign through Macworld to test things out. We gathered a few other of our developer friends and got a print ad, along with some banner ads going. And today the print ad comes out in the magazine.
We decided to put up a website and drive all the traffic there initially, then send people off right to the App Store for more info on the apps they’re interested in. That site is called App Store Gems and we just went live with it.
Co-operative advertising is a great way to limit your risk and expenses, yet still try to go for the “big splash” with something like advertising in the largest Mac magazine. The iPhone app thing is all pretty new to all of us so we’ll see how it all goes. I plan to report back with results as we get some info back on their effectiveness.
A couple of the things that I felt was very important for this was to work with developers I knew and trusted, and also to make sure that the apps I picked were of high quality and had a good mass-market potential. Some of the people included are Ollie Wagner, who I worked with on mission 6 of MacHeist I, Josh and David Keay of Insanely Great Tees and a bunch of other nifty, Mac-related things, and Jorge Llubiá and Pedro Cuenca, developers of Xslimmer, which was promoted in MacHeist. They’re a great bunch of people and I’m happy that we’ve all banded together for this.
One very nice thing about this is that everyone involved has been contributing in some fashion and we’re all thinking about other potential ways to co-operatively promote our products. The whole is often greater than the sum of its parts and this promotion is the perfect example of that.
And one important thing we all decided to do was donate all of our earnings for AppStoreGems.com’s debut today to charity. The charities we’ve each chosen are:
Schlaeps
3:40am, August 25
Pity that the print ad has Kineo’s old name.
Justin W.
7:42am, August 25
This site is a great idea. I hope more apps appear soon!
Jack
8:41am, August 25
The ad looks great. The website looks great. Congratulations :). (I still like Flipbook better than Kineo ;)). So are you planing on adding different apps later on for new ads?
Nathan
9:45am, August 25
Filemagnet looks quite different in those promos than the screenshots on the App Store (and on Magnetism’s website for that matter)
Andrea
10:18am, August 25
Nice job guys!!! I especially like the fact that you are donating your earnings to great organizations. American Humane is such a fantastic cause!!!! http://www.americanhumane.org
macpug
11:04am, August 25
Great job. The site is just gorgeous! I picked up the ones I didn’t already have
I’d been thinking about it, then decided with the $$ going to charity, I’d just go ahead and grab them. Look forward to more great apps from all involved!
Garrett Murray
2:21pm, August 25
Isn’t it a little strange to include Groceries on there when it’s not released?
Max Barel
6:21pm, August 25
I’m in for the html/css challenge.
here is my first shot (hope pre tags work):
demo absolute
/* @override http://grogro.local:8888/~max/zjb/www/vues/vues/style/demo.css */
body {
margin: 0;
}
div {
position: absolute;
border: 1px solid gray;
}
#top, #bottom, #middle {
width: 100%;
border-right: none;
border-left: none;
}
#top, #bottom {
height: 98px;
}
#top {
top: 0;
}
#middle {
top: 100px;
bottom: 100px;
}
#bottom {
bottom: 0;
}
#middle div {
width: 20%;
height: 50%;
top: 0;
bottom: 0;
margin: auto;
}
#iphone_1.big {
height: 70%;
left: 20%;
margin-left: -10%;
}
#iphone_2.medium {
left: 50%;
margin-left: -10%;
}
#iphone_3.small {
height: 30%;
right: 20%;
margin-right: -10%;
}
Max Barel
6:26pm, August 25
I’m in for the HTML/CSS challenge.
Here is a link to my first shot: http://ac-mb.info/a_x/ftp/demo.html
Fubiz
6:36pm, August 25
Congrats Guys !
Mikael
6:29am, August 26
Great job, waiting for more.
craig t mackenzie
12:19pm, August 26
fyi: as far as i can tell this is broken in Safari 4 Dev Preview (5526.11.2)
the logo, bg + dock (incl. icons) render but nothing else…
there seems to be a javascript error on the page somewhere, but Safari 4’s console hasn’t improved much and it’s just telling me there is a null value….
you can download the Safari 4 preview from adc.
Raymond
6:33am, August 27
Hello Author,
I am working on my iPhone Apps too, I agree advertising is a big issue for us, not sure if I can join the advertising campaign, if yes, please add my msn here: raymng@hotmail.com
by the way, what is the largest community for iphone developers now?? I would like to know more friends in this area
Brad Gignac
4:02pm, August 28
I’m looking into the challenge now. It appears that the site is broken in some browsers. I’m using Safari 4 Developer Preview and Firefox 2.0.0.6 on two computers and neither one works correctly.
On Safari 4, the phone graphics don’t appear at all.
On Firefox 2.0.0.6, one giant phone is shown and the app links at the bottom are incorrectly positioned.
James Stanier
6:26pm, September 21
AppStoreGems looks really lovely - well done! As a developer I feel absolutely stumped when it comes to advertising my own apps, and it looks like you’ve got a really excellent idea going on here.