10 ms·

How HoursTracker earns five figures a month on the App Store

306 points by wallflower 12y ago

harisamin 12y ago
Interesting read. I’ve been looking at Mac Apps for a while to make some extra steady income. There’s definitely less competition there and yields are usually higher. I recently launched my first Mac App to the App Store: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mackernews-hacker-news-client/id946730699?mt https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mackernews-hacker-news-clien...
mherrmann 12y ago
Cool article but I think things are very different now. If the author launched the same app today, I think he'd have a much harder time getting to that revenue, even in 6 years. The time when the App Store opened was great for the first developers there but things have changed.
- cribasoft 12y ago
  Things have definitely changed over the years, and I've had to pivot many times along the way. I think it remains a good opportunity today. In fact, maybe even better because the market is much more stable and the right way to do it is more evident. I made mistakes along the way that probably cost me a lot of money.
  - rcorin 12y ago
    Can you elaborate on those mistakes? :)
    - cribasoft 12y ago
      A lot of it was just trying the wrong things to convert users to customers. Giving away too much for free or not enough, things like that. I can see the graph change directions when different strategies were at play. Not jumping on the IAP train fast enough was probably the stand-out one. Over time, it seemed like people got used to buying via IAP and almost resisted doing anything else. Sometimes it was as simple as being afraid they'd have to start over with their data if they purchased a whole different app (they wouldn't). I think its important to let people pay when they are ready with as little friction as possible. If you have the friction of returning to the App Store, you will lose a lot of them in the process.
  - andrewtbham 12y ago
    I agree. In the old days there were tons of crap time tracker apps. I suspect that as they didn't make much money and as they had to pay the yearly fee, the dev shut them down. Now there are only about a dozen fairly good apps.
  - jbigelow76 12y ago
    Congrats on your success. Have you launched any other apps in the app store, and if so are they performing similarly to how HoursTracker did at the same point in its life cycle?
    - cribasoft 12y ago
      HoursTracker was supposed to be app #1 of a shotgun approach to find something that stuck. Things worked out differently.
  - sixdimensional 12y ago
    Your use of metrics to track performance and ability/desire to experiment clearly had an impact as well. In these kinds of situations where you can get good quality metrics relatively easily, and experiment so quickly, it is still surprising to see folks not collecting those metrics. Of course, it's not ALL about metrics, and in some ways I reject the line of thinking that you can't improve what you don't measure (qualitative research/understanding can go a long way). But with quantitative research/data so easily available... it only makes sense to make use of it. Thanks for sharing your insight!
    - cribasoft 12y ago
      No doubt. That could be a whole article by itself. I track a lot of metrics and keep a custom dashboard that I can look at any time to see how things are going long-term/short-term/real-time.
programminggeek 12y ago
In my experience, the early apps rank well and it's much harder to launch a new app and get downloads.
- vampirechicken 12y ago
  So in business parlance, you're saying that it's easier to make money in a 'blue ocean', with little or no competition, than in a 'red ocean', with lots of competition.
  - nine_k 12y ago
    The problem is that you often have to start in a puddle, in a hope (but without a guarantee) that it will grow to a size of an ocean.
    - vampirechicken 12y ago
      The Blue/Red Ocean concept isn't about the size of the market, it's about the lack of competition in the market either by being first in a clearly new market, or by differentiating your offering from others to the extent that you're not competing for the same consumers. There's a book "Blue Ocean Strategy." It's worth a read for the explanation, and the case studies. There's worksheets and process too, but that didn't lend itself well to listening in the car.
  - programminggeek 12y ago
    Blue oceans are amazing if you can find them.
    - vampirechicken 12y ago
      "Blue Ocean Strategy" was an interesting, if repetitive, book. I enjoyed the examples/case studies.
- poopsintub 12y ago
  I think the key is finding a unique niche with only a few competitors in the store. If not, you will get lost among a few hundred similar apps., even if yours is better. Marketing $$ might help overcome, though. I haven't tested trying to push up a bottom dweller.
jonawesomegreen 12y ago
I think the app store has become much more about marketing now when you are entering with a new app. Most of the built in discovery tools are focused on apps with an existing reputation. Given the volume of apps this makes sense, and helps ensure that users are shown quality apps, however it also places a barrier to entry to newcomers until they can build a reputation that allows this virtuous cycle to take hold. I would be interested in hearing from any app developers who have managed to break through this cycle recently and the marketing techniques they used.
- barumrho 12y ago
  I just wanted to share my experience that this isn't always the case. I launched a transit app in Toronto* about 3 years ago. (There were already plenty of them back then.) Over the years, daily downloads steadily grew without me doing any marketing. These days I get a few hundred downloads per day which, to me, is mind-boggling. I realize this is a bit of a special case since people now look for transit apps when they get a new phone. * https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/ttc-watch-for-toronto/id505286932?mt=8 https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/ttc-watch-for-toronto/id5052...
  - LiweiZ 12y ago
    Your app is very simple and nice to use, though I do not take TTC. Nice to see its creator here.
  - jonawesomegreen 12y ago
    That is very interesting. I always like to hear counter examples. Have you had any success in turning downloads into revenue? Does the ad model work for your app, or is most of the revenue from in app purchases as in the article?
    - barumrho 12y ago
      The revenue from my apps have grown to be significant. Not enough for me to work on it full-time though. Off the top of my head, I think 95% of my revenue is from ads. I have plans to work on improving IAP conversion since I don't like the fact that I show ads. This article got me thinking about what I can offer more than just "remove ads".
andrewtbham 12y ago
I have a similar app, onsite time tracker, and it makes way less. like a few hundred dollars per month. https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/onsite-time-tracker/id470803110?mt=8 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/onsite-time-tracker/id470803... I have always been curious how much Hours Tracker makes. It dominates the app store searches.
- ianlevesque 12y ago
  The article says free with IAP is making much more revenue. You'd probably be wise to try that with yours.
  - andrewtbham 12y ago
    yeh i agree. will probably make the change soon. one struggle i had was what to make free and what to charge for. i thought about making the app free and charge only to export data, but i felt like people might feel duped by not realizing and then be forced to pay when they thought it was free. the plan with limiting the # of entries makes way more sense.
    - cribasoft 12y ago
      When I'm considering tweaks to IAP strategy, any ideas that entrap the user's data are non-starters. The user owns that data, they should always be able to get out what they put in. Supertop's Unread also has a great (similar) take on IAP: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/unread-rss-news-reader/id911364254?mt=8 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/unread-rss-news-reader/id911...
debacle 12y ago
One thing that I really notice a lot as I get older is that so many people say it isn't possible to make money anymore, early adopters had it easy, etc. People say this about apps and startups and the like. I tell myself these same things sometimes, but then I have to check myself - it is actually easier to make way more money on an app these days than ever before. What is bigger is the risk proposition, which is why people tell themselves that success is entirely about luck - if your own skill doesn't matter, there's no reason to try, and if you try and don't succeed it isn't your fault. This is a very real trap and I think in the reddit age (where if you aren't a cynic by 15 you're behind the curve) it is a mental virus. The world still rewards value, even if it takes some time. The people clamoring that it doesn't are doing so because they want to believe that it isn't their fault they didn't succeed. You need to be willing to emotionally and mentally invest yourself in something with a reasonable chance of failure or you will never, ever succeed. The people that you see who you are smarter than that have succeeded haven't gotten there because of luck - they've gotten there because they tried. Luck just helped.
- naithemilkman 12y ago
  Thanks for writing this. It spoke so much truth I feel like I could have been the one writing this.
- placebo 12y ago
  Yes, it is still possible to make money, even a lot of money, writing an app but that doesn't mean early adopters didn't have a big advantage. Market vacuums will always be filled and the later you arrive at the scene, the higher the probability you will have to rely on hard marketing work to be noticed and stand out in the overcrowded application markets. The good news is that: a) Persistence and hard work will usually pay off in the long run (assuming your product does indeed provide some sort of value) b) There will always be new vacuums. If keep you a close watch on developing trends you might be able to climb on the tree when it's still young and sit back while it grows, instead of spending your resources building giant ladders...
- HamboneWilson 12y ago
  People have been saying it's impossible to make money since they invented currency I'm sure. That's why everyone with an idea and some programming knowledge isn't a millionaire. It will always take passion, hard work, and business sense to be successful.
coolhand 12y ago
This is a compelling story. 6 years is a long time and I think that anything can happen in the app store in that timeframe. Too much talk that things have changed - always opp in the app store.
viggity 12y ago
I love the company name in the screenshot "Setec Astronomy" - it's a reference to the movie "Sneakers". It is an anagram for "too many secrets".
- lrm242 12y ago
  It's also an anagram for Cootys Rat Semen!
  - cribasoft 12y ago
    "Too many secrets" (from Sneakers) is certainly the intent. Pretty much the whole screenshot is full of Sneakers references.
    - lrm242 12y ago
      Oh I know. Cootys Rat Semen is also from Sneakers. It is the first decoding of the anagram that Bishop decoded while playing Scrabble. They quickly discarded that and found "Too Many Secrets" shortly thereafter.
      - c17r 12y ago
        It was the 3rd decoded that they didn't share with the group. The 1st two were "Montereys Coast" and "My Socrates Note". LOVE LOVE LOVE Sneakers
- johndoe77 12y ago
  I was ecstatic to see this "Sneakers" reference. When ever I use any type of voice recognition software it's a requirement to use the phrase " My voice is my passport. Verify Me.
__abc 12y ago
Got my money simply for using setec astronomy :)
serve_yay 12y ago
Nice work if you can get it!
justboxing 12y ago
I love your iPhone app landing page. I mistook it for a page on apple.com http://hourstrackerapp.com/iphone/ http://hourstrackerapp.com/iphone/ Simple, yet very beautifully designed.
- cribasoft 12y ago
  Thanks! That is high praise.
  - halfcat 12y ago
    Does the app track wherever you go? Such as, "iPhone was at this location from 2pm to 3:45pm"? Or do you have to manually add locations? I have always wanted something that tracks my location that I can refer back to. I drive all over, and if I forget to make a note of when I arrive and leave, it becomes a CSI-style investigation, cross referencing text messages and emails and phone calls to try and determine when I arrived and left a client's office.
z3t4 12y ago
This is the best article I've read in years. This guy understands economics, design, copy-writing and apparently knows how to code. What usually would need a whole team of highly educated professionals he seems to do all by himself ...
- cribasoft 12y ago
  Wow, thanks for the amazingly kind words.
lmedinas 12y ago
Would be interesting to see the numbers for the Android version.
- cribasoft 12y ago
  About 15% of the iOS revenue. It's a younger product with strong growth and lots of room for refinement. I'm satisfied with how it is going so far.
  - Zaheer 12y ago
    Android across the industry generates an order of magnitude less revenue than iOS apps so don't be surprised if you don't see as high figures.
alexvr 12y ago
Seems like a great app! Thanks for sharing
maguay 12y ago
Somehow reminds me of Stratechery's writeup about Pleco, a Chinese dictionary app: http://stratechery.com/2014/pleco-building-business-just-app/ http://stratechery.com/2014/pleco-building-business-just-app.... There's something to identifying a problem and working relentlessly to solve it—and, of course, to being willing to experiment and find a business plan that works for your product.
epaga 12y ago
This freemium approach is exactly the one I've chosen for my own iOS app Mindscope - if Apple would finally get their act together and natively support trial versions of apps, I would change to that in a heartbeat. Until then, I offer an ad-free, functional app for free but then charge to unlock the complete functionality. It's worked quite well for me so far (but obviously nowhere near five figures a month) seeing as how about 15% of downloaders end up unlocking the full functionality which I think is a pretty good number.
timtas 12y ago
Congrats to the developer, and I appreciate his taking the time to tell us about his journey. However, I find that the post offers little insight. I have a special reason to seek this insight: I did nearly the same thing, and my app makes THREE figures per YEAR. I read this post hoping to gain some insights as to why. I was disappointed. Actually, I didn't do what he did. If I did what he did, I would be making all that money. My complaint about the post is that it didn't help me discern the key differences. In March 2010 I introduced Bill It [1], a time tracking app. I was motivated by my own need combined with a desire to get into the exciting world of mobile apps. Like the author, I was a .NET developer by day. As a contractor I wanted something for myself, and I figured I was not unique. I want to be very clear that I am not surprised of my lackluster results or jealous of his success. (Well maybe a bit jealous.) I approached it as a build-it-and-maybe-someone-will-come-but-who-cares-because-its-fun-and-I-learned-something kind of thing. It hurts my head a little to think about it marketing, so I built it and threw it out there. But so did he: "Surprised to see it getting some traction, I decided I should take HoursTracker a bit more seriously." His app took off with no marketing at all. Mine did not. Had I been able to say this about Bill It, my whole story would have played differently. Had I seen the proverbial fishing pole starting to bend, I would have grabbed it and stared reeling, as he did. Is that a post hoc rationalization? Maybe, but I don't think so. So what made the difference? Time-to-market? Features? Try-ability? Pricing? TIME-TO-MARKET As others have said, time-to-market is important because the app store keeps the winners at the top, and it's easier to get to the top early on. Maybe I was just too late to have a chance without serious marketing. Who knows? FEATURES My "killer feature" was supposed to be Quickbooks Integration. I was running my consulting business on Quickbooks, and I needed to get my hours input in order for billing to be linked to payments, deposits, revenue, etc. I created a very nice feature set to accomplish quite smoothly (if I say so myself). I decided not to add a timer. I explain the rationale in the product description. Perhaps this was a bad decision. Who knows? TRY-ABILITY Bill It launched shortly before in-app purchases were introduced. So I created a "lite" version and a full version. As soon as in-app purchases came out, I added a "full" purchase in the lite app. Did I "accidentally give too much away for free?" No. If anything, I erred on the opposite side. The Quickbooks integration took some setup work, so my main goal for the lite version was to allow the user to verify it before paying. I only allowed 5 time entries, which was plenty to see how the app works but not enough to actually use it. Maybe that was the problem. Who knows? PRICING Just before Bill It came out, another time tracker featuring Quickbooks integration came out. Although I thought my integration feature was superior, their app seemed to have a few more features and a little more polish, so I tracked just below their price, ending up at $8.99 (about the same as the pro version of HoursTracker), which is still a high price as apps go. Maybe a different pricing strategy would have been better. Who knows? I want to clarify another point. I don't expect the author the know what made him successful where I and others weren't. My real complaint is that the rest of us expect that of him. From the first word of his title, "How," we can see that he wants to meet this unrealistic expectation. The post would have been better titled "HoursTracker earns five figures a month on the App Store" but then no one would read it I guess. I told you, I'm bad at marketing. [1] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bill-it-lite/id367603023 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bill-it-lite/id367603023
shanev 12y ago
Good to see an article about an indie developer doing well in the age of funded startup hype. I too have been living off the success of my app Drum Kit since 2008. No longer making 5 figures a month, but it did for a few years :)

306 points by wallflower 12y ago

Interesting read. I’ve been looking at Mac Apps for a while to make some extra steady income. There’s definitely less competition there and yields are usually higher. I recently launched my first Mac App to the App Store: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mackernews-hacker-news-client/id946730699?mt https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/mackernews-hacker-news-clien...

mherrmann 12y ago

Cool article but I think things are very different now. If the author launched the same app today, I think he'd have a much harder time getting to that revenue, even in 6 years. The time when the App Store opened was great for the first developers there but things have changed.

cribasoft 12y ago
Things have definitely changed over the years, and I've had to pivot many times along the way. I think it remains a good opportunity today. In fact, maybe even better because the market is much more stable and the right way to do it is more evident. I made mistakes along the way that probably cost me a lot of money.
- rcorin 12y ago
  Can you elaborate on those mistakes? :)
  - cribasoft 12y ago
    A lot of it was just trying the wrong things to convert users to customers. Giving away too much for free or not enough, things like that. I can see the graph change directions when different strategies were at play. Not jumping on the IAP train fast enough was probably the stand-out one. Over time, it seemed like people got used to buying via IAP and almost resisted doing anything else. Sometimes it was as simple as being afraid they'd have to start over with their data if they purchased a whole different app (they wouldn't). I think its important to let people pay when they are ready with as little friction as possible. If you have the friction of returning to the App Store, you will lose a lot of them in the process.
- andrewtbham 12y ago
  I agree. In the old days there were tons of crap time tracker apps. I suspect that as they didn't make much money and as they had to pay the yearly fee, the dev shut them down. Now there are only about a dozen fairly good apps.
- jbigelow76 12y ago
  Congrats on your success. Have you launched any other apps in the app store, and if so are they performing similarly to how HoursTracker did at the same point in its life cycle?
  - cribasoft 12y ago
    HoursTracker was supposed to be app #1 of a shotgun approach to find something that stuck. Things worked out differently.
- sixdimensional 12y ago
  Your use of metrics to track performance and ability/desire to experiment clearly had an impact as well. In these kinds of situations where you can get good quality metrics relatively easily, and experiment so quickly, it is still surprising to see folks not collecting those metrics. Of course, it's not ALL about metrics, and in some ways I reject the line of thinking that you can't improve what you don't measure (qualitative research/understanding can go a long way). But with quantitative research/data so easily available... it only makes sense to make use of it. Thanks for sharing your insight!
  - cribasoft 12y ago
    No doubt. That could be a whole article by itself. I track a lot of metrics and keep a custom dashboard that I can look at any time to see how things are going long-term/short-term/real-time.

programminggeek 12y ago

In my experience, the early apps rank well and it's much harder to launch a new app and get downloads.

vampirechicken 12y ago
So in business parlance, you're saying that it's easier to make money in a 'blue ocean', with little or no competition, than in a 'red ocean', with lots of competition.
- nine_k 12y ago
  The problem is that you often have to start in a puddle, in a hope (but without a guarantee) that it will grow to a size of an ocean.
  - vampirechicken 12y ago
    The Blue/Red Ocean concept isn't about the size of the market, it's about the lack of competition in the market either by being first in a clearly new market, or by differentiating your offering from others to the extent that you're not competing for the same consumers. There's a book "Blue Ocean Strategy." It's worth a read for the explanation, and the case studies. There's worksheets and process too, but that didn't lend itself well to listening in the car.
- programminggeek 12y ago
  Blue oceans are amazing if you can find them.
  - vampirechicken 12y ago
    "Blue Ocean Strategy" was an interesting, if repetitive, book. I enjoyed the examples/case studies.
poopsintub 12y ago
I think the key is finding a unique niche with only a few competitors in the store. If not, you will get lost among a few hundred similar apps., even if yours is better. Marketing $$ might help overcome, though. I haven't tested trying to push up a bottom dweller.

jonawesomegreen 12y ago

I think the app store has become much more about marketing now when you are entering with a new app. Most of the built in discovery tools are focused on apps with an existing reputation. Given the volume of apps this makes sense, and helps ensure that users are shown quality apps, however it also places a barrier to entry to newcomers until they can build a reputation that allows this virtuous cycle to take hold. I would be interested in hearing from any app developers who have managed to break through this cycle recently and the marketing techniques they used.

barumrho 12y ago
I just wanted to share my experience that this isn't always the case. I launched a transit app in Toronto* about 3 years ago. (There were already plenty of them back then.) Over the years, daily downloads steadily grew without me doing any marketing. These days I get a few hundred downloads per day which, to me, is mind-boggling. I realize this is a bit of a special case since people now look for transit apps when they get a new phone. * https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/ttc-watch-for-toronto/id505286932?mt=8 https://itunes.apple.com/ca/app/ttc-watch-for-toronto/id5052...
- LiweiZ 12y ago
  Your app is very simple and nice to use, though I do not take TTC. Nice to see its creator here.
- jonawesomegreen 12y ago
  That is very interesting. I always like to hear counter examples. Have you had any success in turning downloads into revenue? Does the ad model work for your app, or is most of the revenue from in app purchases as in the article?
  - barumrho 12y ago
    The revenue from my apps have grown to be significant. Not enough for me to work on it full-time though. Off the top of my head, I think 95% of my revenue is from ads. I have plans to work on improving IAP conversion since I don't like the fact that I show ads. This article got me thinking about what I can offer more than just "remove ads".

andrewtbham 12y ago

I have a similar app, onsite time tracker, and it makes way less. like a few hundred dollars per month. https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/onsite-time-tracker/id470803110?mt=8 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/onsite-time-tracker/id470803... I have always been curious how much Hours Tracker makes. It dominates the app store searches.

ianlevesque 12y ago
The article says free with IAP is making much more revenue. You'd probably be wise to try that with yours.
- andrewtbham 12y ago
  yeh i agree. will probably make the change soon. one struggle i had was what to make free and what to charge for. i thought about making the app free and charge only to export data, but i felt like people might feel duped by not realizing and then be forced to pay when they thought it was free. the plan with limiting the # of entries makes way more sense.
  - cribasoft 12y ago
    When I'm considering tweaks to IAP strategy, any ideas that entrap the user's data are non-starters. The user owns that data, they should always be able to get out what they put in. Supertop's Unread also has a great (similar) take on IAP: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/unread-rss-news-reader/id911364254?mt=8 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/unread-rss-news-reader/id911...

debacle 12y ago

One thing that I really notice a lot as I get older is that so many people say it isn't possible to make money anymore, early adopters had it easy, etc. People say this about apps and startups and the like. I tell myself these same things sometimes, but then I have to check myself - it is actually easier to make way more money on an app these days than ever before. What is bigger is the risk proposition, which is why people tell themselves that success is entirely about luck - if your own skill doesn't matter, there's no reason to try, and if you try and don't succeed it isn't your fault. This is a very real trap and I think in the reddit age (where if you aren't a cynic by 15 you're behind the curve) it is a mental virus. The world still rewards value, even if it takes some time. The people clamoring that it doesn't are doing so because they want to believe that it isn't their fault they didn't succeed. You need to be willing to emotionally and mentally invest yourself in something with a reasonable chance of failure or you will never, ever succeed. The people that you see who you are smarter than that have succeeded haven't gotten there because of luck - they've gotten there because they tried. Luck just helped.

naithemilkman 12y ago
Thanks for writing this. It spoke so much truth I feel like I could have been the one writing this.
placebo 12y ago
Yes, it is still possible to make money, even a lot of money, writing an app but that doesn't mean early adopters didn't have a big advantage. Market vacuums will always be filled and the later you arrive at the scene, the higher the probability you will have to rely on hard marketing work to be noticed and stand out in the overcrowded application markets. The good news is that: a) Persistence and hard work will usually pay off in the long run (assuming your product does indeed provide some sort of value) b) There will always be new vacuums. If keep you a close watch on developing trends you might be able to climb on the tree when it's still young and sit back while it grows, instead of spending your resources building giant ladders...
HamboneWilson 12y ago
People have been saying it's impossible to make money since they invented currency I'm sure. That's why everyone with an idea and some programming knowledge isn't a millionaire. It will always take passion, hard work, and business sense to be successful.

coolhand 12y ago

This is a compelling story. 6 years is a long time and I think that anything can happen in the app store in that timeframe. Too much talk that things have changed - always opp in the app store.

viggity 12y ago

I love the company name in the screenshot "Setec Astronomy" - it's a reference to the movie "Sneakers". It is an anagram for "too many secrets".

lrm242 12y ago
It's also an anagram for Cootys Rat Semen!
- cribasoft 12y ago
  "Too many secrets" (from Sneakers) is certainly the intent. Pretty much the whole screenshot is full of Sneakers references.
  - lrm242 12y ago
    Oh I know. Cootys Rat Semen is also from Sneakers. It is the first decoding of the anagram that Bishop decoded while playing Scrabble. They quickly discarded that and found "Too Many Secrets" shortly thereafter.
    - c17r 12y ago
      It was the 3rd decoded that they didn't share with the group. The 1st two were "Montereys Coast" and "My Socrates Note". LOVE LOVE LOVE Sneakers
johndoe77 12y ago
I was ecstatic to see this "Sneakers" reference. When ever I use any type of voice recognition software it's a requirement to use the phrase " My voice is my passport. Verify Me.

__abc 12y ago

Got my money simply for using setec astronomy :)

serve_yay 12y ago

Nice work if you can get it!

justboxing 12y ago

I love your iPhone app landing page. I mistook it for a page on apple.com http://hourstrackerapp.com/iphone/ http://hourstrackerapp.com/iphone/ Simple, yet very beautifully designed.

cribasoft 12y ago
Thanks! That is high praise.
- halfcat 12y ago
  Does the app track wherever you go? Such as, "iPhone was at this location from 2pm to 3:45pm"? Or do you have to manually add locations? I have always wanted something that tracks my location that I can refer back to. I drive all over, and if I forget to make a note of when I arrive and leave, it becomes a CSI-style investigation, cross referencing text messages and emails and phone calls to try and determine when I arrived and left a client's office.

z3t4 12y ago

This is the best article I've read in years. This guy understands economics, design, copy-writing and apparently knows how to code. What usually would need a whole team of highly educated professionals he seems to do all by himself ...

cribasoft 12y ago
Wow, thanks for the amazingly kind words.

lmedinas 12y ago

Would be interesting to see the numbers for the Android version.

cribasoft 12y ago
About 15% of the iOS revenue. It's a younger product with strong growth and lots of room for refinement. I'm satisfied with how it is going so far.
- Zaheer 12y ago
  Android across the industry generates an order of magnitude less revenue than iOS apps so don't be surprised if you don't see as high figures.

alexvr 12y ago

Seems like a great app! Thanks for sharing

maguay 12y ago

Somehow reminds me of Stratechery's writeup about Pleco, a Chinese dictionary app: http://stratechery.com/2014/pleco-building-business-just-app/ http://stratechery.com/2014/pleco-building-business-just-app.... There's something to identifying a problem and working relentlessly to solve it—and, of course, to being willing to experiment and find a business plan that works for your product.

epaga 12y ago

This freemium approach is exactly the one I've chosen for my own iOS app Mindscope - if Apple would finally get their act together and natively support trial versions of apps, I would change to that in a heartbeat. Until then, I offer an ad-free, functional app for free but then charge to unlock the complete functionality. It's worked quite well for me so far (but obviously nowhere near five figures a month) seeing as how about 15% of downloaders end up unlocking the full functionality which I think is a pretty good number.

timtas 12y ago

Congrats to the developer, and I appreciate his taking the time to tell us about his journey. However, I find that the post offers little insight. I have a special reason to seek this insight: I did nearly the same thing, and my app makes THREE figures per YEAR. I read this post hoping to gain some insights as to why. I was disappointed. Actually, I didn't do what he did. If I did what he did, I would be making all that money. My complaint about the post is that it didn't help me discern the key differences. In March 2010 I introduced Bill It [1], a time tracking app. I was motivated by my own need combined with a desire to get into the exciting world of mobile apps. Like the author, I was a .NET developer by day. As a contractor I wanted something for myself, and I figured I was not unique. I want to be very clear that I am not surprised of my lackluster results or jealous of his success. (Well maybe a bit jealous.) I approached it as a build-it-and-maybe-someone-will-come-but-who-cares-because-its-fun-and-I-learned-something kind of thing. It hurts my head a little to think about it marketing, so I built it and threw it out there. But so did he: "Surprised to see it getting some traction, I decided I should take HoursTracker a bit more seriously." His app took off with no marketing at all. Mine did not. Had I been able to say this about Bill It, my whole story would have played differently. Had I seen the proverbial fishing pole starting to bend, I would have grabbed it and stared reeling, as he did. Is that a post hoc rationalization? Maybe, but I don't think so. So what made the difference? Time-to-market? Features? Try-ability? Pricing? TIME-TO-MARKET As others have said, time-to-market is important because the app store keeps the winners at the top, and it's easier to get to the top early on. Maybe I was just too late to have a chance without serious marketing. Who knows? FEATURES My "killer feature" was supposed to be Quickbooks Integration. I was running my consulting business on Quickbooks, and I needed to get my hours input in order for billing to be linked to payments, deposits, revenue, etc. I created a very nice feature set to accomplish quite smoothly (if I say so myself). I decided not to add a timer. I explain the rationale in the product description. Perhaps this was a bad decision. Who knows? TRY-ABILITY Bill It launched shortly before in-app purchases were introduced. So I created a "lite" version and a full version. As soon as in-app purchases came out, I added a "full" purchase in the lite app. Did I "accidentally give too much away for free?" No. If anything, I erred on the opposite side. The Quickbooks integration took some setup work, so my main goal for the lite version was to allow the user to verify it before paying. I only allowed 5 time entries, which was plenty to see how the app works but not enough to actually use it. Maybe that was the problem. Who knows? PRICING Just before Bill It came out, another time tracker featuring Quickbooks integration came out. Although I thought my integration feature was superior, their app seemed to have a few more features and a little more polish, so I tracked just below their price, ending up at $8.99 (about the same as the pro version of HoursTracker), which is still a high price as apps go. Maybe a different pricing strategy would have been better. Who knows? I want to clarify another point. I don't expect the author the know what made him successful where I and others weren't. My real complaint is that the rest of us expect that of him. From the first word of his title, "How," we can see that he wants to meet this unrealistic expectation. The post would have been better titled "HoursTracker earns five figures a month on the App Store" but then no one would read it I guess. I told you, I'm bad at marketing. [1] https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bill-it-lite/id367603023 https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/bill-it-lite/id367603023

shanev 12y ago

Good to see an article about an indie developer doing well in the age of funded startup hype. I too have been living off the success of my app Drum Kit since 2008. No longer making 5 figures a month, but it did for a few years :)