iPhone and iPad

Final App Store Survey Results

March 10, 2009 by Ellen

What One Change You’d Like

Here’s the result of the final question in our survey (check the archives if you want the rest), as well as the winners of the gift cards.

To the question: “What one change would you like most to see in the iTunes App Store?”, over 60% of you picked free trials. I guess given that so many of you indicated that you bought apps regardless of price (or at least didn’t just buy the $1 and $2 ones), trials makes a lot of sense. 18% opted for better categorization, with just under 10% wanting better find. Specifically:

Of the “other” replies, you asked for:

• All of the above!

• All of these, app store is almost unusable

• General change to the style how people use (browse) the app store

• More serious apps like eWallet and less junk

• “Best of breed” featured apps, regardless of popularity (# of downloads)

• Better search and iTunes like search playlists (to exclude junk devs)

• Less crap!

• Moderated reviews

• Review moderation. Many reviews cite problems that are due to apple

• Dated reviews with version reviewed

• Sort by rating

• Rankings based on revenue

• Amazon.com-like functionality: wish-lists, similar-apps-bought, order-by-ratings

• A wish list to keep track of apps, music, etc. until I can decide on them

• Wish List capacity to store for later purchase

• A way to save a list of apps I am interested in.

• Robust wish list (as at Amazon)

• More game options

• Would be nice to have a VIDEO review on apps (esp games) rather than on YouTube

• Demo capability

• The original ability to see all aps by post date

• Canadian redeem codes, for the love of Bob!

I grouped those for better readability, but otherwise didn’t edit them at all.

I’m happy to see that Apple took down reviews from non-buyers late last week. I hope - and believe - we’ll keep seeing improvements to the App Store. Find and trials would be great ones!

OK, and now for the 12 gift card winners. Congratulations to: Ken M., David B., Robin C., Addison H., Gina G., Dennis B., Drew C., Terry W., Louie L., Susan L., Nicole T., and Paul T. You’ve each won a US$10 gift card. People in the U.S. will get iTunes gift cards; people outside the U.S. will get gift cards from your local Amazon site. I’ve sent out emails about these already; if you think you’re one of the winners and didn’t see one, please be sure to whitelist emails from iliumsoft.com. I’ll re-send them to anyone I didn’t hear back from.

Once again, thanks to everyone for participating!

Still More App Store Survey Results

March 4, 2009 by Ellen

Results #3: Everything Else

Here are the results of most of the rest of the questions on our App Store Survey. Earlier results are here (how you find apps) and here (how you evaulate apps

To start - I’m not going to publish anything about the pricing questions. Not because I want to keep the info to myself, but because too many people wrote to me that the questions didn’t make sense. I think the answers are probably pretty useless, except to say that people really don’t insist on free or even inexpensive apps, at least not the people who took the survey.

For the question of How do you browse and shop on the iTunes App Store?, the result was split so evenly between on a desktop, on a device, and both that the chart’s really boring:

For the question of about how many apps you add to your iPhone/iPod Touch per month, almost 80% of you said 1 - 10.

Of those apps, most of you said that 30% to above 60% were free, rather than paid:

and that same number will still installed:

This seems to contradict Pinch Media’s really exellent presentation analyzing how people use apps on their iPhones. I’d believe them, rather than me. They have a lot more - and better - data. If you haven’t seen it, check it out; it’s really interesting.

OK, very soon I’ll post the response to the question of what one change you want to see most, as well as the names of the gift card winners. I’m closing the survey today; once again, many thanks to everyone who participated.

More App Store Survey Results

February 26, 2009 by Ellen

Results #2: How You Evaluate Apps

Today I’m writing about the questions that asked how you evaluate apps. And yes, I’m still surprised.

The longer version follows. In case you missed it, last week we posted a survey about how people use the iTunes App Store. I published results about how people find apps a few days ago.

So you all do a lot more reading than I’d have thought. I really thought people skimmed descriptions, looked at screenshots, and pretty much ignored reviews.

I was wrong.

For the question about what you look at when evaluating apps, screenshots and descriptions got the highest score, but reviews were very close behind, and even other apps scored between “sometimes” and “usually”.

But in answer to how carefully you read the descriptions, almost 70% said you read them completely, with only about 27% choosing “just skim”. I’ll admit it - I’m a skimmer.

And most people read reviews. Over half read enough to get a good consensus, another quarter read or skim a few. Only 11% just glance at the average (read later this week for info on why the averages don’t seem to be accurate), though only about 6% read a lot of reviews.

Again, more results, plus the prizes, soon! And the survey’s still open so jump in if you’re interested.

App Store Survey Results

February 23, 2009 by Ellen

Results #1: How You Find Apps

The short version: OK, I’m surprised.

The longer version follows. In case you missed it, last week we posted a survey about how people use the iTunes App Store.

First, a few disclaimers. I doubt this is really a representative group. Or a big enough group to make the responses statistically believeable. My questions weren’t written or organized in such a way that we probably got the best information. You’re welcome to use the information, but it’s at your own risk.

So, with that out of the way, here are some results. I’m going to split these up over a few days, so any given post isn’t too long.

Starting with what was most interesting - and surprising - to me: how you find apps. From the 200+ people who responded:

85% said yes, you do l ook outside iTunes to find, or find out about, available apps. Only about 12% said no to that one. (Click on the graphs to see the bigger versions.)

On the question of how you find new apps, the response was very spread out (and yes, people were allowed to pick more than one option). But the most popular answer - from websites outside iTunes - got under 20%. Ads got least votes: just about 1%. Don’t tell Apple; I love seeing the App Store ads on TV, even though they don’t feature our stuff (I’d go through the ceiling if they did). Power Search, the second lowest response, got just over 3%. Here are the details:

The “other” responses included magazines, RSS feeds, specific site names, and “It’s so un-organized you cant find apps!”. It’s true. I’m hoping to write more about finding apps in the store soon.

And finally (in the Find apps questions), when asked whether you ever go to an app developer’s site, over 87% of you said yes! Only 10% said no. OK, time to work on our site.

I’ll write about what the rest of the answers were later in the week, as well as some commentary and of course the prize giveaways. Meanwhile, the survey is still open, so if you haven’t taken it yet, please do! This is really an eye-opener for me. And I’m happy to keep posting results, and giving away prizes, as long as more people respond.

And, before I forget, many thanks to everyone who participated, and who posted about the survey.

How Do You Use the iTunes App Store?

February 11, 2009 by Ellen

There’s a lot being written about iTunes and the App Store this week. And a lot of it is by developers who are guessing what people want, how they find it, and how much they’ll pay for it.

Rather than guess, I thought I’d ask.

I’ve put together a very short survey. If you’d like to fill it out, please do! We’d appreciate the answers. And we’ll give away a bunch of iTunes or Amazon gift cards to people who fill it out (and include their email addresses, which we won’t do anything else with), so you’ll have a good chance to win.

We’ll publish the results if we get enough responses to be meaningful. So if you’re interested, help us publicize it!

Check it out. Tell your friends. And if you have comments, please post them below.

Apples2Oranges in the New York Times!

January 29, 2009 by Marc

I always love it when our products get on TV or into one of the big newspapers. I’m not sure if it sells more software, but it is definitely fun. You get that giddy “Woo hoo! We’re famous!” feeling. It’s just a blast. Anyhow, I just found out that Apples2Oranges got a mention in today’s edition of the New York Times (B5, lower right corner).

Bob Tedeschi wrote an article about Free Internet Calling services and at the end did one of his “Quick Calls” sections, where he highlights a few cool apps he has come across. It’s there that he mentions Apples2Oranges! You can pick up a copy at your local brick and mortar store, or read the whole article here. (You might need to register.)

So thanks, Mr. Tedeschi! We really appreciate it! I’ve got to go hit the newstand to pick up a couple extra copies!