Is the App Store bubble about to burst?
John Strand of Strand Consult, who’s been advising mobile operators on strategy for many years, is once again making us all sit up and question:
Is Apple’s App Store really such a large success as the media write, or is it simply one of the many solutions that are being overhyped?
Here’s what John Strand says:
“If you were to evaluate Apple’s App Store and the cash flow it generates, compared to the global market for premium mobile applications, our analyses show that the value of the premium mobile services market in Norway is larger than the total global value of the premium services being sold via Apple’s App Store. In Norway, the population of 4.3 million people spent 120 million Euro on premium mobile services.”
He has a point, don’t focus on developing apps for just one handset as you’ll be missing out on the wider market. Also is developing an app the right thing? There’s a great article over on Mobile Marketer: Choose wisely: Mobile application or Web site? which is definitely worth reading if you’re unsure which route to go down.
If you want to build a revenue stream from your digital content though then it’s important to cover as many handsets, on as many networks and countries as you can. That’s where Bango mobile billing can help you….
While John Strand has a point about the apple apps store, it is worth bearing in mind that (1) it is only one of the proposed myriad apps stores that will soon be out there; (2) it is very very early days in terms of uptake of apps stores — its all very explorative at the moment; (3) If you get the right app — such as the some what prosaic iFart – you can make as much as $5000 a day; (4) the Apple apps store has done something far more important than make money, it has created (possibly) a whole new route to market for brands, content owners, SPs and so on that by pass operators (largely) — it is also a boon for alternative billing providers; (5) There is also the possibility of adding premium content and services within apps to increase their value, customer stickiness, shelf life and revenue generating potential (as I said, we are at the very beginning of the apps model) (see http://twitter.com/MobileMktg/status/1785747410).
There are of course problems with apps and the apps model — it is just a walled content garden and in that regard something of a retrograde step. But, it has wrestled the control of content services and, most importantly, the billing from network operators. They are also such large walled gardens that one could wonder whether it really matters — the choice of product is there if you go looking for it, so its kind of more open (or at least appears to be).
The other really interesting issue is that it has inspired everyone. I was at a banking conference earlier this week (with a different hat on) and the iPhone and apps were mentioned in almost every sessions as to how it had changed consumer views of what they could do with mobile and what corporates could do with mobile and apps to make consumers stickier. Whatever the initial revenue generation numbers are, this is only the start and we will see, I believe, the apps model mutate to become the content, service and marketing delivery mechanism of choice. I also think that once it has location added to it it will really become interesting and will be able to charge a premium for content.
What a self-serving article. You can’t take the truth. Apple is eating your lunch. No developer in their right minds is developing for any other platform. The air is being sucked out of the room.
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