January 25th, 2010 by Arjan Olsder Posted in Marketing Strategies, Platforms: iOS | No Comments »
Jon Jordan is running stories on the business behind the FreeAppADay portal of ICS Mobile. Apart from giving away your game for free, there is also a heavy price to pay for the traffic.
The portal is inspired by the AppVent Calendar which brought ICS Mobile a huge amount of traffic when their Navy Patrol game was listed. That portal was created by fellow developer Blacksmith Games that has plans to bring the Appvent Calendar back in April.
For developers to get their app listed on this 365 days a year service, making the game free is no longer enough. They have to cough up $1.200 to get listed. That money should be earned back with the increased sales the day after (or via in-game purchases). ICS says the revenue ($36K/month on average) is needed for the staff and servers to run as well as to invest in the future of the portal.
Because of the commotion caused by Jon’s first story, ICS did announce to change the pricing a little bit. First time developers are now able to get listed for free IF their game is compelling enough. Also, if a game didn’t reach the top 100 after the promotion, there will be a 50% discount.
