Apple changes the way it handles AppStore updates, freaks out developers

Yesterday, a few of my updates to my existing applications were approved by Apple. I was excited to see the approval and made some changes to the date in iTunes Connect so that they show up in iTunes under their respective categories. To my surprise, they didn’t show up in iTunes. I gave it a day to see if it helps. Nope. Apple changed the way it handle updates and this is BIG blow to the iPhone developers.

Changed Behavior for Application Updates:

Previously when a developer updates an application, the updated app used to show up in the main category page in iTunes. This meant better visibility to the updated application which resulted in good spike in sales whenever an update is rolled out. These spikes in sales during the updates was the key motivation for developers to keep pushing out updates and to keep improving the apps.

With this new ‘upgrade’, newly updated applications don’t show up in iTunes category page. This means, when a developer updates an application, the update will be pushed directly to existing users and that’s pretty much it. There is no way for new users to know about those newly added features/improvements. Apple killed the key motivation for developers to improve apps, which I think is a BIG mistake.

When developers don’t have any motivation to improve existing apps, the quality of existing apps will suffer. Also, because new apps get good real-estate in AppStore, developers will focus on creating new apps rather than improving existing ones.

But, seriously, do we need more apps in AppStore? It currently has over 100K apps. Isn’t it time to focus on quality, rather than quantity? I talked about this earlier. Unfortunately, with this new move, AppStore will officially turn into a CrapStore very soon.

Developers Feedback?

As you can expect, iPhone developers are pissed. There are many threads in iPhone Dev Forums expressing concern on this new move. Here are few comments from developers.

All 99,000+ apps that are not on the top lists are now poo.

Way to go, Apple!

I agree…if updated apps are no longer listed under release date then this has to be the saddest day for the app store developer community.

If the whole thing is not just a temporary bug, I will stop iPhone development and go to Android and Symbian! For real!

There are lot more and we will see more developers yelling at Apple once they start noticing this change.

Not all is Negative

This is not all bad news for all developers. New applications will get better attention. Previously, new apps were hidden among a series of updates of existing apps. This will change now.

If Apple continues to keep this change, my guess is, apps in the Top 100 lists will prosper while all others apps will go down the drain.

What do you think? Do you think this is good/bad?

In App Purchasing for Free Apps: Good move?

Apple finally rolled out In App purchases for free apps. When Apple restricted In-App purchases for paid apps only, I wondered what the thought process was behind the move. I thought there were two reasons they restricted this earlier.

1) If they open In App purchases in free apps, we will see a ton of free apps and in many cases with very limited functionality and developers will try to nickel and dime for every feature after the free app is installed. The number of installations a free app gets is few hundred times more than paid apps in some cases (based on my own experience).

2) Free app developers need not have some agreements signed with Apple (and hence no linking to their bank account etc) as there is no money involved. The process of offering apps on AppStore was straight forward for free apps. If In App purchase was introduced for free apps, there needs to be some changes to the agreements and involves some backend work.

These anyway were my own reasoning on why they didn’t introduce this in the first place. But now we have it available and I think it is a good move. I might change my opinion after I see how the market will turn out. I hate to see developers nickel and dime customers. Regarding my second point, Apple today made some changes to the agreement. While I didn’t see what has changed between the previous agreement, I am sure it has something to do with In App purchases for free apps. I think Apple is finally ready to offer this and I think this can benefit the AppStore.

Finally, as I said earlier, Apple has been focusing a lot of quantity of the apps rather than quality. Once the AppStore hits 100K app, I think it should start focusing on quality. If not, it’ll just turn out to be a CrapStore.

AppStore’s Top 200 is no more

When iTunes 9 launched, I mentioned that Apple showcased Top 200 apps instead of previous Top 100. My take on that was mixed as the display was very congested with no app getting any attention.

Well, looks like the numbers were out. Apple today reverted it back to Top 100. You’ll no longer see Top 200 in AppStore.

I think this is a good move. What do you think?

Changes to AppStore in iTunes 9

Apple launched iTunes 9 today. The first thing I did was to hunt for changes in AppStore. Here are the ones I found and my take on these changes.

First, The AppStore menu moved to the top. This is a very welcome move and can get more exposure to AppStore. Its good to see AppStore becoming a main category.

Where are Categories in AppStore?

When you go to AppStore, first thing you’ll miss is the list of categories. Importance was given to ‘New & Noteworthy’, ‘What’s Hot’ & ‘Staff Favorites’ sections. Between each of these sections there are some apps highlighted. I am not sure why. But Apple could have used this space to list the categories. Instead, Apple chose to move the Categories section to the top. You’ll have to move your mouse on to AppStore to view the drop down icon and then go to the category. This is not a great move. Ideally, the categories should be listed in AppStore home page. Currently AppStore home page looks like a dump of images.

The current design is great if an app is in Top 100 or if your apps i featured. If it you are not in there, I think it is tough to find an app in individual categories. Will have to compare the app sales to see what kind of impact this has.

Top 200 under ‘Top Paid Apps’

Apple now shows the top 200 apps in a category. This is great as most of the users purchase apps from the Top paid apps lists. But I think Apple tried to crunch all the apps in a single page and the page looks very very congested. I doubt if many apps will actually stand out in the clutter. I’d have ideally liked some clutter free space on the top paid software screen. It is tough for any app to really stand out.

There were no changes to the individual apps pages.

AppStore Genius

This is undoubtedly a great addition to AppStore. Apple now recommends apps based on your other apps. Sometimes it also includes apps you already purchased, but deleted on you phone. This is a great way to tempt users to purchase other apps from AppStore.

Apart from these, there are other minor changes to the AppStore. I’ll add them to this post as I discover them.

AppStore review process needs improvements

Many people in the industry felt that Apple shouldn’t be a gate keeper for apps on AppStore. I was never a fan of that model and I believe having a gate keeper is important to not allow junk apps.   But may be, Apple is taking it too far.

I never had many issues with AppStore review process. Many of my apps have been rejected several times for several reasons and I never had problems. Lately though, it is getting worse. Not the rejection process, but the approval process, both obviously are interlinked.

Time for Approval/Rejection

Earlier, some of the apps used to be approved in about 3 days. This also meant, apps were rejected in 3 days. This used to be good because we were able to fix the problem and re-submit the app to be approved all within the same week.  While some people debate the reasons for rejection, I never considered that as an issue as we can quickly fix whatever Apple asked us to fix and resubmit it again quickly. So Time is an important factor here.

Lately though,  an app is taking a month to be reviewed. This means, after I submit an update, it’ll take atleast a  month to know if it is approved/rejected. If it is rejected, we have to resubmit the build and cross our fingers for another month. Meanwhile, users are out of luck as they live with the issues in the app as fixes takes longer and longer due to slow approval process.

Solution: Improve Approval process by cutting approval times

App Rejection vs Content

Several of my apps were rejected for different reasons. I never had many complains. Lately, my ‘Flight Status‘ app was rejected because it has a keyword it shouldn’t have.  Well, I don’t disagree with Apple. But then, why reject an App instead of putting it on ‘Hold’? Apple can just request the developer to change the keywords instead of  rejecting the entire app and asking me to resubmit it again. Removing a keyword takes 5 seconds. For Apple to approve the re-submitted app, it takes a month. You see the problem, right? I hope Apple realizes the issue here.

Worst part is, I have other apps in ‘Review’ with similar keywords and I can’t do anything about this. They even disable the option to change the keywords after you submit them.

Solution: Apple needs to add an ’On Hold’ Status. Currently an App is either ‘In Review’, ‘Ready for Sale’ or ‘Rejected’. For issues related to content and others which may not be related to the core app, Apple should just place the approval on hold till the developer modifies the content or provides additional info requested by Apple. This way, they need not review the app again which will cut down the review time and is good for developer and also for Apple.

I hope Apple is listening to feedback. I think they are and I hope to see some positive changes to the approval process.

Travel Guide in AppStore

Did you notice the new ‘Travel Guide’ option in AppStore? Apple seem to be adding/rotating that section often and this time (finally!) it is travel categories turn.

I like two things in this new ‘Travel Guide’ section.

First, Apple combines all content in iTunes in a single section. You’ll notice that this section not just includes apps from AppStore, but it also includes travel related podcasts, audio books, music, movies etc.  Hidden in these multiple sections is a good sign where Apple finally listed sections for ‘Translation’, ‘Learning’ etc. This is a good sign as Apple sees the need to separate these translation and learning apps from other categories as I noted earlier, these types of apps fill the AppStore.

Second, I am glad to see one of our app – Currency Exchange – listed in there. Our own currency converter application has been one of our successful apps and we are glad it is starting to get some attention from Apple. Our recent update has been received well and we are working on a new update which I think is going to make this app even better.

Improvements to AppStore Developer Portal

Last week Apple made some changes to developer’s website iTunes Connect. Now developers can add keywords to the application description so that they show up well in search results. This news has been covered well by many blogs.

The part that is not covered is, why this is done and what features are disabled. When you search in AppStore, the name of the application obviously is given priority compared to a keyword being present in the description. So for apps to show up in many search results, developers started tweaking the names of the applications to fit in as many keywords as possible after the app is released. Infact, in some cases, we will see the names of competing applications show up in some apps. This means, names of the apps change pretty frequently and the app names end up like a mini app description. So, to avoid this issue, Apple make two key changes to the way it works.

1) Apple disabled the option to edit the name of the app once submitted. This means, the developer has to choose and live with the name once he submits the app. There is no tweaking it again.

2) Any additional search keywords developers want to include should be included in in the Keywords section. But then, you cannot have your entire dictionary there either. Keywords are restricted to 100 characters. So you better choose the appropriate ones….and once you nailed your keywords, there is no changing it….forever after submitting the info. So think again before you hit the submit button.

So what does this mean for end users? Well, good short names for the apps to start with and hopefully better search results.

I consider this a good move from Apple. I wish they let me edit those keywords though, atleast when I update my the application as it could contain some new functionality and I might want to include in the keywords. Overall, a positive move. What do you think?

Update: I noticed that both Application name and the keywords can be modified while submitting an update. This is good.

One year into AppStore…

AppStore celebrated its first birthday very recently and what a ride it has been for Apple, iPhone, Developers, the ecosystem and the complete industry. The past year has been a great progress in mobile computing and AppStore obviously proved to be extremely successful with over 56,000 Applications and 1.5 Billion AppStore downloads. Congrats to Apple for changing the mobile market forever.

With over 56,000 applications and growing at ever faster pace, how will AppStore look a year from now is hard to imagine. My guess is, AppStore will become more diluted and a messy place with countless number of apps – unless Apple makes some changes in the way they approve apps and comes up with a better way of listing apps.

When I say AppStore will be filled with unlimited number of apps, I almost mean it. To give you an example, let us look at the ‘Travel’ category in AppStore. There are 172 pages of Apps with each page holding 20 apps. That is basically 3440 Apps in travel category. Now, if an app has to make it to the top 100 in that category, it probably needs to sell less than 10 units a day. So imagine how many units the other 3300+ apps selling. But that is not the point. The point is the kind of applications that are making their way onto the AppStore in this category. If you notice, a majority of apps in this category are info about cities. This means, there is an app for almost every city. I mean, an app for EVERY CITY. So where will this end? Imagine the state of the AppStore when every city has an App and the difficulty end users will face to find other apps among this App Jungle.

This is a good problem to have for Apple. But this has to be addressed by Apple soon. The focus for AppStore now has to be on Quality and not Quantity. Its time for the next major update, Apple.

iPhone AppStore should feature Apps for each Category

AppStore has had many success stories. In almost all the cases, the applications have been featured by Apple in AppStore either through ‘Staff Favorites’ or ‘What’s Hot’ section or other places on iTunes AppStore home page.

Basically, if an application is featured, its sales go up dramatically. I don’t have the numbers to prove it, but in my observation I have seen apps raise to top 5 in each category, when featured. After Apple stops featuring an app, I have seen an App drop even from the top 100 for that category, a slide from Top 5. The Apps Apple chooses to feature almost seem random. Though I have seen some great apps featured, I have also seen some less desirable apps featured.

In other words, to some extent, Apple kind of defines the success of the Applications in AppStore. For those whose apps are not featured, they are obviously disappointed. I sure am one among them. My apps have been featured in Apple’s retail stores and even installed on some of the iPhone displayed there. Unfortunately, none of my apps were featured in AppStore on iTunes. I am keeping my fingers crossed hoping that I’ll be lucky some day.

That said, there is one key functionality I am looking for. Adding featured apps per category. The current featured apps in AppStore home page serves the following…

- It features some great apps
- Easy way for end users to notice good apps rather than search for them
- Featured apps bring in good revenue to Developers & Apple

Obviously, Apple cannot feature all apps as there are tens of thousands of apps across all categories. So the questions is, why not feature apps based on category. Now there are enough apps in each category, it makes perfect sense to feature some apps in those categories. It is important for both Apple and App Developers to get some iTunes real-estate. As the sales goes up, it is going to help the entire iPhone eco-system

What I am asking here is not something new. Infact, I just noticed that this is already available for the Games category which is the most popular category in AppStore. I am hoping that Apple will add ‘What’s Hot’, New & Noteworthy’ and other sections to the home pages of individual categories.

This will be a good way for featuring good apps and making it easier for users to find good apps as browsing apps in over 100 pages is not an option.

iPhone’s Rating Issue

Lately I have seen some very good written reviews on some of my apps, but the ratings have been low. If you look at ‘The Currency Converter‘ app for example, there are more than 10 written reviews in AppStore and there is no rating with less than 4 stars. But when we look at user’s ratings, it tells a completely different story.

When users delete the app, Apple asks users to rate that app. The ratings you see above is a result of these ratings.

This ratings dialog comes in when a user deletes an app. Obviously, when a user is deleting the app, in more cases, the rating is going to be negative. There is nothing wrong with collecting feedback during approach, but it is not balanced enough. Apple doesn’t collect feedback in any other mode except this. If feedback is collected similarly if a user opens the app more than 10 times, then it becomes balanced as feedback will collected while the user is happy with app as well as when the user deletes the app. But when feedback is collected only when the user deletes the app, it is going to be biased, and mostly on the negative side.

I hope Apple improves the way they handle this ratings system.