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Tag: Amazon App Store

  • Amazon Says Their App Store Is Best For Developers

    Did you hear? The Kindle Fire is officially sold out for good. That must mean that a Kindle Fire 2 announcement is imminent. Amazon saw great success with the hardware, but they want you to know that the apps are where it’s really at.

    Amazon announced that the Amazon App Store has facilitated the purchase and download of hundreds of millions of apps. They also said that more developers keep coming to the App Store in hopes of striking it rich. They attribute the growth to their “industry-leading e-commerce features like 1-Click purchasing and In-App Purchasing.”

    “Amazon’s platform is a complete end-to-end solution for developers wanting to build, market and monetize their apps and games,” said Paul Ryder, Vice President of Apps and Games at Amazon. “Developers can build their apps and games using Amazon Web Services’ industry-leading infrastructure platform. For important audience engagement features like leaderboards, achievements, and syncing game state between devices, developers can use Amazon’s new GameCircle services. To gain exposure to tens of millions of customers, developers can list their apps in the Amazon Appstore and take advantage of awareness-building programs like Free App of the Day. And, to monetize their apps and games, customers can use Amazon’s industry-leading e-commerce and payment capabilities like In-App Purchasing and Subscriptions.”

    Developers are encouraged to use the in-app purchasing model on the Amazon App Store whenever they can. Amazon found that in-app purchasing brings in more than twice the revenue of traditional paid apps. It’s the same just about everywhere else as more games go free-to-play while supporting themselves on a massive number of in-app purchases.

    A number of developers from Spotify, Glu, Pocket Gems and more have joined the Amazon praise chorus. They say their apps have a kind of visibility that just isn’t available on other platforms. It’s hard to say whether or not the Amazon App Store has an app graveyard like Apple’s 400,000 still undiscovered apps.

    As fas as overall revenue goes, however, Amazon’s App Store is still in second place. Despite the majority of apps never even being downloaded, Apple’s App Store still commands most of the market. That’s not to say that Amazon is doing poorly. In fact, they’re doing much better than Google Play in terms of revenue.

    All of this is to say that Amazon will be pushing digital goods even more in the future. The Kindle Fire 2 launch is probably going to bring an update to the Amazon App Store. Developers can’t afford to stay on any platform these days. Amazon’s App Store is a major contender and developers would be wise to recognize that.

  • Amazon App Store Going International

    Amazon App Store Going International

    The Amazon App Store has been one of the most successful ventures for the company to date. It’s already proven to be more profitable than Google’s own Play distribution platform. The only thing really holding it back is that it’s only available in the U.S. Amazon is changing that this summer.

    Amazon announced today that they are now accepting apps for the Amazon App Store international launch later this summer. Developers will now be able to sell Kindle Fire apps to customers in the UK, Germany, France, Italy and Spain. The move will help Amazon catch up to both Apple and Google as they have been launching their various stores in countries across the planet.

    Amazon has a few tips and changes for developers who want to jump onto the international bandwagon. First up, developers will have to choose which countries they want their apps to be sold in. In all honesty, you should probably sell your app in every country that’s applicable. You can set your prices for each country separately, but please try to keep to normal conversion rates.

    Releasing internationally will probably lead to the localization of your app. Amazon doesn’t require that your apps be localized even if you are releasing in foreign countries, but they encourage it. While Amazon doesn’t feature their own localization service, there’s another Android partner (Google) that can help.

    As far as changes go, Amazon is also updating the Mobile App Distribution agreement. The company will now put revenue share at 70 percent of each paid app sale. It used to be 70 percent of the app’s sale price or 20 percent of list price with whatever the higher amount was being paid out to developers.

    The other change has developers getting more control over their own app distribution. Developers will now be able to set up times to which their apps will be available to Amazon customers. It allows developers to roll out apps to users in different countries over the course of a week instead of it dropping all at once.

    If the changes to the developer agreement weren’t enough, Amazon has another offer for potential developers to make apps for their platform. They have waived the annual developer fee for 2012 so you can sign up to make apps for the Kindle Fire and the Amazon mobile platform right now.

  • Android App Developers Like Action Movies [Infographic]

    Android development has had a rough time of it over the past few weeks. There’s been reports of developers jumping ship and just losing interest in the platform. All this information has come from surveys that looked into developer interest at the most basic level. Where is the in depth survey that looks into device brands, platforms and even favorite movies?

    A new infographic from Startapp seeks to answer these very questions and more. The infographic contains the results from a survey that looked into the habits of Android developers. The results are fascinating as it paints a much brighter picture than what previous surveys have.

    The first and most important result from the survey is that the majority of Android developers are independent. This is further confirmed by the results that say the majority of Android development “companies” are staffed by a single person. With these kind of numbers, the amount of apps published by each developer must be pretty low, but surprisingly it’s not. Fifty-two percent of developers have published six to nine apps so far which is offset with 32 percent of them still working on their first app.

    A recent study found that the Amazon Appstore makes more money than the Google Play store. This survey seems to confirm that finding with 66 percent of developers publishing to the Amazon Appstore alongside the Google Play store.

    Of course, many Android app developers also make apps for other platforms. While Android is still the number one platform these developers at 62 percent, 37 percent of Android developers also develop for iOS. Even though iPhone development is second to Android developers, it’s third in terms of the devices they own. Fifty-three percent of Android developers own a Samsung device while 22 percent own an HTC device.

    By far, the most interesting find from this survey is the kind of movies, music and sports Android developers enjoy. It’s found that Android developers overwhelmingly prefer action movies more than any other genre. As for music, rock and pop are almost tied with one percentage point separating them. As for sports, soccer and basketball take the top spot with “Other” at a close second. What is “Other?” I don’t know, but I really hope it’s something like Curling.

    Following the White Rabbit [Infographic]
    © 2012 StartApp

  • Angry Birds Rio: Exclusive For Android Devices & Amazon Appstore

    The next installment of Rovio’s uber-popular Angry Birds saga, Angry Birds Rio, will be an Android exclusive release, but you won’t be able to get it from the Android Market. If you’re left scratching your head about how you can get the game, don’t fret, as it will be available via Amazon’s Appstore for Android… exclusively.

    Do you think more apps will release exclusively with Amzaon? Tell us your thoughts.

    @amazonappstore
    Amazon Appstore    We’re all atwitter over #AngryBirdsRio for Android, launching exclusively in the @AmazonAppstore. http://amzn.to/gh0vMz 4 hours ago via Amazon Publisher · powered by @socialditto

    Aaron Rubenson, category leader for Amazon Appstore said…

    “Amazon is thrilled to work with a leading developer like Rovio in offering our customers Angry Birds Rio for Android exclusively in the Amazon Appstore… We think Angry Birds Rio is sure to be an instant customer favorite.”

    Angry Birds Rio, developed in conjunction with Twentieth Century Fox, sees the original cast of characters kidnapped and taken to the magical world of Rio, where they eventually escape their captors and begin the quest of saving their friends.

    “The Amazon Appstore will be a great new way for consumers to download all their favorite Android apps, and we’re excited to offer Angry Birds Rio as one of the first pieces of content to be made available to consumers through this new store”, said Peter Levinsohn, president of new media and digital distribution for Twentieth Century Fox .

    Angry Birds Rio will be available for download at http://amazon.com/angrybirds.