[Author introduction] Four years of experience as a full-time independent developer, 17 independent development shelves.

【 Objective 】 Dry goods share, help you earn the second income in addition to wages.

In my last post at the Nuggets, I talked about how we can get a “good idea” from the start when we want to do indie development. First, you have to think outside the box. Then, we should really combine these ideas with the actual needs in daily life, and really have an idea that can solve the problem, so that we have the beginning of everything.

This article talks about how to put your idea into practice and turn it into products and money. And what are the “good ideas” that are not for you to do, or for anyone else to do.

Fake demand, competitive products

One of the great things about being an indie developer is that you feel like you own the project, the product, and you often get into flow mode when you’re working on something, and you feel like everything is ready to go until the work is done.

However, after hard work and product launch, users often do not pay. Finally, it is the process from entry to give up. I feel that I have tried my best, even the courage to resign and the endurance to work, but I cannot earn money.

In fact, the problem often appears in the very beginning of the first step, is what you want to make a thing.

One obvious example is when you eat instant noodles, you have to wait three minutes to make the instant noodles, right? I want to make a board to cover the noodles, to press down on the noodle box. Is this a bogus requirement? No, this is a real demand. People really need to press down on the box. But you actually built this thing. Do you think you can sell it? It doesn’t sell. Why is that? Because there are so many competing products, like I grabbed my iPad on the table or a roll of toilet paper and covered it up, right?

As a competitor, the iPad is far worse than a board that covers the noodles. At least it’s expensive, and it’s a lot more expensive. But even without instant noodles, I still need my iPad. This means that the product you’re going to make is being replaced by the added value of something more mainstream. It’s like I might need a pair of rain boots on a rainy day, but my basketball shoes also happen to be waterproof… A parasol can be an umbrella…

This sentence is very important, because we often see someone want to do a few small tools, such as photo albums viewer – system is becoming more and more powerful, qr code scanner, alipay WeChat QQ weibo a sweep all the national application support code, such as facial filter, the filter class the application on the market basically with the function of the skin care…

There are also some apps that are very well done and belong to the standard “small and beautiful” type, such as a reminder, a calendar, a notepad and so on, which are very, very beautiful. But if you’re not the only one who does something well and beautifully, you’re likely to be in the minority of people who are willing to pay for something that’s not just needed.

So before you start, think about how your product is going to land. After a while, you may find that your idea may not make sense:

• How difficult is it to monetize? Is the market small (niche app)
• Big companies, star products, do you already have the functionality of your product
• If you do, do you have any special highlights or selling points
• What is the monetization model, where users may not be willing to pay for low frequency usage

Information asymmetry

However, the above is not entirely true, compared with two offline stores next door, no one dare to sell coke for a dime more. One of the characteristics of Internet products is that it is not easy for users to find your competing products. There are thousands of apps. It is really difficult to pick out competing products and compare them one by one. If you feel very good, you are willing to pay for it. If you feel bad, you can’t stand it.

That way, sometimes you can make a different product with just a little bit of refinement, multiple features. At worst, you get a slice of the pie in a bunch of similar apps. In the Android app market, to this day, there are plenty of apps that offer the same functionality that the system already does. Toolbox type applications, for example, provide functions such as a flashlight, ruler and compass. Maybe you’re bored and despise them. However, some of these apps generate millions of dollars a year in revenue. There are too many users to know what else is available. Maybe you work in Beijing, Shanghai and Guangzhou, or BAT, and you don’t understand it, but your users might be in a small town 1,000 kilometers away, and they think it’s very practical.

As for how they do this kind of traffic, so that people can find this kind of “chicken ribs” app, I mentioned a little bit in an article about ASO posted in Nuggets before, if you are interested, you can click the link to see.

Because this kind of product itself is too homogenous, completely rely on strong operation to make money. So I don’t recommend indie developers go this route. However, if you really don’t know what to do and need to develop First Blood on your own, I would definitely recommend giving integration a try.

Integration of functions, differentiation

For example, qr code scan App is everywhere, you can do a scan code, and can generate a QR code App. Generate two-dimensional code part, you can change the color of the two-dimensional code, add pictures, change the style and so on; The scan part can automatically generate memos, record the history of the scan content, but also one click to share and so on…

Voice memos, there are a lot of them. But you can integrate community features, language to text, local text storage is not difficult to develop, you can change “record good ideas” to “share good ideas”, and successfully complete the “tool to community” work.

There are probably too many apps for beauty filters like the one above. But recently, a number of “light face cameras” have carved their way into the market, featuring premium faces. In the homogeneous application, seeking differentiation, but also found the market, and the effect is not generally good.

Details change to cash – revenue double strategy

The last step is to turn ideas into gold. Products made, there must be appropriate marketing means, strategies, in order to really generate income.

Here is an example of a product that a reader consulted me about two days ago. He independently developed this minimalist QR code App, but he felt that the revenue was not good enough. I put forward some suggestions from the details, hoping to inspire you all.

Here’s a screenshot of the App’s home page:

The App’s revenue is split between a full-screen AD that pops up every three times before scanning the results, and a Settings page that offers the option to pay for ads and download a paid pro version of the App.

I think there are several points that can be optimized:

• The main process is to scan the code, see the ads, see the results, there is no mention of paying to advertise, setting the page will almost not be opened. Before showing the AD, ask the user if they want to see the AD or pay.
• After all, pay is a few, and scan code is relatively low frequency operation, low to even a few days will sweep a code. So showing an AD every three times might mean showing an AD every 10 days and a half months. This frequency is too low too low.
• When I wanted to view the Settings page, there was an AD, which was not appropriate. Because users don’t expect results. When users want to view the scan code results, they can tolerate advertisements for a few seconds without delaying their own business. However, if there are advertisements on the Settings page, it may directly lead to the deletion of the App, which is quite serious.
• The setup page only says “remove ads” on the paid page, which is “selling,” not “marketing.”

This is the pay page for Nihon Live, another app. The pay button is clear and red. The reason for paying is given in three lines, before listing the price, write “Limited time special”. That’s what you want people to pay for, and that’s what a market-to-market product should look like.

conclusion

From ideas to revenue, here are the points:

1. Don’t make obvious applications of competing products, don’t try to replace existing features;
2. If you really want to be a homogenous app and get a piece of the pie, try to integrate features and seek differentiation.
3. The devil is in the details, actively ask users to pay, don’t wait for users to come to you to pay.

About the author

KyXu, with years of independent development experience, has long been committed to helping the majority of mobile developers to cash in, own their own products and become independent developers.