200 Million Android users, 411 sales

We have on occasion received tips from disillusioned Marketplace developers when the performance of their apps have not met their expectations.  Often these emails end with the statement that Marketplace is not worth the investment.

One such email was from the maker of Arachna, a free maze game exclusively for WP7. He complained that after 2 months of sales he only managed 200 downloads in around 60 days, and that he expects if he developed for Android and maybe even iOS he could have done a lot better.

The example of Papermill on Android should act as a reminder that the grass is not always greener on the other side.

They developed their Android Instapaper  app at the cost of around $30,000, mainly in labour, and their app was featured The Verge, LifeHacker and BeautifulPixels.  With the app already successful on iOS one would have expected thousands of sales.

Instead, after 3 week of sales, they only managed a 411 sales and $1630.12 in revenue. Once the media spotlight moves on from the app sales are expected to drop further.

The lesson the Papermill developer learned?  Android users do not like to pay for apps.

The take away for Windows Phone 7 developers is that a larger user base does not necessarily mean significantly more sales, especially when looking at the Android platform.

Via The Verge.com