Anne Catherine Goulby, MagicSolver for Lotus Conference 8

1. Reach the top 25 of the App Store
within 24h
Case study: How to increase
downloads of your iPhone app?
Anne-Catherine Goulby
Marketing at MagicSolver
anne@magicsolver.com

2. MagicSolver – from indie app developers
…to the mobile apps discovery specialists
• We started in spring 2009
• Spin out of Cambridge University
• Winner of Cambridge University Entrepreneur June 2009
• Released 2 first apps in 3 months:
Sudoku Magic FaceShift
• Good technological success (featured by Robert Scoble, MagicSolver
augmented reality pioneers…)
• But very hard to be visible on the App Store
…only few hundred downloads in 3 months…

3. With over 400,000 applications on the App Store,
it is harder than ever to get noticed!
600 new apps on the App Store
every day – hard to stand out,
even with a very good app…

4. PROBLEM:
App Store – too many iPhone apps!
How to find good
apps?
How to be visible?
How to reach my audience?
Global Brands
Users
Developers

5. SOLUTION:
MagicSolver Daily Surprise applications
5
Surprise Users ⇒ Selection of the
best apps
Developers
Global Brands

6. 2009: 300,000 users : top 5 UK & Germany
2010: 1.5 million users
#1 in UK, Germany, France & 20 countries!
Advent Calendar 2009 & 2010
Surprise users … 1 great app every day
1 free app per day
1st to 25th December
6
25 developer partners
All reached the top 25
of the App Store

7. 0
1000000
2000000
3000000
4000000
5000000
6000000
7000000
8000000
Cumulative downloads
In 2 years: 7+ million downloads, #1 in 35 countries
20+ million downloads for our 100+ partners

8. MagicSolver-the mobile apps discovery specialists
We help millions of users to discover the best apps for free every day within
our apps
 Daily selection of paid apps for Free with Free App Magic
 BBC click 1st October 2011
 Special selection for limited edition apps:
 Advent Calendar for Christmas: 25 best apps
 Valentine’s Day: 14 apps for your love
 Football WC 2010, Rugby WC 2011, London 2012
 Halloween Countdown: 13 dark surprises
We provide an innovative user acquisition solution for developers seeking to
stand out from over 400,000 apps.
Over 20 million downloads for our partners, iOS & Android
They reach the top 25 of the App Store across the world every day

9. Why aiming the Top 25 on the App Store
to boost your downloads?
TOP 25 is the first driver of download:
1. Better than been featured by Apple
2. Better than newspaper or TV adds: 1 click to
download
3. Top 25 = like being in the first page of Google search
 Extra visibility from users
 Extra downloads: x50 to x100 more downloads!

10. Case Study: impact of the Top 25 in the App Store
to boost your downloads
Case #1, Sudoku Magic Lite:
• #6 in the UK
• 180,000 downloads in 10 days
• A second life for an 2 years-old game
Case #2, Winter Pop:
• New launch
• #4 in the UK
• 220,000 downloads in 10 days

11. General tips to increase your downloads
1. Have a great app!
– Real benefit for user
– Good pricing policy: what value do you bring? Paid vs. free version, in app purchases,
good balance between paid and free content. The freemium model works well.
– No bugs, no crashes: importance of multiple testing sessions (and devices)
– Should run on iOS 3 & iOS 4. Universal app is a plus (but with a real iPad interface!)
– Great user interface: intuitive, well-designed (Apple Guidelines, benchmark good apps)
2. PR: compelling press release, contact of blogs, friends & family, etc.
3. Social media to spread the word: Twitter, Facebook, …
4. Build a community around your app
5. Localisation: French, German, Italian, Spanish, Japanese, Chinese…
6. Cross-marketing with other apps with a similar target audience
But often it is not enough just to
reach the App Store’s Top 25 list…

12. Minimum downloads required to reach the
Top 25 in the App Store
• In the UK:
• Top 25 of free apps: 10,000 to 100,000 downloads per day
• Top 25 of category: 1,000 to 10,000 downloads per day
• In the US:
• Top 25 of free apps: 50,000 to 500,000 downloads per day
• Top 25 of category: 3,000 to 50,000 downloads per day
• In France:
• Top 25 of free apps: 5,000 to 60,000 downloads per day
• Top 25 of category: 800 to 8,000 downloads per day
Buzz & Media alone are often not
enough reach the Top 25…

13. To get noticed, traditional advertising banners
are very expensive and not always efficient
Traditional mobile advertising agencies suffer from:
1. A low Click Through Rate: 1% to 2%
2. An average Cost Per Click of around $0.10
3. A very low download conversion rate:
• Only 3% to 5% of click to download conversion
rate for a free app
• Only 0.5% to 1% of click to download conversion
rate for a paid app
4. A moderate impact in daily rankings on the App Store
To get new clients on the App Store, your real cost per
download is:
$2 to $3 for a free iPhone app
$10 to $20 for a $1 paid iPhone app

14. Solution: be selected in Free App Magic
1. We surprise users every day
with free apps to discover
2. Developers & Publishers get
additional downloads and
reach the App Store Top 25

15. All 25 Partners in the Advent Calendar reached the German
Top 25 in December 2010!
German App Store, 4th Dec. 2010: 4 partners in the Top 15

16. All 25 Partners in the Advent Calendar reached the French
Top 25 in December 2010!
French App Store, 5th Dec. 2010: 5 partners in the Top 15

17. All 25 Partners in the Advent Calendar reached the UK Top 25 in
December 2010!
UK App Store, 6th Dec. 2010: 6 partners in the Top 16

18. • Toca Hair Salon
• Type: Kid Entertainment
• Paid-for-free promotion with
Free App Magic
• Saturday August 20, 2011
• Result: number 5 in the US, and
stayed there until it was
switched back to paid on August
31, 2011.
• Toca Boca used simple cross
marketing to promote another,
paid app – Toca Doctor (bottom).
• "Free App Magic was a great
start to our marketing campaign
and jumpstarted us up the charts
straight away.” - Björn Jeffery,
CEO of Toca Boca
• Toca Hair Salon – United States
• Toca Doctor – United States
Case Study #3: Toca Hair Salon
#5 US App Store with Free App Magic

19. Case Study #4: Videojug
#2 UK App Store with Advent Calendar
• France: Number 3 Overall
Videojug: Christmas 2010
• Germany: Number 2 Overall
• United Kingdom: Number 2 Overall
The Videojug iPhone app was
featured in MagicSolver’s biggest
app of the year: the Advent Calendar.
It went from out of the overall
rankings in the UK to number 2
overall in 48 hours
The Videojug app is always free.
Snapshot – 6 Dec 2010: 6 MagicSolver
partner apps in the UK top 20

20. Crime City
When it was released in mid-August, Funzio’s amazing app Crime City shot to
the top of the charts when it was released, with over 1 million downloads in 5
days. However, its ranking was going down in September.
A simultaneous feature in Free App Magic and MagicSolver’s Rugby World Cup
app on 10 September 2011 gave a fresh boost to their popularity in many
countries, including France (below).
Case Study #5: Crime City
Back to the top 25 with Free App Magic

21. Over 100 Partners worldwilde
We have a solution for you too
• Gameloft
• Pocket Gems
• Funzio
• z2live
• ngmoco:)
• Happylatte
• CBS Interactive
• Playmesh
• Sunstorm
Interactive
• Playforge
• TinyCo
• Social Concepts
• Grey Area
• Tag Games
• Distinctive
Developments
• Boostr
• UserFans
• A Thinking Ape
• Lakoo
• Mobiles Republic
• Carphone
Warehouse
• Sixt
• Zoopla
• Yellow Pages
• Century 21

22. Would you like to increase your downloads
and reach the App Store Top 25?
We select every day the 3 best apps on the App
Store in Free App Magic
http://bit.ly/FreeAppMagic
 Paid apps with a 24-hour free promotion
Free apps with at least a 3+ star rating
 iPhone, iPad & Android
Benefits for the apps selected:
 Massive additional downloads
 Climb the App Store ranking in 24 hours
 Affordable: flat fee or pay per download
To get selected:

23. Thanks for your attention !
Anne-Catherine Goulby
Marketing and Business Development
anne@magicsolver.com