How to earn more on Android

The editors of App2Top managed to talk with David Worle, vice president of Wild Tangent. On the eve of the Casual Connect conference in Kiev, we discussed the need for diversification on the Android platform, the reasons for developers’ refusal to enter the Chinese market, as well as the differences between Russian and American businessmen.

There is an opinion that it is impossible to earn a lot on Android, especially when compared with iOS. Is it so?So it was at first.

At launch, the platform had a lot of problems, most of which Google simply could not foresee. This is not the most pleasant experience of interacting with the market, and problems with billing, various complexities of the software plan, and so on. Unfortunately, at that time, these numerous moments greatly harmed monetization. Moreover, many believed that this would always be the case. And that was their mistake.

Now Android as a platform can be just as, if not more profitable platform than iOS, thanks to the number of its users. Another advantage is its openness to business innovations.

And don’t worry about the future of the platform: many large companies are investing in Android. This speaks about the prosperous future of those publishers who are present at it. Do not forget that Android is closer to iOS than the usual PC market, and this market has been crushing everyone and everything for more than 25 years, since hundreds and thousands of companies support it with their investments. 

Is it worth publishing projects on as many Android markets as possible, or is it enough to concentrate your efforts on Google Play for success?The Google Play app store is absolutely not enough.

You should publish and support your projects on as many stores as possible. Compared to the cost of creating an application, business development in this direction is probably the best and cheapest type of investment possible. Amazon is a mandatory partner. There are 5-10 more markets that you should take a look at.

Regarding the success, I will say the following: do not forget that the mobile market is still very young, and those companies that are here today in the cash tops may not be there tomorrow. 

Are there any app stores that in the future will not be inferior in size to the App Store, Google Play and Windows Store?In one word, yes.

And this is largely due to the contradictions that are directly bursting the mobile platform market. 

Firstly, app stores don’t think about developers. And the bigger the stores become, the more they put pressure on developers.

Secondly, there is no such thing as free access to users on the mobile market anymore. Very soon there will be no free ways to quickly increase the audience. You can see this by the situation that has developed in the tops of existing markets.

Further, large companies cannot influence the markets in any way, except by increasing the quality of the product and laying out substantial sums for its promotion. But, importantly, the latter will not ensure success with low quality of the game. That is, the final quality is growing, costs are growing, the requirements of the users themselves are growing, and all this quite logically leads to the fact that over time it will become more and more difficult to develop a deafening hit.

It is clear that in these conditions everyone is interested that there were more markets, including young, developing ones.

Plus, vendors themselves are interested in the largest number of platforms, they do not want their revenue to depend on any one of their partners, since in the latter case they themselves will depend on him.

You can make sure that a game of a particular developer is pre-installed on a particular Android device, right? What kind of devices are we talking about and how many of them? And what are the results (downloads, audience)?We launched the Android service last summer.

We expect that by the results of this year it will be installed on more than 100 million devices distributed by companies such as Sprint, TMobile, AT&T Samsung, Toshiba, Sony, etc. The potential audience is very large. But we are just starting to work. Better ask me this question in six months, and I will be able to share the numbers. Unfortunately, I have no right to talk about specific devices publicly. We work with companies that compete with each other, so we have to be silent, like a Swiss bank. 

How do you choose the games that will be pre-installed? Is there any special criterion? There is one criterion – quality.

We also look at the size of the application. Unfortunately, size still matters to manufacturers: the smaller the better. They don’t talk about it very often, but it’s important for us. 

Developers from Eastern Europe are well known for their high-quality casual games. Do you think they will play a leading role in the mobile gaming industry?Why not?

Moreover, it seems to me that it is already worth talking about as a fait accompli. But there are problems they face.

Making money on international markets, no matter which ones, is problematic when they become really big and mature. This is because access to users on them becomes more complicated. Everyone can place an application on the market, but how to attract the attention of the store itself to it, how to create demand for it in foreign markets? Unfortunately, it seems impossible to me that anyone in Poland or Russia would know how to effectively sell their app to someone in New Jersey or Australia. 

In addition, competition is growing, and those companies that previously provided free access to their services are starting to close it. “Winter is coming soon”, many will not survive. This has already happened at least 20 times on other platforms. And if companies from Eastern Europe want to stay on the market, they must have an effective marketing campaign developed. You can find partners, you can go directly with this strategy, however you like. However, I know from my own experience that promoting an application in Russia while in Seattle is a losing cause. So it is better to use local marketing and promotion experts in foreign markets.

Which three games have you liked the most over the past six months?Among all the projects I would like to highlight Shadowgun and Great Little War Game.

Which countries, apart from the USA and China, will show, in your opinion, the greatest growth of the mobile market?As long as China doesn’t start doing business differently, it won’t really matter how big its mobile market is.

Talk to anyone who does business there, and in 10 minutes you will start feeling dizzy. 

I believe that China is not important for Western players for two reasons. Firstly, the Chinese market is closed to outsiders. It’s almost impossible to do business there if you’re not Chinese. Secondly, most Chinese market players receive money in “black cash”. For this and many other reasons, we avoid this market. 

In the US, the smartphone market is experiencing explosive growth. Infrastructure has a lot to develop: the country is big, people live everywhere, even in the most remote corners. Besides, people here are used to paying for content. 

Share your experience: is working on the mobile market in Russia and Ukraine different from working on it in the USA? Yes, it is different.

It took me a while to figure it out. Americans make deals very quickly. They evaluate all the pros and cons, try to bring them into a single table: what one side of the deal gets, what the other side gets, and they sign the contract. In Eastern Europe, everything is different. There people sit down at the table to really negotiate, not to make money. 

It seems to me that they believe here that if at the end of the meeting the original contract is not written with a red pen as if it was shot from a Kalashnikov assault rifle, then it is bad. But it’s not like that! 

In general, my advice is this: do not negotiate for a long time and do not let lawyers become the killers of your deal.