If creating iPhone apps is part of your online business plans, or if you plan to create iPhone apps for the iPhone, iPad, or iTouch, then understanding how to submit your app will save you a lot of hassle and ensure that your app get into the marketplace as soon as possible.

10 Mistakes to Avoid When Submitting your First iPhone App

I’ve just been through the process of submitting an iPhone app to the iTunes store. It wasn’t that difficult but the next time it will be faster. Here are a few things I learnt.

1. Release Date – understand how Apple reviews iPhone App and learn what the terminology means when you’re submitting an app. For example, when Apples you that the app is being reviewed, this usually means it will be approx 8-15 days for the review to be completed. Once this is completed, then it’s scheduled for release.

2. Updates – when you want to update an app, for example, you’ve added new screenshots or changed the pricing structure, you need to submit an update. This process should not take very long, especially if you have a track record (i.e. are in good standing account wise with Apple) and allow you to get the revised app online. But… double-check that the app has been updated and that the new features, text or prices are updated correctly on the iTunes store.

3. Resubmitting an App – let’s say you want to change or add a new feature. This means Apple will have to test the app again. It does this to ensure its customers are getting a quality, working product and the only way to check that it works it to test it.

4. Quality – Apple usually tests the app for the first 5 minutes max. After all, it has 1000s of apps to test every day so it can’t test all aspects of your app. What it looks for most is whether your app will crash the iPhone or iPad. Every time your app needs to be retested it goes to the back of the waiting list. So, make sure it works the first time you submit or you will have to go through the whole process again.

5. Tags – You can add tags (aka keywords) when submitting your app. Should you add a few or hundreds? What works best for me is to select five keywords (ie the same keywords you use in your SEO, marketing, PPC and advertising) rather than taking a ‘long tail’ approach.

6. Description – Look at how the best-sellers write this text for their apps and adapt their copy. Don’t copy and paste what you have on your website or blog. Refine the description so that it works for the iTunes store. If necessary, hire a copywriter (see oDesk) and get them to do the text. Don’t be ‘penny wise and pound foolish’.

7. Forms For Overseas Developers – Non-US Developers must submit a “Certificate of Foreign Status of Beneficial Owner for United States Tax Withholding” form (W-8BEN).

8. Forms for Australian Developers – Upload their ABN and GST certificates in iTunes Connect.

9. Selling Apps for Japan – Developers living outside of Japan, must submit a Japanese tax treaty form if you want to sell your apps in Japan.

10. Connecting with Marketing Plans – Until you know how the app submission process works, you need to be careful when committing to dates on your marketing plan. In other words, if you’re expecting the app to be live on March 1 – to link into a PPC or Adwords campaign – then work backwards and submit the app in early Feb.

How the iPhone App Submission Works

With this in mind, here are the steps you need to complete to develop, test, and submit your iPhone app.

1. Learning how to program with Xcode. This is the software programming language for the iPhone, iPad, iTouch.
2. Apply for the Standard Program $99. It takes 5 days approx to be approved. You have to pay this fee is you want to submit your app to the iTunes store.
3. Develop your app or get it outsourced. I’d recommend to get it outsourced so you can concentrate on other marketing activities.
4. Design the icon and write the descriptions text for the app store.
5. Set up provisioning profile for Ad Hoc distribution and testing.
6. Prepare files for submission. This includes screenshots, support website details etc. This took me the most time.
7. Complete tax info, contact and bank details so you get paid.
8. Submit the app and wait!

Next Steps

One of the mistakes most everyone makes with their first app is expecting it to be quicker or getting frustrated when Applerequest that you re-test the app. The more you understand the submission and review cycle, the more you can align with marketing activities and ensure that your campaigns kick in at the right time. It will also save you the hassle of explaining to your manager, partners, or customers why there is a delay.

One last suggestion is to note what errors or issues caused Apple to reject or query your app. Capture these points and refer to them the next time you submit your app.

Have you submitted an app to iTunes store? What happened?

When your 11 year old son creates his first iPhone app, you know there is no excuse not to build your own. The advantage I (may?) have over my son is 20 years of marketing experience. So, I should be able to make money from this iPhone app, right? Here’s the plan to monetize, market, and promote my first iPhone app.

How to build your First iPhone or Android app

Before you start… spend some time researching best practices before defining your Business Plan for building iPhone and Android apps. For example, as Apple does not support Adobe Flash do make sure your designer creates animation that works or can be exported to different systems.

Depending on how you build your mobile application, you can use the same material to create an application that works on both the Apple iPhone and the Google powered Android.

Why do I need to know this?

You want to get the best return on your investment.

• Instead of building a mobile app that is limited to an iPhone develop the materials so you can export them to other platforms.
• Create the source materials, for example, images, in formats that work on both systems.
• Develop the app so that you can also use parts of it for your website and/or blog. Use screens and animations from the app to build short movies – to market on YouTube – and for lead generation on your site.

In other words, before starting the development process, scope out where and how you can use the content to increase your reach.

The last thing you want to do is build an app…. and then have to build more material for your blog. YouTube account, and media kit.

Making Money From iPhone & Android apps

The app I’m building is about education. It’s designed to teach business folks how to speak 100 Chinese phrases they can use in business meetings in China.

There are – at least – five ways we can monetize it.

1. Free – create sufficient interest in the product so that others download it for free. You can make money once you get enough traffic from the online advertising. So advertising is where you plan to make the money. The attraction here is that there is no upfront costs. The downside is that it’s not easy to get the critical mass to justify this approach.
2. Paid – if the product get good reviews (more on that later) and is recognized as ‘best in class’ in its respective category, then you can explore charging. The default is usually .99 cents at least on the ITunes marketplace.
3. Subscription – This means that you charge customers a recurring fee, for example, every month, for using the product. This works very well for certain business models. Education is one of these, which is why we’re focussing here.
4. Add-ons – The Angry Birds app has sold 10 million copies at .99 cents each. One way they’ve increased their sales has been by offering other add-ons, usually for .99 cents that give you more skills or powers in the game. This is an effective way to offer a product at a low price and then tempt customers with other products as they use the game more.
5. Physical Products – You can further expand your sales efforts by developing offline products. For example, the Angry Birds will soon be available as a board game. We’ll be selling the Chinese education materials as ebooks and flashcards you can print out.

Market your iPhone & Android apps

Next week, we’ll look into this a little more but for now, here are some ideas:

Get Reviews

• Team up with a set of like-minded bloggers.
• Send them free copies of your application
• Ask them to review the application and send a link back to your site.
• Encourage friends to comment on the reviews (positively of course) and generate as much excitement as possible.

Pre Launch

Before you launch the product:

• Use your blog to discuss what you plan to do with the application.
• Ask your readers for ideas on how you can build the application. They idea is to get them involved in the brain storming process and then share the excitement with them
• Continue this process for at least one month.
• Start to use the same strategy on Twitter, Facebook and other channels. For example, you could ‘seed’ questions on LinkedIn to generate curiosity.
• Share screenshots on the prototype app with your readers. Again, ask for more feedback.
• Connect with others who’ve develop similar (but not competing apps) and ask for advice. Remember to thank these folks (repeatedly) when you launch the product and in post launch blog posts.
• Thank everyone who responds by email.
• Give special discounts to early buyers. Use this to get referrals, which is critical for getting more credibility. See John Jantsch’s book, The Referral Engine, on how to do this right.

Product Launch

When you launch the product:

• Countdown to the product launch on Twitter and your blog.
• Develop a Twitter Plan.
• Choose your keywords wisely.
• Share this Twitter Plan with your affiliates and business friends.
• Get your friends to send out the same message on Twitter the same day. It has to be the same day. Use the same message and send folks to the correct landing page.
• Generate as much buzz as possible for 2-3 days. Drop everything else and focus on this.
• Write a series of blog posts that discuss the new product. Schedule these in quick succession.
• Get your network to leave as many comments as possible.
• Do the Retweets and Facebook likes to drive more traffic to the blog.
• Where appropriate, send folks to the Apple ITunes store or to eJunkie if you’re selling it online. We plan to use eJunkie.
• Thank everyone!

Post Launch

The final step is to:

• Automate the sales process so you can move to the next projects.
• Fix any errors that were encountered by customers when using the product.
• Reply to everyone who helped you get there.
• Share more on Twitter on how well the product launch went well. This is where you give as much credit as possible to your network. Don’t forget to spread the message on their Facebook pages as well.
• Use Google Analytics to examine the sales and landing pages. Creates goals in GA and observe these very closely.
• Begin to look at the feedback and see what type of products you can upsell. You’ll only know this once the product goes live and you engage with customers.
• Return to all the LinkedIn groups and remind folks of the product, thank them for their help and ‘share’ the sales page where they can see the end result.

Next Steps

Building a successful IPhone/Android application involves more than developing the product itself. Most folks focus too much on the app and overlook the marketing plan.

This means that they end up with a wonderful product but never find the customers. They also don’t build the network is critical to generate the necessary buzz and, more critically, gets your product in front of their customers.

Those are five ways to make money with an app. What else would you add?

Two of our family friends are single moms with kids. They asked me to give them some ideas of how they can get started and develop income by working over the web. One has a degree in software development, while the other is a real go-getter and can learn things very quickly. Here are some of the ways you can make money using your PC and working from home.

7 Web Careers For Single Moms

In no order of priority, here are the different ways you can get started and make money from home:

1. Product Reviews – setup a blog reviewing expensive technical products, such as digital cameras. Write reviews that are over 700 words and possibly over 1000 words. These will be picked up very quickly by the search engines. If you do this right, you’ll be asked to write (and get paid) by others sites.
2. Screen-casting – with the explosion of video technology, you can help software and educational companies with their training materials by developing screens casts. You can also branch out and develop services that help others to do this. You’ll need Camtasia or other Screencasting software to do this.
3. Software Testing – not every company has dedicated software testers but need people who can test software at all stages of the development process. If you have skills with computers, the ability to write reports, and analyze software, then this can work very well. You can promote your services with a niche site that talks about software testing and the benefits of outsourcing this task.
4. Virtual Assistant – I use oDesk all the time for project work that my Virtual Assistants can do faster than me. I’ve found two that are very reliable and use them most every week. So far, I’ve spent over $2,000 dollars this year on Virtual Assistants. If you can provide a high-quality reliable service, then register with oDesk and develop your profile. Link it to your blog and get as many endorsements as you can. Focus on one area, such as bookkeeping, design, finance, coding, typing and nail this.
5. Market Researcher – if you have good writing skills and like to gather information, then Market Research is for you. Who do you target? Any company that develops products, especially mid-size ones that may not have dedicated Market Researchers. You can work with the Sales team and use Social Media, Google and other tools to gather data on trends, brands and customer expectations.
6. iPhone app developer – this is a very lucrative area if you have software skills or know how to develop new products. For example, you can learn how the process of developing iPhone apps works and then offer to do this for other companies. Most businesses want to be on the iPhone but don’t know how to start. If you can solve that problem, and have the development team lined up, then you’re in business. Your development team is out there on oDesk
7. Translator – one of the big surprises when I lived in China was the number of US and European students coming there to learn Chinese. Some of these were charging 50 USD per hour to do translation and interpreting work, which isn’t bad for a 20 year old. I got to know two of these and they made very good incomes teaching other English over Skype and doing translation work. If you have language skills, then target the business sector and you’re setup.

Conclusion

One of our friends is half Spanish and now works with clients translating documents over Skype. There are almost no setup costs. She gets paid very well as these are business documents, such as Request For Proposals.

The other helps small companies setup Facebook pages. She’s used Facebook for years now and has it inside out. Why not monetize what she knows? She charges $299 to setup a new Facebook account with pages and links it into their Twitter account. She works when the kids are off in bed and restarts before they begin their work day.

What other careers can you do online?

What’s the one thing you enjoyed most in Avatar? For my Project Management friend it was the video logging. Did you notice that the team kept their reports not in Microsoft Word (i.e. on paper) but as video logs.

When trying it out, the protagonist in the movie couldn’t get a handle on it. ‘Don’t worry, you’ll soon get used to it’, was the reply.  Well, it worked for them, could it work for you? Here are some of the reasons you might want to consider using video for project management activities.

What Avatar Can Teach You About Project Management

Advantages of video logging

• Capture Emotions— Capture human elements missing from electronic reports, such as emotions or subtle suggestions made in the video logs that would not otherwise be noticed.
• Speed — Videos are faster to make. You just open your mouth and talk! Consider the effort in using Microsoft Word, applying styles, finding the right template, typing, fixing grammar horrors etc.
• Convenience — you can record videos almost anywhere. The recording device is smaller and easier to transport.
• Faster — For me, using a flip camera is now as easy as a telephone – just start talking! Consider this against the effort in using Microsoft Word, applying styles, finding the right template, typing in, fixing grammar horrors etc.

Disadvantages of video logging

• Structure — you need to train people how to deliver video reports, otherwise they’ll ramble defeating the purpose.
• Search — while you can search Word files on the network by keyword (i.e. metadata), how would you do this with video? Is it possible to tag/keyword videos as we do with Word docs and online reports?
• Edits — while videos are faster to make, if they need to be edited, then you lose the upside.
• Convenience — while you can record videos almost anywhere, this can be abused as employees file in reports pretending to be onsite with the client.
• Compliance – the number of laptops stolen each year (holding confidential data) continues to rise. This raises issues with unauthorized user video apps to submit, retrieve, share confidential data. Of course, this also applies to PC, iPhones etc.
• Storage — maybe this is no longer as problem as the cost of server space continues to fall and compression technologies improve. But would terabytes of data get expensive in the end? Not sure.

Should Project Manager use video for status reports?

It’s early days yet but I can see the attraction of using video to file in reports.  The difficulty may be in getting people to make the change. As it often the case, the problem is not in the processes or technological benefits, but the human issues that underpin these decisions.

What do you think?

Could it work? What do you think is the main barrier to using video more frequently in the work place?

From Chris Brogan

I dropped off three copies of Trust Agents to my local library today, and realized a few changes since I’d last gone in (a few months or so). They’d added free wifi. They’d taken most of the new release fiction and nonfiction and stuffed it in an off-center room to make room for their ever expanding collection of feature length DVDs.

That’s right: my library has become Blockbuster.

But no, not really, and let’s not malign this, because my library is adapting to what its patrons are demanding, and they evidently want newly released movies about the mafia and aliens and anything starring Nicholas Cage or Jim Carrey. And this gets us thinking about what a library’s mission REALLY is today.

My library has a half dozen computers with Internet access, plus free wifi. So they’ve given us pipes to the largest reference system in the world. They have media in paper and DVD and audio CD form, as well as links into all kinds of electronic document repositories (such as eBooks and the like).

In conversations over a year ago with some library futurethinkers, we discussed the possibility of libraries outside of the walls of the library. Why not use geotagging to drop rich data in the air beside monuments, to denote historic battles, to lay out political stories? Why not have geotagging tied to online video libraries that show me the ecological history of a place? Why not have bird guides that fly onto my iPhone when I’m standing in the nature reserve, versus that pesky distraction of visiting a building downtown that has become a video rental depot?

What do libraries really stand for today? Who do they serve? How should they evolve? What are your thoughts?

Chris Brogan: The Library of Today

According to a new study, 12% of the overall population has bought virtual goods in the last 12 months. A closer look at the digital entertainment habits of virtual goods buyers reveals that virtual world visitors are the heaviest virtual goods buyers, with 46% of these consumers buying virtual goods (from virtual worlds, games or social networks) and nearly one third of iPhone owners buying from the same platforms.
Other results were reported as follows:

Largest demographic of consumers who have reported buying virtual goods:

1. 17% of Females ages 25 to 34

2. 15% of Males 12 to 17 and 18 to 24

3. 15% of Females 12 to 17

4. 15% of Females ages 35 to 44

Where consumers are buying from:

1. Marketplace of the virtual world or game that a user is playing in (29%)

2. The official Web site of the virtual world or game (29%)

3. A web site of an authorized reseller of the virtual items (25%)

4. A web site of an unauthorized reseller of the virtual items (8%)

5. Another player (7%)

6. Other (5%)

7. Not sure (27%)

Ethnic breakdown of virtual goods purchasers:

1. 16% of Asian Americans

2. 14% of Latinos

3. 12% of Caucasians

4. 10% of African Americans

While the greatest number of consumers (51%) that bought virtual goods said they were not sure how much they spent last year, those who did recall (27%) said they spent less than $50 in the last year on virtual goods, with the average price of all transactions averaging $30. Another group of consumers (15%) said they spent $100 or more, driving substantial annual revenue per user.

“The fact that lots of people are reaching into their pocket to buy virtual goods is impressive, but even more impressive is that some of those consumers are spending considerable dollars,” said Mike Vorhaus, President, Magid Advisors. “As this market grows, Magid believes that the majority of consumers will continue to spend $50 or more on virtual goods every year, and this will grow to be a multi-billion dollar market.”

“This data reinforces the high growth potential of microtransactions and digital goods for online games and virtual world developers,” said Eric Hartness, Chief Marketing Officer of PlaySpan. “Our internal data and client conversations also corroborate the findings, and we’ve noticed a significant increase in the number of customers who now spend several hundred dollars per month on digital goods.”Revenue from virtual goods now stands at a $200-250 million dollar market in the U.S. alone, with firms such as Strategy Analytics reporting that microtransactions are expected to grow from slightly over $1 billion today worldwide to $17.3 billion in 2015.

“As this market grows, Magid believes that the majority of consumers will continue to spend $50 or more on virtual goods every year, and this will grow to be a multi-billion dollar market.”

Note: Virtual goods, according to the study, were defined as non-physical objects that are purchased and exchanged on the Internet in games, virtual worlds and social networks. The actual description of virtual goods can be simple items such as virtual points or tokens or more complex items such as avatars.

The survey was conducted between April 20 and April 25, 2009. It was a nationally representative online survey of 1,927 people, of whom, 1,697 were between the ages of 18 and 64 and 230 were between the ages of 12 and 17.

Copies of the research may be requested via email at gus.perez@playspan.com

Posted via email from ivanwalsh’s posterous

Yesterday we looked at a new Microsoft Office to iPhone app which lets iPhone & iPod touch customers edit Microsoft Word files, synchronize their files and send & receive attachments. So, since we’re here I thought it best to give a list of what else it can do.

For mobile or home users who want to use Word documents on iPhone or iPod touch, it offers quiet a range of features: Here goes.

• Advanced viewing and editing features
• Touch navigation
• Cut/copy/paste
• Text selection
• Predictive text entry
• Bulleted and numbered lists
• Bold, italics, underline
• Embedded pictures
• Tables
• Word count
• Password-protected files
• Edit in landscape view

Most of this is made possible thanks to InTact Technology, which ensures that all original file formatting is retained once a file has been edited and forwarded on.

Documents To Go also uses Apple’s built-in viewing technology for dealing with other important files such as Excel, PowerPoint, PDF and Apple iWork.

This feature keeps files in one central location and makes managing and using them simple and straightforward.

Want to know more?

Documents To Go is available at $4.99 from Apple’s App Store on iPhone and iPod touch or at www.itunes.com/appstore/

I don’t have an iPhone but if I did this new Microsoft Office to iPhone app might be worth investing in. It lets iPhone & iPod touch customers edit Microsoft Word files, synchronize important desktop files and send & receive Exchange attachments. DataViz, who develop Microsoft Office compatibility solutions, released its mobile Office suite application, Documents To Go, on the Apple App Store.

Documents To Go includes a desktop application that provides Windows and Macintosh customers with the ability to transfer files to their device using a Wi-Fi connection.

Customers can “set it and forget it” by adding entire folders or select single files within a folder. More importantly, during synchronization, Documents To Go checks to make sure all documents on the iPhone are current. If any changes are made on either the desktop or iPhone, Documents To Go will automatically make sure the latest copy is on both the desktop and iPhone or iPod touch.

Receive, Edit & Send Microsoft Exchange Attachments

Documents To Go with Exchange Attachments includes a built-in email client which allows customers to download, view, edit and send Word attachments while on the go.

This integrated portion of the product uses the Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync technology, which DataViz has licensed from Microsoft, to provide secure, wireless synchronization with Exchange Server 2003 and 2007 e-mail.

Customers can make changes to their Word documents and immediately reply back with the updated files.

In addition, Excel, PowerPoint, PDF and other attachment types can be viewed as well as attached to new e-mails sent from within Documents To Go.

Pricing & Availability

Documents To Go and Documents To Go with Exchange Attachments are available at $4.99 and $9. from Apple’s App Store on iPhone and iPod touch or at www.itunes.com/appstore/