The Sobits Shop has opened! To help promote our brands and products we are now selling apparel at low prices through CafePress.com. Our favorite offering is our “I WANT MILK!!!” infant/todler products which are absolutely adorable! You’re probably wondering where this cow comes from and how it relates to Sobits. Well, the jet-pack-powered-cow is a new character that has been developed for the upcoming update of our iPhone and iPod touch game Flying Pigs. You’ll also find adult apparel ranging from T-Shirts to “I Heart Sobits” thongs. Yes, you heard right, we’ve entered the women’s underwear business. We plan to add more products and styles to the store as time goes on so keep checking for updates! If there is anything you would like us to offer on the shop let us know and we’ll try to make it happen!
We have never shared our sales figures publicly because we were waiting for something significant to show. However, this past week we announced that we’d be giving a portion of our revenues to the American Red Cross (Haiti Relief and Development) so clearly we need to reveal our sales figures. Here are our sales and the monies generated for charity from Jan 22- Jan 30:
Hint Sprint- The Rhyming Word Game! (current highest grossing app)
retail price - $1.99
copies sold - 11
gross - $21.89
revenues - $15.40 (after Apple’s 30%)
donation - $11.55 (75% of revenues)
Total Apps Sold - 23
Gross - $33.77
Revenues - $23.80
Donation - $18.75 (we rounded up to $20)
OK, the main goal was to raise a little money for Charity and $18.75 is where we panned out. Since we haven’t had a recent release or update (drastically increase sales) we anticipated a very slow 9 days during the charity so we previously made a $75 donation to The Red Cross. We rounded up the $18.75 to $20, bringing the total donation to $95. These certainly are not George Clooney donation numbers, but as we grow as a company we also plan to grow our contributions to charity and the community.
Thank you all for helping spread the word about the fundraiser on Twitter and buying some Apps for a worthy cause.
We’re donating 75% of our revenues (sales - apples commission) from Friday Jan 22nd to Sat Jan 30 to the Red Cross to help Haiti. To better the offer, we decided to give 100% of the revenues for The Mood Setter to Haiti. We also gave a $75 donation to the Red Cross to give some aid before the end of the week. Hopefully, we sell some apps this week and raise more $$.
Flying Pigs - 75% of Sobits revenues go to Haiti BUY NOW
Hint Sprint-The Rhyming Word Game - 75% of Sobits revenues go to Haiti BUY NOW
The Mood Setter - 100% of Sobits revenues go to Hait BUY NOW
Keeping tabs on emerging and existing mobile gaming markets, we ordered an unlocked version of the Nexus One which runs on Googles Android OS and has games available for sale on the Android Marketplace. Being iPhone lovers, we are tough to convince when it comes to other phones but the Nexus One definately had some redeeming qualities. On paper, the Nexus One has more powerful hardware than the current iPhone model 3GS and we saw faster load times on the internet browser, a larger and higher resolution screen, and awesome camera. However, as we started playing around we found that we were still madly in love with the iPhone operating system and were not impressed with the current state of the Android gaming development. The Nexus One is definately a great machine and as the Android market and operating system evolve, it could become a great gaming platform in the future. Here is a quick “first impressions” video where we put the two phones head to head. There are a lot of angry comments from Apple haters already - too bad for them, they are missing out on some cool stuff : ) There are a few freudian slips where the Nexus One is called a Droid, that also really pissed ‘em off!
Made a little promotional video for Hint Sprint. I was in a silly mood so I made a little jingle with lots of cow bell to go along with it. Download Hint Sprint
We hope that everyone is starting 2010 happy and healthy! To kick off the New Year we’re doing another gift card giveaway on Twitter. When we get to 1,750 followers we’ll randomly give one of you a $15 iTunes gift card. To enter: Just follow @sobits on twitter and post a tweet telling your followers about us. It’s that simple : )
In other news, we’ve been working on all sorts of stuff so stay tuned for some Sobits announcements in the upcoming weeks. One thing I’ll leak is that we made a new foe for Flying Pigs as well as two new power ups for our first update.
We really appreciate all feedback we receive from our users, so feel free to leave comments on our existing products. Many of you voiced that you want scoring leaderboards for Flying Pigs, so we’re going to be adding it and holding off on our next release until our scoring system is setup. Basically, what I’m getting at is: we listen to our fans, so speak up!
Flying Pigs has been out for over a month now and has racked up some great reviews. We have seen a lot of positive feedback from iTunes reviews, twitter comments, and iPhone app review sites (some even from Brazil!) We haven’t cracked any of the iTunes charts which translates to modest sales, but we’re not discouraged. The fact that strangers are buying and enjoying our game when there are so many out there tells us we’re doing something right. To add to the appeal of Flying Pigs we are going to be adding leader boards so users around the world can compare their scores. Our next game is coming along nicely, but it won’t be released until our scoring system is setup - so expect a new game and Flying Pigs update to come out near simultaneously. We’re also working on new powerups and characters to make Flying Pigs even more enjoyable. More on all that to come in our next blog post so stay tuned.
What the “iPhone press” is saying about Flying Pigs:
“Sobits has dared to move out of the normal boundaries and has created something special here” - AppSafari
“Flying Pigs by the developer Sobits is not an ordinary iPhone game - To be honest, I could actually hang out with these guys because I love the conceptual idea of the game” - Crazy Mike’s Apps
“These guys are f&*#@!g smart and funny - go to your penny jar, count out 99 pennies, and totally get it!” - iPhoneSlutz Podcast
We’ve gotten several other reviews as well. To see the quotes and user reviews check out the game on the App Store
When you see an application with an average rating of 1 star after 2157 ratings (and hundreds of reviews saying “don’t buy this”) in the top 50 paid applications, when there are an alleged 100,000 applications on the store, you have to ask “How Relevant is Quality on the App Store?” I haven’t used this application myself, so I cannot comment on whether it deserves the rating or not, but it definitely surprises me that it’s in the top 50 with so many bad reviews. In the early days of the App Store there were many fart and boob apps soaring up the charts but we soon began seeing higher quality games, ports from big studios, and some really fascinating stuff surfacing. If you look at the top 100 apps there are some really great products, but it appears that despite immense competition, there are some low quality products still making a lot of money.
You are probably expecting me to complain about the app mentioned above and cry about ours not selling as well. Not the case at all, I’m writing this entry to share that we are seeing a similar result amongst our own products.
Everyone likes different things and that’s part of the reason why there are so many different kind of apps out there. I’m proud to have my name attached to all our apps, but I think that Flying Pigs is our best, Hint Sprint runner-up and The Mood Setter third (Just as they rank in app store ratings). However, much to my surprise The Mood Setter has not only had the best first month launch, but is currently our highest grossing application out of the three. The worst ratings, and the highest sales. Go figure.
I do believe that Flying Pigs will outsell The Mood Setter in the long run because it is the type of game that you really need to play to understand. As said in one of the quotes from an iTunes review “just play it and you see” and I think that is a quality that will lead to a lot of word of mouth and sustain long term sales. Just like a retail, most consumers buy the box, not the product. If something looks catchy and cool in the App Store, they download it. If it sucks, they tell their friends not to buy it or simply forget about it. If it’s awesome they go and show everyone what they can do with their iPhone and people say, “OooOo I want that too, what’s that app called again?”
After analyzing what I see in the App Store and what we’ve experienced with our own sales, it would suggest that quality is not necessary to make a quick buck with an iPhone app, even with a gagillion apps out there. But while Sobits doesn’t have the data to support it yet, I’m still going to say that you need a high quality app to have prolonged sales and repeat customers.
We always strive towards continuous improvement and keeping our products fresh. In version 1.3 of Hint Sprint we added all new graphics and artwork as well as improvements to the typing interface. To keep the game interesting for previous buyers and a better value for new buyers, we added 25 medium puzzles to version 1.4. We are excited and eager to create new games and apps - but we won’t forget about our older titles and loyal customers! Stay tuned for more updates and new releases, we have a lot in the works….
Thanks to all who participated in our Flying Pigs iTunes gift card giveaway on Twitter! We’re now up to almost 1,000 followers and we have more giveaways planned for our next release so stay tuned! Congrats to the $30 and $100 winners!
When you see an application with an average rating of 1 star after 2157 ratings (and hundreds of reviews saying “don’t buy this”) in the top 50 paid applications, when there are an alleged 100,000 applications on the store, you have to ask “How Relevant is Quality on the App Store?” I haven’t used this application myself, so I cannot comment on whether it deserves the rating or not, but it definitely surprises me that it’s in the top 50 with so many bad reviews. In the early days of the App Store there were many fart and boob apps soaring up the charts but we soon began seeing higher quality games, ports from big studios, and some really fascinating stuff surfacing. If you look at the top 100 apps there are some really great products, but it appears that despite immense competition, there are some low quality products still making a lot of money.
