40 Secrets to Making Money with In-App Purchases

37. Ask Politely

When it comes to customer satisfaction, there is nothing more powerful than kindness. When you want your user to do something, like perform an action in exchange for virtual currency, or purchase an in-app upgrade, always use the nicest language possible.

38. Analyze and Optimize Your Strategies

Even if your business is already successful, there’s always room for improvement. Three questions to ask yourself are:

• How can I increase the effectiveness of my IAP strategy?
• How can I make my IAP content more appealing?
• How can I make my content easier to purchase?

To help answer these questions, compare two games from the same franchise: Contract Killer Zombies and Contract Killer Zombies 2.

Wow, that’s a great deal for a shotgun! But unfortunately, your player is out of gold. So when your player clicks the “Buy Now” button, they will be redirected to the gold store before they can purchase the shotgun. This two-step process dramatically decreases the conversion rate of your IAP content.

But take a look at how Contract Killer Zombies 2 has made a slight tweak to the buying process:

Did you notice the changes? There’s only a single step to buy the content, and the offers are definitely priced for whales, who are the best bet for IAP conversions. Pretty smart.

Always put as few barriers as possible between your user and your IAP content.

39. Use Powerful Marketing Words

Language is an incredibly powerful tool when it comes to selling.

Here are a few choice words that have an amazing influence on consumer behavior:

• Sale – consumers are 52% more likely to enter a store that displays “Sale” signage.
• Guaranteed – consumers are 60% more likely to buy a product that is associated with the word “Guaranteed”.
• Free – doesn’t everybody love free stuff?

To illustrate the power of “free”, consider the following scenario.

Customers have a choice between two chocolates. One is well-known brand of chocolate that is on sale and priced at $0.19 — about 50% off the regular price. The other chocolate — identical in quality and taste, though not a well-known brand — is priced at $0.01.

In this scenario, about 75% will choose the chocolate that’s on sale, while only about 25% will choose the chocolate priced at $0.01.

Now the chocolatier lowers the price of each chocolate by one cent, resulting in the following pricing scheme:

Suddenly, the situation is reversed: people suddenly forget about the chocolate that is on sale, and 71% choose the free chocolate. Only 29% will still see the chocolate that’s on sale as a good deal.

The moral of this story? “Free” can be a powerful tool to change buyers’ behaviors — but be careful that you’re not cannibalizing other areas of your IAP strategy!

40. Never, EVER, Annoy Your Users

Last, but definitely not least, never do anything purposely to annoy your users.

Unhappy customers will not buy anything from you. Even worse, they may delete your app entirely, preventing you from capitalizing on your side streams of revenue such as advertising. Word of mouth referrals will make or break your reputation, so focus on offering a really compelling game experience and prevent greed from ruining your game.

Always put the enjoyment of users first!

Where To Go From Here?

Hopefully you’ve found something in this list of 40 tips and tricks that you can use in your IAP strategy. The most important thing to remember is that many, many developers and studios have already learned a lot of the hard lessons. Do your research and find out what others have already discovered — before you make the same expensive mistakes that they have already made.

I’ll leave you with a few links that you may find useful on your journey to monetizing your app:

• Introduction to In-App Purchases in iOS 6 Tutorial — a great place to start when looking to implement IAP in your apps.
• In-App Purchases in iOS 6 Tutorial: Consumables and Receipt Validation — a primer on the nuts and bolts of secure in-app purchases.
• http://blog.flurry.com/?Tag=In-App-Purchase — select articles from the Flurry Blog on IAP statistics and other IAP resources.
• Part 1 and Part 2 of an article from PlayHaven on 11 techniques to maximize the value of your users

If you have any questions, comments, or neat ways in which you’ve leveraged IAP strategies in your apps, come join the discussion below!