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Developing apps for Facebook, iphone?

Discussion in 'General Business' started by tradester, Sep 23, 2011.

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  1. #1
    Zynga is top social games apps for Facebook and is now worth between USD15 to 20 billion. What is potential of developing apps for Facebook, iphone?
    Roughly what are development costs for average app on Facebook, iphone? What are chances of an app being profitable?
    Read that apps on iphone are take longer to be approved and more expensive compared to Facebook apps. :)
     
    tradester, Sep 23, 2011 IP
  2. jhardy2008

    jhardy2008 Peon

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    jhardy2008, Sep 25, 2011 IP
  3. zabivka

    zabivka Peon

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    From what I understand, and granted I've only made a couple of apps on Facebook (and only one for myself), the Facebook app industry is dominated by a small group (maybe 100 or so) developers, and then outside of that it is very difficult to make money with apps on Facebook. Don't let that discourage you, though. I think it really comes down to having an original idea, marketing it well, and programming an app that functions well.

    Estimating your development costs would be next to impossible without knowing the app's functionality. I would probably sell my app, Birthday BFF Greeter ( apps dot facebook dot com slash b-day-greeter ) for around $30k-$50k. It has several cron jobs that run and send out birthday wishes on behalf of the users. But we've put quite a few hours into making it a pretty solid application, and plan on putting quite a few more hours into it. I would imagine my app would be kind of middle of the road. You might have some smaller apps from shops that specialize in app development that you can get for 2 or 3 grand, but you also will have some that are well over a hundred grand.

    For what it's worth, I think the wrong approach is to say, "I want to get a piece of the Facebook app pie, so let me think of an idea that will sell." The right approach, in my opinion, is to organically see a need or a problem and then come up with a solution to that problem. For example, with my app, I really built the stupid thing so I wouldn't have to waste time saying "Happy Birthday" to Facebook "friends" whom I have never even met. Yes, I am a lazy ass, but most men are, right? So I made the app to solve that problem, released it about a week ago, and we'll see how it does. Anyway, I think that is the right way to go about it.
     
    zabivka, Sep 27, 2011 IP