Full time Indie Game Developer Revenue

Backstory quick
So a quick update how it looks financial for me. As maybe some of you guys now I was supported 6 months with a „Gründungszuschuss“ from Berlin at the start of my career as Indie Game Developer. Which was basically almost the same money as I was working full-time. What ever its already 1 year and 3 months later now and I’m still a full time Indie.

My Gaming Apps
I got 26 live apps on iOS, 30 on Android Google play and 30 on Amazon Store. 90% of them created this year, 2014.
The main money comes through 2 of my 26 live apps.  Which are Three Points, which was picked and featured by apple and PewDiePug a game that gets insane ratings and constant downloads due the strong fans/Bro’s of PewDiePie.

My capital + Income Stream
I started to make a monthly income which after splitting 50/50 with my creative partner Sabba Keynejad
is comparable with a internship salary(400 Euro a month). I got an extended „Gründungszuschuss“ of 300 Euro until March 2015 on top. My original start off money of 6000 Euro has been declined to around 2500 by now.
The rough 700 Euro will now probably make me stay around 2000 to 3000 Euro with my current expenses.

Monetization
I got featured with Three Points back than but I only had in there iAD Banners which made out of 330 000 Downloads and over 1 million expressions rough 1000 USD. We took a big learning and added Chartboost which would have generated around 7000 USD on top if we would have had it in. All Apps now got both, some of them have an extra option to remove advertising for a in-app purchases of 0.99 USD. Even tough our overall Downloads have been reduced drastically since the apple feature past there is now a solid income stream etablished. (since the last 3 months)

Chartboost statistics iOS
(2.5 months)
ios revenue

Chartboost statistics Android
(2.5 months)
android revenue

The biggest Hope
The second game is our biggest hope so far, If Pewd’s Bro’s can make him play the game on Youtube this would eliminate all money worries quickly. PewDiePie was back than one of the main reasons Flappy Bird became the success it is/was.

Trying out some Marketing

So far I did post on several social media channels, PR agencies, this blog, deviantart and made youtube gameplay footage of my games. I tried admob, invested 100 Euro all in one day with CPC(cost per click) of 0.10 USD it made 800 more downloads over 2 days. Which was pretty ok already, additionally I’m now in contact with a big marketing player, which currently checks whats the best way to give my apps some more attention. Let’s see how this all works out.

 

Fresh Road

Here one of my newest games. Gameplay obviously actually three points my earlier game, but with a fresh look, feel,music and balancing. Went live 1. November, this Saturday.

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/app/id931819072

Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=davidzobrist.freshroad

Amazon: http://www.amazon.de/David-Zobrist-Fresh-Road/dp/B00OQ8D4VO
fresh berlin david

Bubbels – Pop them Bubbels!

Pop them Bubbels! 
Bubbels just went live for iOS so here the official announcement, now its your turn to play it.
Have a good start into this new week everyone!

iTunes: https://itunes.apple.com/app/bubbels/id930848530?mt=8

Google Play: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=davidzobrist.bubbels

Amazon: http://www.amazon.de/David-Zobrist-Bubbels/dp/B00OOY6G2O

Bubbels 1 Bubbels 2 Bubbels 3

Let’s talk statistics

I didn’t post my app statistics since way back when I released Sha Cat. As you may have read I changed my approach after that game and went for a lot smaller apps. Throwing 3-4 Apps out a month for the last 3 Months.
Using iAds and maybe 1 simple in-app purchase to monetize.

The first one was Bumpy Ball which already performed much better than all my apps before. And I took my learnings but couldn’t really re-apply them for a several apps after.

I teamed up with Sabba Keynejad a very talented technology/trend designer.
And we created the one app which is by far the most successful app I released.

The App had around 5000 Downloads within the first two days, all natural, there was no Marketing except the regular posts through my social media channels. ( Google+, Twitter, Tumblr, Linkedin, Facebook, Deviantart, Pinterest)

David Zobrist pewdiepug

It even managed to get into the iTunes roleplaying top 10 in Estonia, and went into the top 100 in 32 other countries. Unfortunately the iAd failed to appear on time so we did not create any money within this time.
I couldn’t take that and switched it to paid. Which immediately kicked us out of all reached positions and decreased the downloads dramatically (-90%). It basically killed all natural growth.

A half week later the ads where there.. So I switched it back to free. It did came back up from 10-20 daily downloads (paid time) to 200-300 Downloads a day.

But it obviously had lost it’s magical boost. Since the last two week it remained like this but we patched it and the changes went live the last week. We basically created a pop up to rate the app and give the player in-game points for doing so. This small change had a dramatic effect. We received around 110 fresh user rating in the last 5 days, most of them beeing 5 of 5 possible stars.  We are right now trending back up, which is really exciting.

pewdiepug game ratings david zobrist

The loop of getting more players through the nice ratings and turning them into active game raters through the pop up seem to run incredible effective.

Pewdiepug Charts iphone David Zobrist

I know for sure I will never switch an app to paid again, no one pays now a days and it kills all growth.
I’m right now really happy that we got this second chance.
Let’s see what the week brings us!

Big thanks to Gamesalad – A great tool!

I decided to take the time and just write what positive experience game salad was/is for me.
gamesalad david zobrist

(click on the pic for the link)

The simplicity but also diversity of how game salad can be used is just great.
The Documentation via the Cookbook is really helpful and covers all required big questions. The Community is super helpful. The forum is highly active and everyone tries to help. All in front some key figures or game salad celebrities witch help out with great knowledge about the tool and the industry in general. The Gamesalad team tries its best to comes up with new updates that make me excited like a little kid.

With my age of 28 years by now I finally became able to fulfill my dream and create a variety of games and share it with people and even make some money out of it. I just wanna say a big thanks to the game salad team and the community.

Keep up the good work!

Thanks, Dave

1 Cruise – iPhone Gameplay Trailer

One of my 3 upcoming iPhone games this weekend.
1 Cruise -Featuring Music by @audioPad  youtube.

The Game will be available from the 28.6.2014 on.
For iPhone exclusive! (Android is for poor people)

Game Info:
Cruise through a vibrating world, as long you can. Gain power and become more effective. Enjoy the trippy graphics. Compare your result with players all over the world.

1 Cruise – iPhone Gameplay Trailer
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NBFPGMNZf04