When Did You Buy Your Last App? Survey Says It was Over the Weekend
It's no surprise that people spend their weekends goofing off, relaxing, and entertaining themselves, but our weekly downtime activities also have major implications for mobile application marketing, as it turns out. According to new data from Flurry, a mobile analytics company, consumers are over 30% more likely to download an application over the weekend than during the week.
Not only are people more likely to download apps over the weekend, they're more likely to pay for applications over the weekend, too. This is perhaps because they've tested the free version during the week and then decide to upgrade to the paid version over the weekend when they have more time to play. Or perhaps paid apps are just becoming an alternative to the more expensive forms of weekend entertainment from days past as we continue to suffer through a down economy and tighter household budgets.
In any case, Flurry reports that free games are downloaded 26% more times on a weekend day versus a weekday, while paid games are downloaded almost 50% more times. Other non-game applications show similar trends with 27% increases for free apps and 36% for paid.
Given these findings, Flurry suggests that developers consider timing their launches to take advantage of these apparent trends. For example, app developers could launch their apps early in the week to encourage free-to-paid conversion sales over the weekend.
These numbers came from the latest Flurry Industry Pulse, an ongoing status check report for the mobile industry. This past month's report is conducted from a sample size of 200 applications, 25 million consumers and four platforms: Apple (iPhone and iPod Touch), Blackberry, JavaME, and Google Android.
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I usually spend a lot of my time testing and downloading free to try apps and usually decide after testing it.
I'm curious what the average time frame is for someone to buy an app. Makes sense the weekend would have the most buys when people have more time to look around after a week of reading things. When I get my iphone I will need to do some research on what apps to get.
I'm curious what the average time frame is for someone to buy an app. Makes sense the weekend would have the most buys when people have more time to look around after a week of reading things. When I get my iphone I will need to do some research on what apps to get.
Interesting findings - probably because they hit home with me! I usually buy apps on weekends because it's the only time I have to actually look at them properly and do a few searches for discounts etc. Usually I discovered them through an RSS feed during the week, or when browsing the net for work purposes and there's an interesting ad somewhere. I always grab a free trial - have never purchased an app without testing it first, and usually a week is enough time for me to make a decision.
As a side-note, it's always interesting to me how some developers won't let you test-drive a product for free. Sure, there may be some that will rip you off, but if you truly provide an excellent product with lots of value, then my view is that folks would pay. It's all about the relationship.
Are iPhone users bored over the weekend?
Nothing to do but to download an application?
Seems not very social.
Get a life instead of an iPhone.
Interesting findings - probably because they hit home with me! I usually buy apps on weekends because it's the only time I have to actually look at them properly and do a few searches for discounts etc. Usually I discovered them through an RSS feed during the week, or when browsing the net for work purposes and there's an interesting ad somewhere. I always grab a free trial - have