Well, perhaps this question appears quite often for beginner iPhone developers or those who wants to spend as little money as possible on creating and promoting their iPhone app.
Fortunately, there are lots of places to say about your app for free. Not sure that it works perfect, but anyway it’s better than just throw away your app on the AppStore and wait for impressive sales!
So, where can your iPhone app be promoted for free?
Forums
There are lots of forums on the Internet where people discuss iPhone-related issues. Such forums often have section dedicated to app promotion. You can write a review of your app in appropriate thread, provide screenshots, full description and iTunes link for downloading your app.
You need to write review of your app on many forums to have any effect. Also be sure to read forum rules and follow them properly.
Here is a short list of forums where you can start:
- http://forum.theiphoneblog.com/
- http://www.iphonedevsdk.com/forum/
- http://planet-iphones.com/forums/
- http://www.talkiphone.com/forums/
- http://www.everythingicafe.com/forum/
Review sites
Lots of review sites detect your app automatically and grab some info about your app from the AppStore. As a developer you can add more screenshots, video URL, etc. Here are some of automated review sites:
But there are also sites where apps are added manually. The problem is that these sites have lots of apps to add and review, so submission of your app can take quite long time. Usually for some affordable fee you can put your app in the top of pending list. Here are some of review sites:
- http://www.appsafari.com
- http://www.iphoneapplicationlist.com
- http://www.iphonetoolbox.com
- http://www.appstoreapps.com
Home Website
That’s completely for sure that you need to have cool promo site where people can see screenshots, video and read full description of your app. Be sure to place iTunes link where it can be found and clicked easily.
YouTube Video
Video tells much better about your app than dozens of screenshots. It’s a good idea to have a video placed on YouTube where it can be found by people watching iPhone-related videos.
Your Friends
Don’t forget about them! Tell everyone you know about your app and ask them to tell about your app too! Recommendation which came from friend is much better than one which is found somewhere on the Internet.
P.S. This list is of course not full and it would be great if you share your thoughts in comments. What do you think about free ways to promote your app on the AppStore? Which of them work and which don’t?
Is there a go to place on the ‘net to see ALL or most of the top app review sites?
Advertising your app on Craigslist may also yield results. It’s free and hardly anybody does it, so your ad stands out. And believe me, a lot of people search for iPods and iPhones. And make sure to ad your app’s website to comments in blogs like these :-)
Twitter is a great (free!) way to build buzz around your app. You can link people directly to your app in the App Store by using a URL shortener like bit.ly and putting that link in your Twitter profile.
It seems that trying to get your app reviewed by app review sites is a key to success. There are too many of them though, so it makes sense to outsource sending app review requests to another company. iSpreadNews.com seems to be the cheapest of them.