Insider Tips for Building Better, More Profitable Android Apps — Sarah Karam, Google

On the podcast: How developers can launch and optimize their app listings on the Google Play Store. A conversation from Google I/O 2024 with Sarah Karam, director of Apps Partnerships at Google.

Key Takeaways:

There are now more ways to optimize revenue with Google Play Commerce, such as installment subscriptions and automatically adjusted local pricing. 

On Android, the leading apps diversify their monetization. Instead of offering just subscriptions, for example, they offer IAPs to cater for diverse user preferences. Tipping, for example, has seen huge growth. 

The leading Android apps also adjust their overall approach to cater for the huge and diverse user base. Just replicating your iOS strategy will only serve a small fraction of potential customers. How can you serve someone on a $200 phone as well as a $2000 one? 

“The consumer rarely buys what you think you sell” and understanding this can lead to secondary product-market fit, unlocking new growth. Stop thinking about your app in terms of the feature(s) it offers and more about what problem it solves. 

About Guest

👨‍💻 Director of Google’s Apps Partnerships team.

🤖 Sarah is passionate about helping developers succeed on Google Play Store and the Android ecosystem.

👋 LinkedIn

Resources

Google Play Academy

Guidelines to Getting Featured on Google Play

Guides to Help Grow Your Business on Google Play

Google I/O 2024 Keynote

Engage SDK

Custom Store Listings

Google Play business community on X

Android Developer YouTube Channel

Episode Highlights:

[3:57] Feature presentation: Getting your app featured on the Google Play Store can be great, but it isn’t the most important thing (and you still need to market your app to take advantage of being featured).

[8:46] Proactive engagement: Google’s newly announced Engage SDK (currently in developer preview) will surface apps at relevant times for users in the context they’re most likely to engage.

[13:53] Easier ways to pay (and get paid): New commerce options — including newly accepted forms of payment, installment payments, and student and senior plans — allow Android developers to serve more users around the world.

[23:37] Custom is key: Google Play Store listings can now be customized by the keywords users searched to find the app.

[29:38] Diversifying payments: Apps that offer in-app payments (IAP) in addition to subscriptions tend to perform better than apps that offer subscriptions alone.

[31:54] iOS =/= Android: To take full advantage of the Play Store, developers need to think about the diverse devices, budgets, and preferences of the 2.5 billion Android users around the world.

[34:40] Baby steps: Small experiments (like offering a paid 7-day pass instead of a free trial) can help you determine what works best for your app and tailor your offerings for diverse markets.

[45:00] Penny for your app?: Tipping is a surprisingly effective way of letting users pay for your product.