Beware of App Store app bundles

When I worked in sales and went through Force Management training we were taught to be wary of jumping to discounts. In the sales process it’s better to find customers where your product has a great fit where it’s solving their business problem very well (and for you as the salesperson to prove that value).

The type of customers you need to offer discounts to are the ones where your product isn’t solving enough of their business problem and therefore they need a lower price. Not only have you given up profit margin but you’ve also taken on a customer who will need more assistance and be less satisfied since your product isn’t perfect for them.

Obviously enterprise selling isn’t the App Store but I think it’s still good advice to think about. If you charge existing users $10 for the whole new version, the people who love the app will buy it. If you charge them $3, that means 1 of your really dedicated customers are worth more than 3 of your customers who are just buying because of the discount.

Finally, like you said, you see why developers go with subscriptions. You said you hate them, but you also want to charge your users more money. I’m not sure that it makes sense to want things both ways, at least on Apple’s platform. If it were me, I would probably embrace it. I think you can come up with something fair that is behind a subscription. Also, your royalty rate to Apple goes down by HALF for year two and beyond of a subscription. That’s a benefit I wouldn’t pass up.