Google PlayStore Offers Promotional Prices For Subscription Apps
by Gavin O’Malley@mp_gavin, November 3, 2016
In its PlayStore, Google is planning to give app developers the option of offering short-term promotional prices.
“Coming soon, you’ll be able to create an introductory price for new subscribers for a set period of time,” Larissa Fontaine, director, global head of apps business development at Google Play, notes in a new blog post.
For example, app makers can offer a subscription for $1 per month for the first three months before the normal subscription price takes effect.
“Along with local/custom pricing and free trials already offered, introductory pricing will help you acquire more subscribers and grow your subscription business,” according to Fontaine.
For Google, the change is part of a broader effort to please developers, which means helping them increase their subscriber and financial figures.
Subscriptions are the fastest-growing business model on the PlayStore, Fontaine noted on Thursday. Indeed, consumer spending in subscription apps increased about tenfold over the last three years. Yet not every decision Google makes works directly in developers’ favor.
Earlier this year, for example, Google Play began to note more clearly if a particular app “Contains Ads” — right alongside the note about whether or not apps offer in-app purchases.
Notably, Apple’s App Store does not include any such warning. In 2014, the Google rival did begin to identify which apps and games included in-app purchases, but that’s as far as it went.
Overall, Google appears to be more concerned with quality control within its Google Play ecosystem.
Last year, for example, it began assigning content ratings and “family star” badges to kid-appropriate apps and games, as well as vetting apps through a manual review process.
Earlier this year, meanwhile, the search giant began experimenting with app awards to separate the wheat from the chaff.
In the U.S. alone, advertisers will spend $28.72 billion to reach their targets on mobile devices, this year, eMarketer estimates.
MediaPost.com: Search Marketing Daily
(35)
