Sep

28

Proof that it’s the year of mobile

Filed Under Advertising, Branding, Marketing, Mobile 

Yes, that’s sarcasm in the title. Here’s the latest: over 85,000 iPhone apps available, 10,000 apps for Android devices, 80 for Palm, and who knows how many for BlackBerry (update: someone heard me, it’s 2,500 apps).

As of right now, there isn’t a Brands category in any of these app stores and I don’t foresee that ever happening (wouldn’t really make sense anyway). As more big brands release mobile apps, it’s becoming harder to keep track of who is doing what.

subwayiphones2

So I created a Google spreadsheet to try and organize all these apps in one place. I’ve decided to only focus on the iPhone for now, but should be moving on to the rest soon if there is interest. I’m also probably missing a lot of apps right now but this will, of course, be an ongoing (and hopefully collaborative) effort.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW THE GOOGLE SPREADSHEET

Some trends

  1. Out of the 200+ apps listed so far, only about 15 have an average rating of 4 stars or better
  2. AndroLib shows 64% of all Android apps are rated 4 stars or better. Are branded apps in general worse or just on the iPhone? As soon as I build the Android list, we should have a better idea
  3. In general, it’s pretty obvious the total number of ratings should be a good indicator of the apps overall popularity (not downloads)
  4. The biggest category by far is Lifestyle, News being the second
  5. Brands are consistently improving apps because I rarely noticed an average overall rating that was lower than the latest version’s rating
  6. Not surprisingly, free dominates branded apps (about 90%)
  7. Top 5 most rated apps: Facebook, Zippo, Barclaycard, Weather Channel, and Google

Update: Steve Smith from MediaPost’s Mobile Insider wrote a great article titled Your Brand App Hit Parade that references my spreadsheet. Make sure to check it out if you didn’t come from there.

Please let me know what branded apps are missing by using this form or send me a reply on Twitter @jsmakr with the brand/app name.

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Comments

  • Daniel_Lookout
    Great spreadsheet - thank you! I've been harping on this point in Australia for a while now and this spreadsheet is the perfect allies when addressing my concerns.
  • Nice data set. I found interesting that you do not have a tab for Microsoft's Marketplace for Mobile. As of last week there was a whole 246 apps available there... so I guess its not real exciting yet, but you never know. It seems Microsoft is really going to have to score next year with Windows Mobile 7, or its going to have a pretty small footprint in the smartphone market moving forward.
  • I think there is a definite reason why apps on the iPhone have lower ratings than Android and/or BB...and it's not because they are sub-par.

    It is MUCH easier for an iPhone user to leave a negative review than a positive one. Here's what I mean...you probably delete apps you don't like and keep the ones you do like, correct?

    Well, it's very hard to leave ratings for apps you keep. One has to log into iTunes via their computer to do so, which many people don't do.

    On the flipside, if you want to leave a negative review....well, it's easy to do, you are prompted to leave a rating when you delete the app. Since there's a greater overall chance people are deleting bad apps and not good ones, you are going to see more negative reviews.

    At the end of the day, this is why I feel iPhone apps are rated worse than other smartphones...their system caters more to bad reviews in my opinion.

    BTW....AWESOME spreadsheet!
  • Agree. I guess some of the best apps will also have the least # of ratings because they are actually staying on iPhones.
  • I'd agree and even further, I think the star rating system may not really give a good picture of an apps success or otherwise (outside of the extremes). You see this in places like YouTube as well: http://youtube-global.blogspot.com/2009/09/five-stars-dominate-ratings.html
  • We will *definitely* have a Brands category on http://www.Appolicious.com !! Fantastic job on this spreadsheet...would love to connect
  • Great organization; thanks so much; the ratings are directionally proportional to usefulness quotient. Are the majority of these apps really making life better?
  • This is soooo useful! Thank you!
  • luke_f
    Awesome spreadsheet, i've been making my own one recently but this is far more in depth. I also have some that you've missed and will submit via the submission form. Keep up the good work.
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