Posts tagged ipod touch

4Notes offers Universal access to your notes on your iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Access your notes from any device, and updates are automatically synced to your other devices and the web if you have a Press Start Games account. 

Since the initial release, 4Notes has added a ton of features such as Data Detectors, Drag/Drop Support, group synchronization, iPad support, multitasking, reminders, and so much more. The best news is that at $4.99, it’s an incredible value.

My goal has always been to get 4Notes into as many hands as possible. With the update of v2.0, I realized my goal of having 4Notes sync the way I’ve always wanted it to sync. In other words, not only does 4Notes sync without user interaction, the app syncs even if you leave the application (iOS4 Required with compatible hardware).

Now, my focus has turned to increasing volume. With that goal in mind, I’m proud to announce that a free version of 4Notes has been submitted to the app store, titled 4Notes Free. 

4Notes free offers many of the features of the original, premium version of 4Notes. Incredible features such as multitasking, syncing between your iPhone and iPod touch, emailing notes within the app, and drag/drop support. 4Notes Free also provides users the ability to add and update notes from our web application. 

As shown below, 4Notes Free offers a compelling package to users who want a free, simple, and powerful note taking application for their iPhone and iPod touch.

The original 4Notes offers substantial value over the free version, and will continue to be updated with enhanced functionality. Right now, the paid version offers iPad support, sync capability over cellular networks, categories, note reminders, data detectors, and lacks ads. It also offers 25x+ the storage capability. In other words, no matter what type of notes application you’re looking for, 4Notes Free or 4Notes should be able to satisfy your requirements.

4Notes Free also utilizes iAds, Apple’s ad service. If you do download the free version, please support the work by clicking on the ads. They’re really cool.

4Notes Free should be available later in the month of July, depending on Apple’s current review times.

Version 1.1.1* of 4Notes has been submitted to Apple. Along with the enhancements for v1.1, this release provides the following.

• Last Note Shown on Startup (iPad). Previously, 4Notes on the iPad always showed the first note on startup. With this release, 4Notes starts with the last note shown on the previous run. 
• Group Synchronization Fixes: Specifically, Deletion of Groups now syncs across devices. For example, if you delete a group on the iPad, that deletion is replicated on your other Apple devices. Also, modifying a note’s group will tell 4Notes to sync the note to the cloud.
• Compose Button (iPad). Clicking the “Compose” button will bring up the keyboard, no matter if Data Detectors is enabled or disabled.

As always, feedback is always welcome.

* As of this writing, some aspects of this post talk about future features & functionality which have not been approved by Apple for distribution in the iTunes App Store. At this time, Press Start LLC does not guarantee these features will be submitted, approved, or found in a future update.

4Notes v1.1 was submitted to Apple last night. It’s been a long road to get this new version completed, but I’m really happy with the results.

4Notes has received tons of positive feedback since its introduction 7 months ago, even being featured on the iTunes App Store front page. This version takes the simplicity of 4Notes and brings it to the iPad, allowing seamless syncing between your iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. For example, make a change on your iPhone while you are out. When you get back home, the change will be on your iPad. Or, create a grocery list on your iPad and access that list from your iPhone while you are out. Syncing just works (Press Start Games Account and Setup required).

With support for the iPad, I wanted to let everyone know that 4Notes will be a Universal application. What’s “Universal” mean? It means that you pay once for 4Notes, and it will work on all 3 devices. Think about it. There won’t be a need to buy a “for iPad” or “HD” version. 

Here’s how 4Notes looks on the iPad.

and iPhone…

I’ll have much more to say about 4Notes over the next week (there are many more enhancements besides iPad support), but I wanted to first thank everyone for their support. Creating a Universal application is much more work, but the result is worth it. I’ve been creating and updating notes between devices for a while now, and am very pleased with the results.

Depending on Apple’s review cycle, 4Notes will hopefully be available in Mid-May. 

- Seamless Syncing for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.
- Add URLs, email addresses, and phone numbers to your notes.
- Drag/Drop Support. Manually reorder rows. 
- Better Group Control & Synchronization. 
- Better Accessibility, including support for VoiceOver.
- All the features of version 1.0.

See the website for more information. Note that some aspects of this page talk about future features & functionality which have not been submitted and/or approved by Apple for distribution in the iTunes App Store. At this time, Press Start LLC does not guarantee these features will be submitted, approved, or found in a future update.

So. 3 Weeks ago I apologized for my lack of updates. I’d been working on version 1.1 of 4Notes extremely hard and my blogging really suffered. I announced then that version 1.1 was feature complete and I would return to the world of blogging.

Well, it turns out 4Notes was not done, sorta. What happened? The iPad came out. I made a decision when the iPad was announced that I would not make a version of 4Notes without testing on the device. I just couldn’t come up with a good reason to do so, and felt the end result would not meet my strict standards. So, with version 1.1 (iPhone/iPod touch only) in the test phase, I started playing around with the iPad. After using the iPad for a few days, I came to the conclusion that 4Notes needed to be on the iPad “now” instead of version 1.2. Therefore, I have been working extremely hard to update 4Notes, for iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.

So now, version 1.1 of 4Notes is feature complete and is nearing the end of the test phase. The iPad version works great and I’m extremely pleased with how the app looks and feels. Some notes on the next version.

• It’s a Universal Application. Buy once, and you can use it on iPhone, iPod touch, and your iPad.
• It syncs seamless between devices. Make a change on your iPad, and it updates your other devices. 
• It SYNCS seamless between devices. If you have version 1.0, you’ll notice the difference. I’ll have more on this soon.

4Notes should be submitted to Apple in late April / early May. More to come..

<Ad Network> worked out for me well. However, the ads won’t work out well for you if you’re looking for big traffic bursts within a short time.

Advertising and marketing are an integral and necessary part of any iPhone developer’s success. Whether you work for a big company, or you’re a one-person shop, you have to spend a significant amount of time letting people know your application is actually in the app store.

Search Google, and you’ll most likely come across tens of posts stating high expectations/low results of app sales. If you dig a little deeper in the posts, the developers usually state that they have done zero marketing, or only one expensive task, such as a paid review or advertising on an expensive CPM network.

I’ve developed several applications and have experimented with several marketing methods (and researched even more). I’m no expert, and I continue to research and try different marketing techniques, but I thought I’d take some time and put down some lessons learned from marketing in 2009.

iTunes is a marketplace, not an advertising platform (for most people). The biggest mistake is inflated expectations in regard to the iTunes App Store. People expect hundreds of sales with little to no work.

Don’t get me wrong. You will receive some sales with iTunes. iTunes gathers hundreds of millions of users into one store. If you sold your application on your own website, you wouldn’t receive any visitors because no one knows about you (or me).

When it comes to apps though, the iTunes App Store could be compared to a supermarket. It contains thousands of items, but it’s up to the product-maker to get consumers to notice your product, not the supermarket’s.

Also similar to the supermarket, iTunes does have an advertising platform called the App Store front page. I was fortunate to have 4Notes on the front page and it is the best marketing platform for apps. The problem is, unlike supermarkets, you can not “buy” your way to the premium spot. Therefore, you need a plan to market in other ways.

Banner Advertising (or other CPM methods). I receive a ton of advertising requests from medium size websites. A few things to note about CPM methods. First, even very popular websites, with hundreds of millions of visitors, have low click-through rates (around 0.1%). When I owned a company in 2004, I utilized Google AdWords, and click through rates were below 1%.

What can you gain from this? If your intent is to build a brand, then CPM is a great method. If your intent is sales, then this may not be the best method. Of all places, I grabbed the following information from Facebook

CPM advertising is usually more effective for advertisers who want to raise awareness of their brand or company, while CPC advertising is more effective for advertisers who are hoping for a certain response from users (like sales or registrations).

Now, I’m not against this type of advertising, per se. It just has to meet several of my criteria. For example, if you have an app that targets a particular demographic and there is a website that meets that demographic, I may consider CPM. Second, they would have to provide an easy way to create an advertisement. Facebook would meet both of these categories if I was advertising an application for the high school / college market. iPhoneDevSDK.com would be a good place if you had an app targeted to the developer community (they utilize your app icon as the banner). Fusion Ads is another place where CPM may be viable (although I haven’t had much time to research), depending on your goal.

Many websites, however, do not offer either of these. They want me to give my hard earned cash for CPM inventory (without proving their value to me) and they want me to spend money creating my own banner.

Paid App Reviews: I feel different than most people about paid app reviews. If you read many forum posts, people who pay for “honest” app reviews are shunned as cheating the system or something just as horrible.

Personally, I don’t like paid app reviews, but not because the developer is being dishonest or cheating the system. I feel the website who doesn’t disclose their conflict of interest is being dishonest. As a developer, if I pay for a review, it better damn well be a good review. Why would I want to pay $20-$50 for a terrible review?

The websites know it too, which is why you’ll notice most reviews are positive. These types of payments are like magazine advertisements that pose as a positive review and it should be disclosed as such. Or, if a website takes money and doesn’t honestly like the application, then they should return the money and post the review (or not post).

Paid app reviews are necessary sometimes. My first application, Buckets, was seen in publications like ComputerShopper.com and MacWorld. 4Notes was not reviewed in any publications. While 4Notes has performed better than Buckets, I feel Buckets has maintained a longer tail because of these reviews.

With paid app reviews, you’ll also notice that your cost is rarely proportional to the value you receive from that review.

As I continue to research and try new things, I’ll update the Alpha Blog. If anyone has some great marketing advice or stories, let me know and I can update the blog.