Developing Perspective

00:00:00 ◼   ► Hello, and welcome to Developing Perspective.

00:00:03 ◼   ► Developing Perspective is a podcast discussing news of note in iOS development, Apple, and

00:00:07 ◼   ► the like.

00:00:08 ◼   ► I'm your host, David Smith.

00:00:09 ◼   ► I'm an independent iOS and Mac developer based in Herndon, Virginia.

00:00:12 ◼   ► This is show number 89, and today is Tuesday, October 16th.

00:00:16 ◼   ► Developing Perspective is never longer than 15 minutes, so let's get started.

00:00:20 ◼   ► So if you've been following along at home over the last, I guess it's a month and a

00:00:25 ◼   ► half, two months, something like that, you'll know that tomorrow is a big day for me.

00:00:29 ◼   ► Wednesday, October 17th, I'm launching Check the Weather, which is the new weather app

00:00:34 ◼   ► I've been working on for the last while. And I've been kind of hopefully been helpfully

00:00:38 ◼   ► walking through the process on the show. I'm talking about all the various parts that go

00:00:42 ◼   ► into something like this, how I structure the code, how I do prototyping, how I do marketing,

00:00:47 ◼   ► how I do localization. I've been trying to really be helpful there. And as I'm winding down, if I've

00:00:52 ◼   ► missed anything or there's something that you really wish I had covered but haven't, please get in touch.

00:00:56 ◼   ► You know, I can sort of wrap that up before I kind of wind this down with

00:01:00 ◼   ► maybe a couple more shows, just kind of a post launch activities and things.

00:01:03 ◼   ► But overall, you know, I should be winding down a little bit the exactly

00:01:07 ◼   ► what it is I'm talking about.

00:01:08 ◼   ► But today, um, I'm going to kind of walk through the, this pre-launch activity.

00:01:12 ◼   ► It's kind of like, if you imagine, um, You know, it's a set.

00:01:16 ◼   ► If you ever watch like a NASA or something launch and you've got all

00:01:18 ◼   ► those guys, you're sort of, are you go, no go for launch.

00:01:20 ◼   ► Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:01:21 ◼   ► And you're kind of trying to line everything up and make it all work.

00:01:23 ◼   ► That's kind of where I am today.

00:01:25 ◼   ► Like today I've gotten hardly anything done other than just kind of like making sure and

00:01:29 ◼   ► doubling and rechecking and kind of making sure everything's queued up, ready and set

00:01:35 ◼   ► for tomorrow.

00:01:36 ◼   ► Now the funny thing is, of course, tomorrow is actually today.

00:01:41 ◼   ► Tomorrow in New Zealand and now Australia and I believe most of Eastern Asia and so

00:01:47 ◼   ► on.

00:01:48 ◼   ► This kind of was kind of the funny thing.

00:01:49 ◼   ► I came into work today and check the weather's actually available for sale even though I

00:01:53 ◼   ► It won't show up in the US until midnight tonight.

00:01:56 ◼   ► And that's sort of intentional.

00:01:57 ◼   ► It's sort of a nice attribute of the way

00:01:59 ◼   ► that the rollout of the store works, where

00:02:01 ◼   ► I say the availability date was the 17th.

00:02:04 ◼   ► And it'll slowly roll out across the world from there.

00:02:08 ◼   ► And so that works out pretty well for me, in the sense

00:02:10 ◼   ► that I can kind of get a sense of what

00:02:13 ◼   ► it looks like in the store.

00:02:14 ◼   ► I can get a sense of if there's any weird bugs or things.

00:02:17 ◼   ► Some people in New Zealand or Australia

00:02:19 ◼   ► and things for me start buying it and seeing

00:02:21 ◼   ► how it works there.

00:02:23 ◼   ► And it also helps, I think, a little bit versus if you do a manual release, where you go in

00:02:27 ◼   ► and change the date on the day that you want it to launch, and it'll show up, but then

00:02:32 ◼   ► you have this weird awkward thing of like, well, it doesn't show up for me yet, or the

00:02:35 ◼   ► cache hasn't expired yet, and all these weird issues that can happen in iTunes Connect.

00:02:40 ◼   ► So I tend to just prefer to just roll it out based on time, instead of ahead of time.

00:02:45 ◼   ► And so now it's slowly rolling itself out.

00:02:48 ◼   ► You know, tomorrow, probably mid-morning is when I'll do kind of my announcement, officially, I suppose.

00:02:53 ◼   ► So people obviously, anybody listening to this, after midnight in wherever you are, if you search for "check the weather," you should probably see it.

00:02:59 ◼   ► And it should gradually roll out from there. You should be able to get it.

00:03:08 ◼   ► But, you know, sort of tomorrow, and I'll have a big show just sort of talking about the actual launch tomorrow.

00:03:11 ◼   ► But, you know, it's kind of a nice thing about it rolling out.

00:03:13 ◼   ► It's just something to be aware of,

00:03:18 ◼   ► that if you ever get a help desk request

00:03:20 ◼   ► the day before you launch,

00:03:23 ◼   ► and you think, "Wait, it's not live,

00:03:25 ◼   ► and you go into the store, it's not there."

00:03:27 ◼   ► It's possibly someone in New Zealand, Australia, et cetera,

00:03:29 ◼   ► as it's moving across.

00:03:31 ◼   ► So the sun is now chasing my app across the world,

00:03:33 ◼   ► which is kind of cool.

00:03:38 ◼   ► But otherwise, today is my pre-launch day.

00:03:39 ◼   ► And so I'm spending my day getting things ready.

00:03:41 ◼   ► And so you're starting to kind of do all these little parts,

00:03:44 ◼   ► like making sure everything's ready to go.

00:03:45 ◼   ► You know, I have a website that I'll be launching tomorrow.

00:03:48 ◼   ► I have cross-promotion ads.

00:03:49 ◼   ► I have all those things, and I'm kind of

00:03:50 ◼   ► making sure they're all lined up, that they're all ready.

00:03:52 ◼   ► First thing, you know, I can come in tomorrow,

00:03:54 ◼   ► and I can just sort of check them off, like launch this,

00:03:56 ◼   ► launch this, launch this, launch this.

00:03:58 ◼   ► The app will already be in the store, but that's OK.

00:04:01 ◼   ► And that's just kind of the process

00:04:02 ◼   ► I'll be working through, making sure everything's ready to go.

00:04:05 ◼   ► Because you only really get to launch once.

00:04:07 ◼   ► You have, for subsequent versions,

00:04:09 ◼   ► you kind of have other things that you'll

00:04:10 ◼   ► with your launches for minor versions.

00:04:12 ◼   ► But generally, people don't care quite as much

00:04:15 ◼   ► as when you launch a new version.

00:04:16 ◼   ► It's a new thing.

00:04:17 ◼   ► It's fresh.

00:04:18 ◼   ► It's somewhat anticipated.

00:04:20 ◼   ► And so I'm trying to make sure everything's queued up

00:04:22 ◼   ► and ready to go.

00:04:23 ◼   ► I've told my API vendors that tomorrow's the day,

00:04:26 ◼   ► so they shouldn't be too surprised if things get crazy.

00:04:29 ◼   ► But overall, I'm just trying to make sure everything's lined up

00:04:32 ◼   ► and everything's ready.

00:04:33 ◼   ► Kind of doing a few little reaches out to the press,

00:04:35 ◼   ► though I'm trying not too hard on that just because you don't

00:04:38 ◼   ► to be too like, too naggy about that.

00:04:40 ◼   ► So a lot of people have it.

00:04:41 ◼   ► I've heard some people that are going

00:04:43 ◼   ► to write reviews, which is awesome and kind of humbling.

00:04:45 ◼   ► But it's definitely-- everything seems ready to go.

00:04:49 ◼   ► And so then, essentially, what's going to happen tonight?

00:04:52 ◼   ► And I'm walking this through.

00:04:53 ◼   ► If you've released a bunch of apps,

00:04:54 ◼   ► this is probably all I've had to you.

00:04:56 ◼   ► But if you're not, hopefully it's helpful.

00:04:58 ◼   ► But essentially what will happen is at midnight,

00:05:01 ◼   ► or whatever time, the app will just become available.

00:05:04 ◼   ► There's nothing more fascinating about it than that.

00:05:07 ◼   ► It's like the Apple just up here in the store.

00:05:09 ◼   ► And then it's on you to drive people to download it.

00:05:13 ◼   ► Especially in iOS 6, there's no real way

00:05:15 ◼   ► that people find out new apps are in the store.

00:05:18 ◼   ► There used to be a release date list that

00:05:20 ◼   ► was prominent in all categories.

00:05:22 ◼   ► That's been very diminished.

00:05:24 ◼   ► I think there's still a way to create that kind of a view

00:05:26 ◼   ► in the new app store, but it's very, very weaker

00:05:29 ◼   ► than it was before.

00:05:29 ◼   ► So you can't really count on people just discovering it.

00:05:32 ◼   ► You've really got to work on getting people's attention.

00:05:36 ◼   ► And like I said in the previous show about marketing and all

00:05:40 ◼   ► those types of things, hopefully the way you do that

00:05:43 ◼   ► is by reaching out to people you know, people you trust,

00:05:47 ◼   ► people you respect, and giving them preview copies of it,

00:05:51 ◼   ► giving them an opportunity to talk about it, to try it out,

00:05:55 ◼   ► give you feedback, which is both good for improving the app,

00:05:57 ◼   ► and then also will hopefully help spread it around

00:06:01 ◼   ► when they mention it on their blogs, on their news sites,

00:06:04 ◼   ► whatever it is.

00:06:04 ◼   ► kind of what you're trying to do.

00:06:06 ◼   ► I mean, tomorrow is a day that I'll be talking a lot about my app.

00:06:09 ◼   ► I'll be sort of making sure everything works well.

00:06:12 ◼   ► And it's like this kind of thing that you don't want to do too much of.

00:06:15 ◼   ► I've seen a lot of people who you launch something and then you start

00:06:20 ◼   ► kind of get a little crazy about it, where it's like you save the class.

00:06:22 ◼   ► Simple version, and to sort of explain what I mean by that is if you go on

00:06:25 ◼   ► Twitter and it's like they have their sort of announcement tweet,

00:06:29 ◼   ► like tomorrow I'll probably be like, hey, check the weather.

00:06:32 ◼   ► Is it available in the app store?

00:06:33 ◼   ► Check it out.

00:06:34 ◼   ► beautiful, simple, accurate weather, or whatever.

00:06:37 ◼   ► I'll tweet that out.

00:06:38 ◼   ► And then there'll be reviews about it.

00:06:39 ◼   ► And you can kind of sit there and retweet every single review.

00:06:44 ◼   ► And your stream just turns into one big advertisement.

00:06:46 ◼   ► And it's like, that's only sort of helpful.

00:06:49 ◼   ► I mean, maybe I'll mention it a couple times during the day

00:06:51 ◼   ► to kind of from a time zone retweet kind of thing.

00:06:54 ◼   ► Not really, but like trying to space it out.

00:06:56 ◼   ► But for me, that kind of just comes across as kind of like--

00:07:00 ◼   ► it's sort of like advertising by like megaphone or something,

00:07:04 ◼   ► where it's like, check me out, check me out, check me out.

00:07:06 ◼   ► No, really, check me out.

00:07:07 ◼   ► It's awesome.

00:07:08 ◼   ► That's not so great.

00:07:09 ◼   ► So you can just kind of be subtle about it,

00:07:11 ◼   ► be kind of restrained.

00:07:12 ◼   ► The people who follow you kind of have intrinsically said

00:07:14 ◼   ► they're interested in what you're doing.

00:07:16 ◼   ► And if they are interested, they'll probably check it out.

00:07:18 ◼   ► You don't really have to convince--

00:07:20 ◼   ► those aren't the people you have to convince.

00:07:21 ◼   ► These are really people who've expressed

00:07:23 ◼   ► an interest in liking you.

00:07:24 ◼   ► So don't go too crazy with that.

00:07:26 ◼   ► Be very respectful, thankful of people who write reviews.

00:07:29 ◼   ► I think it's very appropriate to write a lot of thank you notes

00:07:32 ◼   ► or things like that to those people.

00:07:34 ◼   ► They don't have to write about your app.

00:07:37 ◼   ► And so be grateful for them when they do.

00:07:38 ◼   ► And people who link to you, definitely give them thanks.

00:07:41 ◼   ► And otherwise, you just kind of watch.

00:07:43 ◼   ► Look at your early app ratings.

00:07:45 ◼   ► If you have an email for tech support, which you probably do,

00:07:48 ◼   ► make sure you're on that all day, like being very responsive,

00:07:50 ◼   ► being on top of issues.

00:07:51 ◼   ► If people are finding problems, make

00:07:53 ◼   ► sure you're responding to them, giving them

00:07:55 ◼   ► a good sense of when things are going to go.

00:07:57 ◼   ► And then just kind of watch and learn.

00:08:00 ◼   ► For me, I tend to not really celebrate too much the day of launch.

00:08:03 ◼   ► I sort of do, but it's typically the day or two after that I'm actually really able to

00:08:09 ◼   ► enjoy the launch.

00:08:10 ◼   ► It's kind of like I said, I celebrate submission.

00:08:13 ◼   ► Launch is just terrifying, and then a couple days after things settle down, you can kind

00:08:18 ◼   ► of handle it.

00:08:19 ◼   ► Probably worth saying, you don't get sales reports until the next day, so there's always

00:08:27 ◼   ► this kind of terrifying day when you're kind of sitting there.

00:08:32 ◼   ► It seems like it's doing well,

00:08:38 ◼   ► it's ranking all right or whatever,

00:08:40 ◼   ► but you won't know until the next day,

00:08:41 ◼   ► so just don't worry about that too much.

00:08:43 ◼   ► You can kind of get a little nuts trying to look at the analytics or things,

00:08:45 ◼   ► but just kind of go with the flow and hope it all works out.

00:08:48 ◼   ► And then you want to have a good, compelling version 1.1 lined up.

00:08:52 ◼   ► And I've talked about this a little bit before,

00:08:53 ◼   ► But the way I mentioned it before was that I think it's good to hold back a little bit

00:08:58 ◼   ► and to not ship all your tricks and all the impressive things right at the beginning.

00:09:03 ◼   ► Because ultimately, your core product needs to be awesome.

00:09:10 ◼   ► Fair enough.

00:09:16 ◼   ► And hopefully check what there is.

00:09:17 ◼   ► I'll look forward to getting your feedback on it tomorrow.

00:09:18 ◼   ► But if your core product isn't awesome, a few bells and whistles aren't going to push it over the edge probably.

00:09:22 ◼   ► put that core experience, that 80%, that 90% of your app

00:09:27 ◼   ► has to be great.

00:09:30 ◼   ► And the other stuff, the sugar that you put on top of that

00:09:32 ◼   ► is something that you, in my experience or my goal,

00:09:34 ◼   ► is what I'm trying to do is I'm trying to build loyalty

00:09:38 ◼   ► to the app through that.

00:09:41 ◼   ► And so you want to add, for me, I think the best thing

00:09:43 ◼   ► you can do is to kind of show whatever every couple weeks,

00:09:45 ◼   ► if you add a new feature, add something that's useful,

00:09:48 ◼   ► be responsive to what people are saying about it.

00:09:48 ◼   ► If people are saying, man, it would be great if it did X,

00:09:51 ◼   ► take a look.

00:09:51 ◼   ► See if X is a good thing.

00:09:52 ◼   ► You don't want to get crazy and be constantly

00:09:54 ◼   ► throwing features in just for the purpose of adding features.

00:09:57 ◼   ► But for me, I find that that's a good kind of concept

00:09:59 ◼   ► of building loyalty by showing people

00:10:01 ◼   ► that you're invested in this.

00:10:03 ◼   ► And if they tell their friend about it,

00:10:06 ◼   ► their friend's not going to be disappointed,

00:10:08 ◼   ► or it's going to kind of go into decay over time.

00:10:11 ◼   ► But that's kind of it.

00:10:12 ◼   ► And then you kind of would iterate from there.

00:10:15 ◼   ► It's kind of an exciting time.

00:10:16 ◼   ► But it's definitely terrifying.

00:10:18 ◼   ► And if you ever launch something and you're like,

00:10:21 ◼   ► oh my gosh, how did the pros do it?

00:10:23 ◼   ► This is terrifying.

00:10:25 ◼   ► I've been doing this for four and a half years or something.

00:10:27 ◼   ► I've launched dozens of apps.

00:10:30 ◼   ► It's always terrifying because you're taking something

00:10:34 ◼   ► that's very personal to you,

00:10:35 ◼   ► that you've put a lot of time, effort, thought, energy,

00:10:39 ◼   ► sort of blood, sweat, and tears in that sort of way,

00:10:41 ◼   ► is you're putting it out and you're asking the world

00:10:44 ◼   ► to say, what do you think?

00:10:46 ◼   ► and some people will love it and some people will hate it,

00:10:48 ◼   ► and you just kind of hope more people love it

00:10:50 ◼   ► or the people who love it are louder

00:10:52 ◼   ► than the people who hate it,

00:10:53 ◼   ► but that's just the reality of it.

00:10:55 ◼   ► But that's kind of terrifying.

00:10:56 ◼   ► So don't worry about that.

00:10:57 ◼   ► You know, you just kind of have to roll with the punches

00:11:00 ◼   ► and overall, you hope people like it,

00:11:02 ◼   ► and I really, you know, the feedback I've gotten so far

00:11:04 ◼   ► has been generally positive,

00:11:05 ◼   ► and I really appreciate the people who've taken the time

00:11:08 ◼   ► in my beta group, my press preview group,

00:11:10 ◼   ► to try it out and look at it, and we'll see.

00:11:14 ◼   ► Alright, that's it for today's show.

00:11:16 ◼   ► I said tomorrow I'll have another one just talking about

00:11:18 ◼   ► the launch and how it went, how it's going, and so on.

00:11:22 ◼   ► But otherwise, I really appreciate all you guys' support

00:11:25 ◼   ► and sort of putting up with me as I've been going through

00:11:28 ◼   ► this process, I hope it was helpful for you.

00:11:30 ◼   ► It's certainly been interesting for me and it's kind of

00:11:32 ◼   ► helped me to be even a little bit more thoughtful

00:11:33 ◼   ► about what I'm doing so that I can talk about it

00:11:35 ◼   ► appropriately here.

00:11:37 ◼   ► But as always, if you have questions, comments, concerns,

00:11:39 ◼   ► complaints, I'm on Twitter @_davidsmith.

00:11:42 ◼   ► I'm on AppNet at David Smith.

00:11:44 ◼   ► And otherwise, have a great week, happy coding,

00:11:46 ◼   ► and I'll talk to you guys tomorrow.

00:11:48 ◼   ► Bye.