It’s not often that a kickass startup will share the reasons behind their success, so when John Fan of Cardinal Blue gave the audience at Mobile Monday last week a run-through of how their PicCollage app made it into the top 10 in twenty countries, we at TechOrange made sure we were taking notes. Even Fan joked that they themselves don’t really know why it has been so successful, but he nevertheless went through the steps from the initial launch to what is surely hallowed ground for app developers.
PicCollage started off as a side project to the company’s main offering, but after gaining 6,000 downloads on its first day in the Apple App Store, the team knew that their focus had to shift. PicCollage was featured in Apple’s New & Noteworthy category, which added to the growing momentum that took it to #2 iPhone photo app in the US. At its peak, the app was ranked second in Taiwan in the photo category – it now features seventh, behind Instagram – and is currently first in Japan’s photo category and sixth overall. It has been downloaded over 2.8 million times worldwide to date.
So how did they do it? From Monday’s talk, we took four main aspects that all app developers should be thinking about.
Name – Naming your app is important because it defines how people search for it. Like a website, apps can be optimized for search. Early on, Cardinal Blue decided to space the ‘Pic’ and ‘Collage’ in the iTunes app store so that it would show up in Apple’s search for ‘picture’ and ‘collage’. If the words were joined, the collage part would be nullified. Choosing key words carefully can help your app rank high in targeted searches. They also worked with Appgrooves, a startup specializing in app store search optimization.
Social – For consumer applications, deep integration with Facebook can propel your app into the stratosphere. For Cardinal Blue, they didn’t want to just publish to Facebook, but to showcase their users’ work in an attractive and inviting manner. By pushing to Facebook, collages appeared as large photos in people’s feeds, and were automatically saved in a dedicated album. Only recently has Instagram followed this lead: previously, photos were stored on Instagram itself, with Facebook users having to click through to see them. Fan says approximately 10% of downloads come from Facebook click-throughs.
Localization – This is important as both a method of pre-emptively gaining traction in foreign markets and servicing existing markets where the number of downloads makes localization worthwhile. Both Spanish and Portuguese were added to the app due to growing popularity in Mexico and Brazil, Japanese was added in anticipation of growth in that market while French and German versions have been prepared but not yet released. So far, only Japan has taken off, Fan adding that the team waited five months between adding Japanese and seeing traction in the notoriously difficult to crack, but heavily rewarding market. Downloads in Japan soared around New Year, when the Japanese traditionally have a week’s holiday. Since their new-found popularity in Japan, the team is currently working with Mixi, Japan’s largest social network, which approached the team about deeper integration. And KDDI, Japan’s second largest mobile carrier wants to pre-install the app on their au by KDDI Android phones. Cardinal Blue used MyGengo, a fellow 500 Startups team to aid with the translation.
Partnerships – From the outset, leveraging the services of other startups can help you cut costs and enables you to be a guinea pig for services that are still in their testing stage. For example, the team worked with Aviary and Sincerely for the photo editing API, filters, and photo printing and shipping services. It was a win-win situation that allowed PicCollage to provide awesome editing to the photos and provided Aviary and Sincerely with additional exposure and testing for their indivudal products.
By utilizing their network, the guys at Cardinal Blue were able to get their app translated and ‘shipped’ to some of the largest markets in the world, a feat that would be impossible if you were relying on Google Translate. And by growing at such a phenomenal rate, they have managed to attract the biggest movers in their core markets. Even though they’re already successful, they intend to hire others when their own skill set isn’t up to the mark. To launch on Android, they’re working with Cogini, a contract app developer here in Taipei.
PicCollage’s success is a story of action and reaction: some moves by the team were intuitive and some were responses to unexpected movement in the market. The message here is that startups need to be responsive and flexible, and willing to take on opportunities and meet challenges as they happen.
Have anything to add? Tell us how to grow a successful app in the comments!
Edit 1/17: The French and German versions have not actually been released yet. Added info on the Aviary & Sincerely services.
