Let's take a quick aside from yesterday's post where Adamson says Overcast "is only barely viable". Really?

insert alt text

Wow. 855 * $2 (after Apple) = $1710 a quarter = $6,840 a year.

That's iff those were the only patrons Overcast got all quarter. That seems a higher number than I usually see (On Aug 22, it was 481, and around 480-500 the next week), but let's start playing with 200 a week, and oversimplify to 800 a month.

If we say that they only pay the lowest amount once -- $2.99 for three months -- that's 800 x $2 after Apple's cut = $1600 a month. That's $19,200 a year. Not much, but if you can sustain that without huge programming costs, not bad.

But let's pretend that the patrons pick 12 months instead of three, and pay $11.99. That's essentially $8 after Apple's cut per patron, or four times as much as our first number. $76,800 a year. Again, well below market rate for an 8-to-5, but nobody's working 8-to-5 today on Overcast. (All that previous work is a sunk cost at this point.)

For 400 patrons a week, we double those revenue numbers. Now we're talking.

Here's what it looks like:

Patrons per month

Realistic?

Monthly revenue ($3 each)

Yearly revenue ($3 each)

Monthly Revenue ($12 ea)

Yearly Revenue ($12 ea)

200/wk x 4wk/month
= 800/month

Very

800 x $2 after Apple
= $1600 a month

$19,200

$6400

$76,800

400/wk x 4
= 1600/month

Possibly

1600 * 2
= $3200

$38,400

$12,800

$153,600

800/wk x 4
= 3200/month

No

3200 * 2
= $6400

$76,800

$25,600

$307,200

At today's rate of 855 (though remember, there's no way that's what it's averaging), assuming no attrition/full years from each, it's $328,320, if my quick calc is right. Not bad for a single app that's not without its bugs.

Let's ballpark a middle ground at $80,000 (maybe close to 400 a week averaging a little over $5.75 each before Apple's cut) for this year. Plus 2014's $164k. Plus whatever happened last year. For a single app plus updates. That's a good investment.

Labels: , , ,