The LA Kings launched their official app powered by Mobile Roadie last Friday, and it’s still going strong. With the release of the Android version this week, now thousands of iPhone and Android users (and counting) are enjoying the LA Kings right on their phones.

In addition to being one of our most downloaded apps this week, the LA Kings app is featured first under the “New” section in sports apps in the App Store. Response has been phenomenal- the iPhone and Android versions have average ratings of 5 and 4.7 stars, respectively.

Kings fans are ecstatic to be able to catch up on news, standings, the team schedule, and much more right on the app, with some describing the app as “very well put together,” “a definite must have for any true Kings Fan,” and a “great way to keep up to date on my Kings!”

Hype around the LA Kings app doesn’t seem to be stopping anytime soon with the season in full swing. If you’re a Kings fan, this app is a must. To download the official LA Kings app, visit http://road.ie/lakings.

Ready for a night out on the town but don’t know what to do? With the official sbe app powered by Mobile Roadie, you don’t have to look further to find the hottest restaurant, hotel, and nightlife brands in North America. The sbe app gives you a comprehensive overview of each of their fine establishments, so you can pick and choose the places that reflect your personality.

And if you’re planning a vacay to one of the hottest entertainment cities in the country, the sbe app is the perfect companion. With their multiple establishments in LA, Las Vegas, NYC, and Miami, sbe has something for everyone. And with multiple features on the app, including photos, videos, music, news, and the ability to shop for sbe packages and gift cards, you’ll be fully prepared to have fun.

Download the official sbe mobile app at http://road.ie/sbe

The top artist of 2011, according to Billboard Magazine, is none other than Adele. With an album that spent 13 weeks on top of the Billboard 200, sold more than 13 million copies worldwide, and garnered 6 Grammy nominations, Adele is a music phenomenon who is exploding not only in the music industry but in the mobile world as well.

It was only a few months ago that Adele launched her official mobile app powered by Mobile Roadie, but already it is being recognized not just by fans but by industry experts as well. The App Store editorial team has chosen the official Adele app as one of 2011′s best apps, featuring it on the front page under the Music apps category of App Store Rewind 2011 (iTunes France).

The official Adele app is featured alongside popular interactive music apps djay for iPhone & iPod, Songify, and Tap DJ, as well as Biophilia, which is Bjork’s interactive studio album in the form of an app that cost 3 to 4 times more than a regular album.

We’re honored to be chosen as one of the best apps in the App Store, and congratulations to Adele. To download her app, visit http://road.ie/adele

Master music producer and DJ extraordinaire David Guetta released his highly anticipated album Nothing But the Beat this week, and let’s just say it’s taking over the charts. With tracks like “Little Bad Girl” feat. Ludacris & Taio Cruz, “I Can Only Imagine” with Chris Brown & Lil Wayne, and “Where Them Girls At” feat. Flo Rida & Nicki Minaj, this album delivers a powerful punch of the hottest tracks to keep you dancing all night long.

And with the concurrent release of the official David Guetta mobile app, you can listen to tracks from Nothing But the Beat as well as his previous albums anytime, anywhere. Not only can you listen to music with this app, but you can also watch videos, check his show schedule, and interact with other Guetta fans and show your support for this legendary music man on the Fan Wall, among other features.

It’s a must-have app for David Guetta fans and house music lovers alike. To download the app for free, visit Mobile Roadie at http://road.ie/davidguetta.

By 2015, International Data Corporation (IDC) predicts that 182.7 billion mobile apps will be downloaded, close to a 1600% increase from the 10.7 billion apps downloaded in 2010.  This impressive figure can be attributed to increases in smartphones and apps- both free and paid- that will continue to occur in the mobile market.

The top two app stores on the market today- Apple’s App Store and Google’s Android Market- account for 19.5 billion apps downloaded so far.

Apple’s App Store

Figure 1: Courtesy of Apple, Inc

In the App Store, which currently has over 425,000 different apps for download, 15 billion apps have been downloaded, up 50% from 10 billion in January 2011 and up 400% from 3 billion in January 2010.  Reports indicate that the average iOS device owner will buy 61% more apps in 2011 than a year ago, totaling 83 app downloads this year, and be willing to pay 14% more for paid apps than a year ago.  82% of mobile apps for download are free.

Google’s Android Market

Figure 2: Courtesy of Google, Inc

In the Android Market, which is home to over 200,000 apps, 5 billion apps have been downloaded since launching in 2008, up 50% from 3 billion in May 2011 and up 350% from 1 billion downloads in August 2010.  In just under two months from May to July 2011, over a billion apps for Android were downloaded.

Time Spent on Mobile Apps

And with all these downloads, it makes sense that smartphone users are spending more time using mobile apps than surfing the Web, according to a recent study by Flurry. Time spent on mobile apps per user jumped 88% to 81 minutes from June 2010 to June 2011, while time spent web browsing only increased 16%.

Figure 3: Courtesy of Flurry

In Conclusion

The mobile app market is expected to be worth $14.1 billion next year and jump 160% to $36.7 billion in revenue from direct sales, in-app purchases and mobile app advertising in 2015. However, these estimates may be understated given the tremendous growth of the mobile app industry in recent years.

Ringtones and ringback tones accounted for $9.7 billion of total revenue, while full track downloads accounted for $3.4 billion and music streaming totaled $1.4 billion of total revenue; however, Informa Telecoms & Media predicts that full track downloads will see the strongest growth over the coming years. By 2014, mobile music revenue will total $25.3 billion, with the largest percentage of revenue coming from full track downloads.

Figure 1: Data courtesy of Informa Telecoms & Media

The Mobile Music App Market

“The biggest blow [to traditional mobile music providers] has been the new world order ushered in by the rise of smartphone apps and the “over the top” players from the online and computer worlds…It is these mobile outsiders that now dominate the mobile content scene.” – MIDEM

The number of music apps in the mobile market is growing. In two years, the Apple App Store saw an increase of 270% in the number of music apps, from 496 apps in January 2009 to 13,912 apps in January 2010. And it’s not just the number of music apps that has been increasing- the number of smartphone users who download music apps is growing as well.

Why the popularity of music apps is growing

What separates music apps from traditional mobile music providers is content interaction. Users can immediately download music apps, and then stream and even download full tracks straight to their smartphones.  Music apps that feature artists allow fans to interact with their favorite musicians and other fans on a more intimate level, encouraging a sense of community.

What’s cooler for a Katy Perry fan than to talk with other KatyCats and receive updates from Katy Perry herself, all while listening to “Last Friday Night (T.G.I.F.)?

The value in music apps

In 2010, mobile apps alone generated $4 billion in revenue.  Music apps in the leading app stores- Apple App Store and Android Market- on average, accounted for 3.9% of total apps by January 2011. And not just music fans are seeing the value in downloading mobile apps; record labels see “the value of [creating] mobile applications as a means of encouraging music fans to interact with their artists”.

In just 72 hours (at the time of this writing) the newly released Taylor Swift iPhone App has shot to the top of the charts in Apple’s App Store.  Right now the app sits at position number six, just one slot away from being in the top five iPhone free apps!  There are already over 1,000 total ratings with an average of three-and-a-half stars, with a total of 109 reviews written.  While we’ve had some serious gains in the app store before for Mobile Roadie apps, this one takes the cake, rising to the highest ranking of any of our apps to date.  And this isn’t even counting Swift’s app on the Android platform, which has gone live as well.

Playing around with the app today myself, I have to say that the interactive features are sweet. Not only can you read Swift’s tweets directly on the app, you can comment and read other’s comments as well. But that’s not the half of it! Let’s say you’re going to the concert in Dallas, Texas, on March 11th … you can connect with other fans going to the concert, post comments and discuss the event and even share photos from the concert, all directly from the app.  There are also 30 tunes you can sample (some are ringtones), share comments with other users about, and decide if you want to purchase them (also directly from the app, of course!).

Of course, congratulations go out to Big Machine Records and Taylor Swift, the real reasons behind the success of this app launch!  Their promotional efforts have paid off, and in a big way. We’re happy to be the platform for the official Taylor Swift app, and we wish her and Big Machine continued success as she continues to engage her fans through the medium of mobile technology. After all, we told you it’s the wave of the future!

Update:

Well, we knew Taylor’s app was going to be a big hit when we originally wrote this blog post three days after the release. However, just two weeks after the app launched, Taylor Swift’s iPhone and Android apps were downloaded a combined total of over 350,000 times with 10% of all users purchasing music during that time frame as well.  One thing is clear: her fans can’t get enough of her music in-app, as over 7.5 million songs and ringtones have been listened to and almost 650,000 videos have been watched.

It’s hard to fathom all the different applications that an iPhone user has access to these days. Everything from useful time management apps to the senseless Pepsi app that recently got so much media attention (which was also subsequently pulled).  So what would you guess is the highest category of iPhone apps on the market today? Believe it or not, its e-books. Yes, that’s right … e-books are more prolific in the app store than games.  I know it’s hard to believe, but let’s take a look at the numbers and where they are headed.

Games led in the app store supply chain from August 2008 through August 2009, according to a report published by Flurry, an analytics company.  Interestingly enough, however, in September 2009 a new category eclipsed games, fueled in its expansion by rising consumer demand.  The category was e-books.  In fact, Flurry noted that 1% of the U.S. population is already reading an e-book on the iPhone. They go on to predict that just like Nintendo DS sales were impacted by the iPhone, the same impact will be felt by Amazon’s Kindle sales.  Only time will tell if they are right about that.

One thing we can be sure of is that the e-book is here to stay and its making a big impact on the iPhone platform.  With millions of dollars flowing through the Apple app store, authors of any genre and status have a chance to sell their product and get their name out there.  It’s just another example of how technology is literally leveling the playing field and allowing the entry level writer to compete against multi-book authors – in the same marketplace.

So what’s the bottom line? If you are an author, you need to leverage the iPhone popularity and platform to get your book out there in the marketplace.  And MobileRoadie is here to help you do just that.  It doesn’t matter how well known you are or how big your book is, we can help you get it packaged for the app store so you can ride the iPhone e-book wave.  So what are you waiting for?

Since March 2009 we’ve tried to be good partners with Apple, making sure our Apps conformed to their standards, looked great, and added value for the end user and our customers. We also paid attention to blogs like TechCrunch and others that shined the spotlight on specific stories of rejections, and tried to proactively adapt.

Yet, despite our best efforts, in the six months since Mobile Roadie has launched, the toughest part of the business has been explaining to our customers the seemingly inexplicable delays and reasons for rejection. Adding insult to injury, Apple was very slow to respond, or just wouldn’t respond at all, when we tried to right wrongs.

In the last 30 days, however, I’ve noticed a change. I was cautiously optimistic after reading about how Phil Schiller was becoming more active in high profile rejections. Then I got a call from a guy named Neil. Neil explained that he was reviewing one of our Apps, one that happened to have quite a few YouTube videos. He told me that 3 minutes and 42 seconds into the sixth video (which was a cartoon), that there was a scene with nudity. He politely explained that this violates Apple’s TOS and the App couldn’t be approved unless we removed the video. I logged in to the CMS and removed the video in real time, he thanked me, and less than 30 minutes later we got an approval notice.

For Apple, a company of tens of thousands of employees that is reviewing a rumored 2,500 apps a week, to call one customer about that level of detail inside one App is truly amazing.

Even more amazing, Apple has approved nearly all of our v2 upgrades less than two weeks after we began submitting them, including approving 22 Apps in one day last week (a record for us). This is good for our customers and good for Apple to get our upgraded product in the store.

I’m glad Apple is waking up and being more responsive to developers, especially developers like Mobile Roadie that have many Apps in the store. Now, if we could just automate code base upgrades without having to resubmit each App individually…