My Pomidoro Windows 8 app is getting famous
Over a year ago I created simple Windows 8 app: Pomidoro (the name 'Pomodoro' was already taken at the Windows Store). And yes, it is for applying The Pomodoro Technique. I published it to the Windows Store on January 7, 2013.
The reason I created this app, was to learn Windows 8 Metro apps development.
From time to time I receive e-mails that my app got some third party award or was reviewed by some website I have never heard about.
A few weeks ago I received e-mail from Best Windows 8 Apps. My app received Editor's pick award:
A few days ago I received e-mail from AppFeds. They states, that they are tracking 116,642 apps. Windows 8 Store contains over 144,739 (source). Now, my app is 579/673 in the productivity category.
I checked how many productivity apps they have and I was a little bit surprised. They have 673 apps in category Productivity. How is this possible that my app was ranked 958 in January 31? Did they have more apps or they are just lying? First warning about credibility of their website.
EDIT (after clarification from AppFeds, see comment): They have more than 2800 apps in category Productivity and almost 700 of them are well received. My app was 958 in January, now is 674. Yesterday (before the comment from AppFeds was posted), my app was 557.
But, in the same time, my app is in page 38, when I sort Productivity apps, by ranking (with 'Well Received' filter off). There is 10 apps per page, which means my app is in top 380(?) Why there is a difference between the list and above chart? Maybe guys from AppFeds can explain that as well? [End Of Edit]
Yesterday I received another e-mail. It made me to create this post. The e-mail was from I Love Free Software:
Hi jj09 team,
I am Ubaidullah from www.ilovefreesoftware.com. We recently reviewed Pomidoro on our website here:
http://www.ilovefreesoftware.com/24/featured/free-pomodoro-timer-apps-windows-8.html
We are a popular tech website and get hundreds of thousands of visitors from over 150 countries around the world.
It would be great if you could add a link to the review on your website. This would tell your visitors that we have reviewed your app as one of the best free app available (and that would add up to your credibility as well).
I have attached a badge with this mail which you can flaunt on your website, and link that to the review. Alternatively, you can just add this code:
<a href="http://www.ilovefreesoftware.com/24/featured/free-pomodoro-timer-apps-windows-8.html" title="Free Software" ><img border="0" src="http://cdn.ilovefreesoftware.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/ilovefreesoftware_reviewed_5Star.png"/></a>
Feel free to get back to me with any questions.
Have Fun,
Ubaidullah Khan
Collaboration Manager
I checked this review. Doesn't look like a simple scam. It is neither high quality review. The cool thing is my app is 1st of 4 best Pomodoro apps :) This is the badge from them:
* Of course I didn't paste link provided by them. The picture is stored on my server for security reasons.
Is that means my tiny app is good? Maybe average Windows Store apps are not very high quality (if app created within one day can be better than them)? Or maybe there are people who trying to get their websites popular, by scaming Windows Apps's creators? I think the last reason is the most likely :)
Now, let's look at the most accurate statistics - Windows Store:
The problem here is following: how can I check how good my app is? The best way to do that is compare it with other apps. But how? I was trying to find some Apps rankings on Windows Store websites and I didn't find any. Maybe I am not good google user. I found some ranking on Microsoft Store for Windows Phone (using Bing), but not for Windows 8.
I know, I am feeding scammers by linking these third party websites here. On the other had, some of them (e.g. this or that) have better UX than Windows Store websites. I spent 10 minutes trying to find Windows Store Apps rankings online and I failed. I know you can sort Apps in Windows Store by popularity, but why it is not available online? In the same time, third party websites like AppFeds have pretty nice and clear UX for Apps Catalogs. Their data may be not accurate, but the UI is nice. Maybe guys from Microsoft should think about something like that?