With the rise of e-commerce businesses due to the coronavirus pandemic (e.g Amazon increase in share price), entrepreneurs are now moving their business online with e-commerce solutions like websites, e-commerce plugins and mobile apps. I intend to buy the full rights and license to the source code of a native mobile android app from an app developer for $3,500. Attached is a demo animation of the e-commerce mobile app.
I have tested the app on various android devices and I must say it has a unique design (UI/UX) with more usable features which makes it stand out from other e-commerce mobile apps on CodeCanyon. My question is can a make profit in the long run (within a year) with that price tag?, will selling the code on CodeCanyon be profitable (make more than $3,500)
From my calculations is I sell each item for $79, I will need to sell approximately 100 items to make $3,500 that is without charging for services.
Please E-commerce authors, is it possible to sell 100 items in a year how is the market over there?.
I would have thought there are some much bigger questions to address first -
If it’s not your app, do you have the technical skills to support and update it?
Are you sure it would be approved on CodeCanyon? If not do you have the skill set to update and modify it to the standard?
Presumably this app is not already being sold on envato?
If you are not a developer yourself then doing this would be total nonsense. Successful CodeCanyon item needs good support and constant updated to address bugs and buyers feedback. You will have to know the app’s code like you know the palm of your hand in order to deliver on these fronts.
But even if you get it approved (and that’s a BIG if) and you are competent enough to support it, nobody can’t tell you if you will sell 100 units in a year (or ever).
@charlie4282… Those questions are already addressed, the package comes with a 1 year free maintenance, bug fixes and updates/modification. When I was sent portion of the code, it was very easy to understand with well commented codes. During the extensive testing of the demo app, I found no bugs. After the 1 year of free update and maintenance by the developer, I can get an Indian developer to maintain/offer services for the app for about $500/month. Also I have extensively gone through Envato and found no app like this , I mean none.
@LSVRthemes… Not all tech entrepreneurs have technical skills, I just wanna know if this business idea is viable. I really didn’t want to go into details of the app sale, but the $3,500 package comes with a 1 year free technical skill from the developer that can modify the app to Envato standards if it gets a soft-rejection.
Based on the limited GIF above I wouldn’t have thought it would not be accepted, but if, in more detail, the item is decent then I would have thought selling 100 copies a year should be doable.
The best option would be to search for similar items (if only by category) on Codecanyon and evaluate their sales.
That said your other app has 3 since January (I am certain it is at least limited by price point), this new one is a fairly niche item, and with respect, this seems like a very risky and unstable strategy, fueled by a degree of naivety here around how the marketplace works and the potential technical obstacle
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Nobody can guarantee it will be even approved. Visually it doesn’t look very good, but I am not really familiar with visual requirements for CodeCanyon items, so I don’t know how huge issue this could be.
It is just a very, very risky investment and anybody experienced enough will most likely tell you to not do it. But if those $3500 is a pocket change for you then why not. Otherwise, probably nope.
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First you need to have it approved on Envato also once approved you need to make sure that you have got the expertise and skills set to support and update it.
Thanks to you all for the contribution. I have decided not to go through with buying the full rights/licence of the source code, not because of the reasons given above but because making money from the source code requires time (for marketing) and work (junior android developer), which I sadly do not have. However @promotionking there are at least 3 ways the source code could be profitable, which includes;
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Sell on a popular marketplace like Envato for $35 per unit (excluding taxes and fees)… on selling 100 units I make back my $3,500 this is minus the services of “installation” I can charge for. @LSVRthemes I searched for E-commerce android apps on Envato and the results where shocking (this app design blows the competition away)…if those apps could be accepted there is no way this won’t, I would just need to adjust the theme (color) as the UI/UX is miles away from competition.
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Freelance on E-commerce jobs, for sites like Freelancer or Upwork… the average cost of developing a native android E-commerce app is $350, with 10 gigs I have made the app cost
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Get in touch with the management team of top E-commerce website that uses Woocommerce without an android app and offer to create an app for their store, in the U.S clients can pay $1,750…with 2 clients, I have made the app cost.
But sadly, I won’t be moving forward with this as I feel bad for the developer who won’t be selling this app to me…but you can reach out to me if you want to contact the app developer selling full rights to the source code as he will be selling only ONCE.
Sell on a popular marketplace like Envato for $35 per unit (excluding taxes and fees)… on selling 100 units I make back my $3,500
That’s wrong. As a new account you will be getting approximately 50% from each sale up to approximately 70% once you will make enough of sales (it takes MUCH more than $3500 in total sales to get to that level though).
More info on this topic:
If it was that easy then surely the developer could just sell it on his own and potentially make much more than those $3500.
@LSVthemes, you misunderstand my first point…I mean $35 per unit as profit, excluding taxes ($4) and fees (Envato charges), which means you can charge clients approximately $69 - $79 per item to make a profit of $35.
Again you are misunderstanding the basics of business which I call “Business 101”… every business needs a product and a marketing team, a good product without a marketing team will fail. 99% of developers only know how to code apps with zero marketing skills. Its the same reason why very good developers get a job in big companies like Google, Facebook etc…and not start theirs.
Making money from this template requires time and effort (work) which the developer may not have. But once its sold the developer can’t use it for any E-commerce android developer project he may get (according to the license). Nobody is saying making money from the template is easy but, if the template buyer has about 5 high profile clients then it will be very easy. But the developer just writes code and is not business oriented.
I hope you understand?
Right, I misunderstood what you meant by unit price.
It seems you are kinda underestimating the importance of the developer after the product gets finished. Outsourcing support/updates sound great in theory, but that will lead only into an extremely messy and hard to maintain code in long-term. But I am not an Android dev, I have no idea how important is this aspect there. If we were talking about a WP theme then it would be a very bad idea.
Anyway, no need to argue about it. You may have much more business oriented mind than I have. I surely don’t know everything and have lots to learn when it comes to marketing and business in general. You’ve just asked for an opinion and you got it.