Twitter® Application Development for Dummies®

Chapter 17. Monetizing with Other Models

In This Chapter

• Making money with your app

• Relying on the generosity of strangers

• Making recurring revenue with subscriptions

• Merchandising

• Earning money indirectly through your app

• Selling your business

In this chapter, I cover seven common revenue models, including ways that customers can pay you for your application's service, how you can sell physical and virtual goods, and long range revenue strategies. This certainly isn't an exhaustive list, but it should give you some ideas to help you start making money with your app.

Some software lends itself to certain monetization models better than others. To find the optimal revenue generator you should experiment with multiple models and exploit the ones that work the best for you.

Requesting Payment for Service

It is customary to pay someone for the services they provide. If you've ever worked a day job you are probably familiar with this concept. Your application provides a service for your users, so it isn't much of a stretch to consider asking for payment in exchange for the services your application renders. There are numerous ways you can go about asking for payment. Here I cover three of the most common ways:

• Asking for donations

• Charging a fee in exchange for a copy of your application

• Charging a subscription for access to your application

Ask for donations

Asking for donations may be the easiest way to start making money with your Web site. Possibly even easier than partnering with an ad network. ...