Someone is asking on Quora: "Does anyone who's created a Shopify app have a conversion rate on how many people pay for their apps vs use it for free?"

Shopify's conversion rate: free app VS paid app

I would say the rule 10/1 applies here (I don’t think that rule really exists, I just created based on my experience described below). The rule reads like this: 10% of visits to the Shopify app store will lead to an install, and 1% of the users installing the app will pay for a premium feature (2–3% if the app is awesome and if the paid feature is a killer). 1% might seem low, but don’t get me wrong, I specified 1% of the installs, not 1% of the users using it for real.

The 10/1 rule of conversion - 10 days after launch

Here’s the data that leads me to create this 10/1 rule (10 visits for 1 install, 100 installs for 1 paid user).

My team and I launched this Shopify App 10 days ago called Automatic Discount. Here's the app summarized in 3 screenshots.

1.Generate discount links

2.Create discount rules

3.Apply automatically a discount at checkout without coupon code

We offer a 7-day free trial and so far we got those stats (august 1st to august 11th - today at 1 pm Eastern):

Visits from launch: 393 users & 647 visits

Clicks on the GET APP button on our Shopify page: 112 clicks *

Note: We got some problems for 2 days where users couldn't uninstall and reinstall the app, stuck in a redirection loop/cache, and for 1 day they simply couldn’t download the app because of a bug. That’s why we got a lot of clicks. Oh and yeah, my team and I installed/uninstalled/reinstalled it 22 times.

Installs: 1 install per store is calculated, and we exclude our tests): 67 installs

Sources - Where do the users come from

We got 4 main sources of traffic for now, in this order:
1. Direct - that includes emails sent to roughly 40 store owners, links from the replies on Shopify forums and traffic inside the Shopify app marketplace
2. Shop Pad weekly newsletter (s.sib.im) - this is a mailer service, from what I know we got featured in this list of the new Shopify apps made by the guys at Shop Pad, right here.
3. Facebook (Desktop and mobile)
4. Google - I was impressed to rank pretty high that early in the game. Thanks to Youtube.

Video views (App video app on our Shopify page): 215 views

Current number of installs: 38 installs

Number of user who tested the premium feature (recurring app charge activation): 12

Current number of paid customers: 1 *.

The 7-day free trial is not over yet for more than 80% of the users

Number of rating: 1

Sales: $3.99 USD minus 20% that goes to Shopify

CONCLUSION: PAID app wins

Overall, I think the free/paid strategy for a Shopify is not the most optimal one. In addition to the data above, I would say that the typical Shopify store owner wants: ease of use, simplicity, no configuration needed. So building an app with a free feature and a paid feature means that the app has at least 2 features. And that is in my opinion already a mistake. A lot of people who contacted us in the last 10 days said they liked the simplicity of Automatic Discount. But in my opinion, it could be even simpler, offering only 1 great feature. On another point of view, offering a great support to 100% of users and getting 1–2% paid customers doesn’t make sense at a small scale.

That’s why our next app to be launched this month will be paid, still with a free trial, and will offer one killer feature and an amazing customer support.

Here's a preview of the next app. I just drop it here and don't say more.

What do you guys think?