Apple finally approved an update to Numerology Lite. I decided to put back in the in-app purchase just to fix the problems that people have been having with it. Generally sales have been going up, but as before scattered between the two versions.

However, I was able to remove the availability of the in-app purchase on Monday and so far this has resulted in an upswing in the full version of Numerology. Last I saw Numerology, was 191 on the Lifestyle/iPad  paid charts and 132 on the iPhone/Lifestyle grossing chart.

I will continue this experiment for a few more days to see if the trend continues. In the meantime, I’m working on a new version of Numerology Lite that again does not have in-app purchase and doesn’t have the links to the full version and other things that Apple objects too.

I actually think this might be better because it will have better prompting as to why the user should upgrade to the full version. My inspiration comes from the book App Empire by Chad Mureta.

The new completed redone Phone Word is now available in the app store. The UI is completely redone and is now tab based for easy access to your saved phone words, the custom dictionary, and the dial pad for discovering new phone words. Thanks to Seth Taylor for the nice new icon you see to your left.

Update your copy or buy it here.

Awhile back, I added an in-app purchase to Numerology Lite so a user could get the full functionality of Numerology without making a separate trip to the App Store and buying it. At the time Numerology was doing quite well, near the top 100 Lifestyle apps in the U.S. App Store. I was looking for a way to further increase sales and an in-app purchase seemed like a good idea. Lots of successful apps were doing it.

So I put it in. Right away Numerology sales went down and Numerology Lite sales went up. They got to the point where their sales were basically the same, so same sales, no harm done. Or so I thought.

Then my average sales per day started going down. Some days Lite sales would be higher than the full version. Then Lite sales started to go down some days and the full sales would be up. Overall, though, sales were down and this is not what I wanted.

I realized that by dividing sales amongst two apps I had caused the ranking of the full version to go down. As its ranking went down, so did its sales. The lite version ranking wasn’t high enough at the start to be affected, and its ranking didn’t help its sales.

So, I decided to take the in-app purchase out of Numerology Lite. The update has been submitted and hopefully approved soon. This will focus all sales into the full version and I hope bring its ranking back up. I may have to work at it again and use updates, ads, press releases, etc. to help bring it back to its previous sales. I’ve already added features to make it easier for users to send me feedback, give reviews, and share on Twitter as well as Facebook. I’ve added analytics as well to help me track user actions, especially when the tap the button that takes them to the store to buy the full app.

The lesson here is, if you have a full app and a trial or lite app, don’t add an in-app purchase to the lite version thinking it will help. You’ll damage your full version sales and your ranking. However, if you’re starting a new app I think in-app purchase is still something to consider as long as everything is in one app. That app will be free and more people will download it and it will be easier for them to make the purchase to upgrade to the full version.

Look for the new version of Numerology and Numerology Lite to be in the App Store soon.

Landscaper’s Companion 1.2 is now available in the Mac App Store. This update adds more plants and images and general notes. There are now 22,000 plants and 15,000 images and you can now manage notes that are not associated with any specific plant.

Numerology and Numerology Lite upgrades have been approved and both apps now support the new iPad’s retina display.

Numerology has lots of text and with the new iPad’s display all that text looks great and is much sharper and easier to read.

I have re-released Packrat Lite to the Mac App store so you can try Packrat out before you buy it. Packrat and Packrat Lite have also been updated to work with Growl 3.0 which is now an app in the Mac App Store.

Landscaper’s Companion 1.1 is now available in the Mac App Store. This version adds a major update to the plant database and now we have:

• over 20,000 plants
• over 14,000 images
• hundreds of updates to the existing plant descriptions.

A new update to Landscaper’s Companion is now available in the Mac App Store. This update fixes some bugs that may have caused crashes for you and adds deer resistance and bloom times to the plant details and searches.

Evernote 1.0.5 is now available in the Mac App Store.

With:

• Better error messages
• Fixed some issues with importing note titles and page titles

If you’ve had some import issues in the past, there is a good chance they have been fixed.

Numerology Lite 1.9.7 has been approved by Apple and is now in the App Store. This version adds In-App purchase so you can upgrade to the full version right in the app. It’s a much better experience for the user and takes just a few seconds to experience the full benefits of Numerology such as unlimited profiles, compatibility reports, more interpretations, and forecasts for any date.