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Monetization: huge obstacle in hybrid web apps?

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Roman
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Roman asked on 05 May 2014, 10:30 AM
I just want to share our experience with the problem of monetization in web apps built with Kendo UI Mobile. Maybe someone has found a good way to handle this and is willling to share this knowledge here. It's of course a common problem not specifically related to Kendo.

When we decided to do our new app with Kendo UI for Android, iOS and Windows Mobile, we did not expect monetization to be the biggest problem in the process. But in the end, it was (and still is). I think this is a major drawback for hybrid web apps. Unfortunately, we didn't notice until our app was almost done. Now we're sitting on a nice cross-platform app with now suitable and useful way of turning it into money.

We tried the following:

1. Using Cordova plugins (i.e. for Admob)

Result:
Very unreliable (inofficial plugins, not getting updated, don't really work cross-platform). For instance: the most recent one that includes the new Google Play SDK doesn't really work on iOS, especially on the iPad. It also interferes with forms in Kendo UI, we had a lot of user reports on this, especially on older smartphones.

2. Using HTML-/JS-based ads

Result:
99% of them is injecting JS and HTML by using document.write(), which does not work with Kendo UI. The other 1% (like AppNext) offers an JSON-/XML-API which allows very nice integration. Unfortunately due to the nature of this technique they only offer revenue through CPA, which is naturally very very bad. You won't earn much this way.

Right now we have AppNext running with CPA ads, but revenue is a joke compared to AdMob or other CPI/CPC solutions.

If anybody found a different solution, please share it here. We would actually pay for it. ;)

If there's no other solution to this right now, I'm afraid I can not recommend Kendo UI right now if you plan to monetize your app.

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Kaloyan
Telerik team
answered on 08 May 2014, 09:21 AM
Hello Roman,

Thank you for the valuable feedback.

As indeed, this sounds like a no-go scenario, I would suggest you to isolate the Kendo UI issues and file a support request(s) to us or to Kendo Professional team. Then, we will be able to investigate them and provide the best solutions or workarounds.

Further, here is a good forum thread about How to monetize AppBuilder apps (just in case, if you haven't seen it already). And another one particularly for the AdMob plugin and its integration into AppBuilder projects.

I hope any of the above helps.

Regards,
Kaloyan
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Check out the Telerik Platform - the only platform that combines a rich set of UI tools with powerful cloud services to develop web, hybrid and native mobile apps.

 
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Roman
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answered on 08 May 2014, 01:36 PM
Hello Kaloyan,

thanks for your reply and the links. I knew them already from my search for a solution. The first one boils down to the infamous Admob plugin, which is covered in the second as well.

The problem is, this plugin causes major issues with (Kendo) web apps. It interferes with the content sometimes, it has huge display issues on iPad's and causes a permanent very high CPU load on some devices we have tested (even if the app has gone to the background) We have tested this very thoroughly (with and without plugins) and it all points to the Admob plugin. These issues are an absolute no-go for a serious app developer.

That's why we are stuck with no useful monetization option for our Kendo app(s) regarding technical issues and revenue.
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Roman
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answered on 09 May 2014, 06:01 PM
...as a side note: we have tested the behaviour of the Admob plugin with the Telerik sample project (provided by Zdravko in the Admob thread you linked above). It's the very same behaviour like in our app: on several of our test devices the plugin causes high CPU load and drains the battery very fast. If you send the app in the background, the high load persists.

I just wanted to mention this in case someone is thinking about using it or are already using it.

We could always reproduce the issue on:

Nexus 5
HTC One X
Nexus 4 (no high cpu load when in background)
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Kaloyan
Telerik team
answered on 13 May 2014, 12:48 PM
Hello Roman,

Thank you for the constant feedback. It is extremely valuable for our clients and also for us.

Unfortunately, at this stage we are not capable of finding a solution to the AdMob issue. However, we will have it in mind for our future releases and will be keeping an eye on the plugin for possible fixes. If something promising appears, I will contact you immediately in this forum thread.

Until then, the only and last thing I can suggest is to check if this version of the plugin also produces the matter (the high CPU load). I hope the results will be different than the expected.

Regards,
Kaloyan
Telerik
 

Check out the Telerik Platform - the only platform that combines a rich set of UI tools with powerful cloud services to develop web, hybrid and native mobile apps.

 
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