The App Factor started this past summer as a side project between myself and my business partner, Thierry Lyles. In only 5 short months we now have 6 paid contributors across four different countries. We also launched The App Factor Podcast in November, which is hosted by myself, our own Brian Sutich, and Justin Seeley of Lynda.com.
The App Factor has grown more than I ever could have imagined in such a short span of time. Our main objective is to create amazing content that we think people will want to read, whether that’s help and how to’s or recommending the apps and accessories we love.
From the very beginning we wanted The App Factor to serve two main purposes:
- To help readers discover amazing apps and relevant products, from a source they can trust
- To help developers share their apps in more meaningful ways
Above anything, we want our readers to trust us. We will never accept paid app reviews, or market products we don’t like just for advertising dollars. That’s just not who we are, or who we want to be.
Monetizing The App Factor is something Thierry and I take very seriously, and something we’ve thought long and hard about.
Some of you may have noticed that over the weekend a few ads went up in the header and side bars of the site. These are native ads, made by the developers behind the apps we love.
You’ll also see ads for Amazon products mixed in. Any Amazon ads you see are not random. They are all hand-picked and created by the staff here at The App Factor. If you see an Amazon ad for a product, one of us on staff is using and loving that product.
Before we get into how we want to monetize The App Factor, I want to start by saying that our goals and attitude towards the readability of the site have not changed.
Here are a few things we aren’t, and will never do on The App Factor:
- You will never see an ad interrupt what you’re reading
- You won’t ever see an ad that isn’t relevant to this site, that means no men’s boxer short ads or banners for new cars
How you can support us long term
If you see an app you like recommended on our site, or a product you’re interested in, use the links in our articles (or in our native ads) to buy them. A percentage of each item you buy or app you download goes directly to us, and it’s how we’re choosing to not only support The App Factor, but to help further support the developers and products we love.
Alternately, if you really love the content we provide and you want to see more of it, we’ve opened a Patreon account as well:
We currently have a very limited budget for contributors. Any support we get on Patreon will go towards site overhead and letting our contributors write more content, more frequently.
2015 was a great (half) year for us and we think 2016 will be even better, thanks to all of you.
As always, we encourage you guys to reach out to us. If you have any questions, feedback, concerns, or suggestions, feel free to email me directly at ally@theappfactor.com.
