80% of apps are unsuccessful, but Pizza Hut’s made it $1m in sales

With Apple’s App Store now holding over 100,000 apps, one would figure that only a few would enjoy success. 

Only five applications are on half of all iPhones/iPod Touch devices and a staggering 80% of apps never get any sort of popularity.

The 1000th ranked app, which is the top 1%, is installed on “only” 1.76% of iPhones/ iPod touches.  If there are 50 million devices out there, that is almost a million installations so that is still significant.

So, the chances of a brand making a successful, engaging and above all else useful iPhone app is slim. However, there are a number who have got this new form of marketing spot on.

Take for example Pizza Hut’s app. After being live in the App Store for three months it surpassed $1 million in pizza sales and has been downloaded almost one million times.

The app is featured icon in the iTunes Lifestyle Category, and allows customers to order their pizza, pasta and wings from Pizza Hut while on the go.

From an income standpoint, iPhone customers tend to be more affluent, and they’re in the tech-savvy 18-34-year-old demographic skewing slightly male that we tend to go after online, according to Bernard Acoca, senior director of digital marketing at Pizza Hut.

He adds that the fast food chain has always saw a steady level of growth with its mobile business via its WAP site, but it wasn’t the explosive level of growth now seen with the iPhone app.

IPhone applications capture consumers’ imagination in a way that WAP sites simply can’t do. The goal of launching the iPhone application was to provide a convenient way for Pizza Hut customers to order from its franchisee locations (the brand has 34,000 restaurants, delivery-carry out units and kiosks in 100 countries).

As for incentive to download and continue using the app, each time a user orders using the application they get 20 percent off their entire order. The app was also featured in a recent TV campaign for the brand.

Following its huge success with the iPhone, Pizza Hut is now in discussions to expand to other smartphone platforms such as RIM’s BlackBerry, Google’s Android devices and the Palm Pre.

Acoca said that in terms of the mobile side of the business, over the next three to five years, more and more online transactions are going to migrate to smartphone usage.

Rather than consumers simply migrating from calling in or visiting the PC Web site, Pizza Hut believes that the iPhone application is driving sales it may not have closed otherwise.

He said if consumers have taken the time to download an app, they perceive it as valuable, because it’s taking up coveted real estate.

A relatively simple idea and some staggering results considering a mid-level iPhone app can cost just $50,000.