How to Make iPhone Apps

When the App Store launched in 2008, it was like the Wild West. Everyone was still trying to figure things out it was easy to throw up an app and have it succeed. Now, after three years and many iterations, the app store is now a mature place of business and your app needs to have a unique strategy for it to succeed.

With over half a million Apps in the App store, your app needs to stand out from the crowd to get those downloads it needs. It has to be able to grab the attention of someone browsing around in the store. How can your app achieve that?

One good way is to have a good design, one that is different from all the apps competing for attention. A lot of apps use the default set of controls provided by UIKit. If yours takes that a bit further and puts a different spin on things, it will easily stand head and shoulders above the rest

Roadblocks Stopping You From Getting Good Design

Getting great design doesn’t come easy though. We are developers and I will be the first to admit that design is not my strong point. You may know how to use Photoshop to do the odd banner or text design but when faced with designing a fully blown app, it can take hours of hair pulling and a design that is below par. Writing code is so much easier, isn’t it?

The other option is to hire a designer, but that can be an expensive option. To get a very good designer that knows how to design iPhone Apps, you will have to spend upwards of $1000. It is a risk because you are not sure of getting a return on that investment.

So what other options to do you have?

How To Overcome The Roadblocks and Make Your App Stand Out

I was told about a new website called App Design Vault. The founder, Tope, wrote a useful blog post on how to design a UITableViewCell and pointed me to his site.

You get to download iPhone App design themes which you can directly use or tweak them to suit your apps. Now you can have a jump start to getting the design your app needs.

Look out for a special deal for HowToMakeiPhoneApps readers at the end of this post.

Here is a sample of the designs you can download from App Design Vault.

Foody – Recipe App Design

PhotoPad – iPad Photobook App

PodRadio – Multimedia App Design

Social Boo – Social Networking App design

Here are some of the reasons why you should get your designs from the Vault

Saves You Time

All of the themes come with sample XCode projects that you can run in minutes to see how the designs are done. You can go from download to tweaking your final app in half an hour. Now you can kiss those long hours spent in Photoshop goodbye.

Saves You Money

Previously, you had to spend over $1000 to get a good designer to work on your app. All the themes at App Design Vault cost $70. Now you can try out the themes, design your apps and not worry about having to pay out tons of money up-front.

Helps You Sell More Apps

At the beginning of this post, having a custom design makes your app stand head and shoulders above your competition. Your potential customers will now see you as a professional publisher and not just a hobby coder.

Special Bonus for How To Make iPhone App Readers

Tope has decided to give a special bonus to you. If you buy a theme from the site, you will get a second one as a free bonus.

To get your special deal, click the “Buy Now” button on this page to buy 140 credits for $70 instead of $140. You will be logged into the Vault where you are assigned 140 credits with which you can use to download 2 themes of your choice.

All themes come with a lifetime guarantee, unlike having 30 days to decide if it is right for you. There is no time limit on when you can ask for your money back.