Meet Ankit Srivastava : The person who grossed $45,000 from his Android app
I have decided to post one inspirational interview month. This month, we have Ankit Srivastava whose app La Musique has been downloaded over a million times.
The Interview with Ankit Srivastava
1. Tell a bit about yourself. (Family, friends, etc.)
I was born and brought up in Lucknow. My dad is a civil engineer and my mom is a housewife. My parents say ever since I was born I was always seeking out different ways of making money. Once I even planted coins in the lawn, expecting a “money” tree to grow from it. It never did.Now I am 23, and I graduated last year with a degree in Computer Science. I like traveling and I am into supercars.
2. What Provoked You To Start With Android App Development?
I was in college when I started making the app. I was doing nothing with my life and I was somewhat depressed and bored as well. I had nothing to do and my grades were low as well. Doing a job isn’t my thing and I had made up my mind that whatever I do, the job won’t be one of the things I do. I don’t like the idea of my life being dictated by others.
3. How did you market your app?
I did a lot of things and frankly it won’t be fair to sum it up in a few lines. it needs an article on itself, that’s I wrote an article on my website ,www.iamankitsrivastava.com but just to give you a brief, I posted on facebook, groups, forums I emailed YouTubers to make a review video and I contacted websites to write an article.
4.Did you take help from any other person?
All the things haven’t been done by me. I hired freelancers for the video, the website, the screenshots, icons etc. Initially, I wasn’t good at photoshop but gradually I got decent with photoshop and the current screenshots and icons have all been done by me.
5.. Did You Expect That Your App Will Be Downloaded By 1million+ People?
Yes I did, I had set myself a target of 1 million downloads within one year and I got over 2 million.
6. How much do you earn per month from your android apps and how?
Per month isn’t a good measure in my case since I keep experimenting, but to give you an enough Idea, I made 30 lakh rupees(45,000$) last year from April 2015-April 2016
7. Are you currently working on some projects? If yes, what are they?
I am working on adding the biggest radio station database in the app. And provide the same to other music players as a service. Currently, I and a friend of mine have added 170,000 radio stations in our database which beats the biggest database by a large margin.
8. What do you plan to do in the future (apps, etc.)?
I have no idea actually, travelling is something I like and I keep looking at different ways to make money passively so that I get time for myself, currently I don’t like doing anything. Money without working is a great concept and I am looking at different ways to increase the passive income.
9. Did your college help you in any aspect?
No, not at all, rather there were teachers who tried to demotivate me. You tell your teachers and they think that you are making an excuse and grade you even lower. I was penalised by the teachers and it brought down my grades even further. But the vice chancellor of the college was very understanding, he allowed me to not attend the classes and pursue what I wanted to do. Thus, I was not required to maintain a minimum attendance. And this was exactly what I needed. Shibhan kak sir, if you ever read this, I want to thank you for your understanding and kindness.
10. What do you plan for your career? Will you go for a full-time job?
I have been offered many jobs both abroad and in India from many reputed companies but currently, I chose not to join a job.I might for some other reasons, but it is not my priority.
11. If a kid runs up to you for a piece of advice and you have only 10 seconds to answer that. What would the advice be?
Don’t go to college.
12. What advice would you like to give to a person who has just started to learn android development?
People fail to realize this, but once they know that they can do what they want, things become easier.
Post Script
So, What do you think? Any app ideas?
Related
Originally published at www.crayonpaper.com on June 7, 2016.
