Inside Social Games

AppBank is a new service that lets social network users build apps and make money from them.

With thousands of apps ranging from quizzes and gifting programs, to polls and games, Facebook has become a goliath within the social space. However, even with all the social developers out there, a large portion of those apps come from the users themselves — as seen with the success of companies like LOLapps. To this end, AppBank is looking to provide a free means for those creative individuals to earn a little extra cash, per month, for their hard work using an ad-share model.

Don’t know how to program? Not really a problem because AppBank actually has an app creator for quizzes, gifts, polls, surveys, tests, and games. Furthermore, signing up includes access to guides, tutorial videos, and templates, and claims to be exceedingly simple. The only thing users seem to need to know (beyond basic computer skills such as uploading pictures or YouTube videos) is how to fill out a W9 form for tax purposes.

Financially, this platform doesn’t seem like too bad an idea either, if you find yourself with a little extra time.

With 300 million global Facebook users, one can see just how large an audience one can encompass. Of course, AppBank isn’t foolish enough to claim you can quit your job like some late night infomercial, but rather suggests it more as a supplemental form of income for things like college books or gas money. Nonetheless, the company does state that their current top earners are making around $769 a month.

Though the number is high for your average individual, it is possible for two reasons. First, AppBank’s “crowdsourcing” model matches ads more relevantly to the application being used than your normal Facebook advertisement. Second, AppBank has a very visual dashboard that can track important analytics and user information such as sex, age, and location, allowing for more precise tuning of whom your app is tailored for.

The company is also trying to patent some of the technology it used to create the service.