How to know if my app downloads are real or spam?

I think push vs in-app are two different things, like email and telephone call. Push reaches people who are not using your app, but require OS-level permission. In-app gives you much more flexibility but they only reach people who are using your app (obviously!). As to whether in-house or external SDK is best, it depends what you are trying to do and whether an external system handles it. For a typical retail environment the SDKs might be easiest--it's a well-established use-case. For something needing a more customized algorithm, an in-house system might work as well as an external SDK (for less money). There are simple options to save you from starting completely from scratch, from PHP toolkits to Amazon SNS. It depends on what (if any) server environment you have... Hope that helps!

You've received good advice. I'd just add one thing. We recently interviewed dozens of developers. After narrowing it down to a handful of individuals that had personalities and resumes we liked, we paid a developer friend of ours a few hundred bucks to interview the developers and thoroughly vet them from a technical standpoint. It was well worth the money to have someone more technically skilled than us contribute to our due diligence on the candidates.

As the host of 'The App Guy Podcast', I can introduce you to a few good developers ranging from inexpensive locations to $100 per hour top rates. As a quick guess, this type of app will start from $900 using a cross platform solution (Like Titanium Studio) to $5000 for Objective-C apps written on xCode Let me know if you want an introduction by contacting me through my website or podcast Paul Kemp - The App Guy Podcast http://TheAppGuy.co/

Tehcnically speaking the only qualification is the type of development you need. However, if you referring to guideline son how to find and assess good outsourcing partners, you should keep in mind: - speed/quality of communication - previous work - payment/delivery terms satisfy your needs More details can be found here: http://giacomoballi.com/how-to-hire-a-freelancer/

You can't offer trials or even easily make refunds accessible via in-app purchases. What you can do is actually make manual deposits or write checks back to the users who ask for it. But the purchase behavior associated with in-app purchases really shouldn't require any promise of a refund. In fact, doing so might make people *less* likely to purchase being that you're telegraphing a weak offering. Happy to talk through alternate ways of testing pricing and willingness to pay in a call.