Reducing the price of an iPhone app pushes up downloads by an average of 1,665 per cent after five days, according to a Distimo report. On iPad, the effect is less pronounced, with a growth of 871 per cent.

More significantly, dropping the price increases downloads enough to have a positive effect on revenue – an increase of 95 per cent for iPhone, and 51 per cent on iPad, after three days. After seven days, that rises to 159 per cent and 71 per cent respectively.

According to the report, which covers Top 400 apps in the 10 largest markets, the most common price change is between $1-2 (42 per cent on iPhone, 33 per cent on iPad). In 76 per cent of cases on iPhone – and 67 per cent on iPad – the price changes by less than $3.

However, as you might expect, download volumes drop once the price goes back to normal – by 46 per cent on iPhone, and 57 per cent on iPhone, aggregated over five days.  However, its worth noting that this drop doesnt entirely cancel out – by our calculations, that leaves downloads around four times higher than the initial volumes on iPad, and eight times higher on iPhone.