App Store Optimization for iOS Live

© Business of Apps 2014 | Soko Media Ltd.
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APP STORE OPTIMIZATION ON iOS LIVE
WEBINAR

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Webinar Aims
• To introduce you to App Store Optimization and to provide a framework
for understanding how it works and why it matters in the mobile
marketing mix.
• To give you practical and easy to understand advice about how to
improve your ASO performance.
• To gather feedback from the audience about areas of concern or
interest, answering questions in the webinar where possible and on the
site in general.
App Store Optimization Live

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About your host
• George is Chief Content Officer at
The Business of Apps.
• George worked as Head of Editorial
Content for MagicSolver.com for two
years, helping the company launch
dozens of apps on a global stage.
• He also works as Events Editor for
Pocket Gamer Biz and runs his own
mobile focused blog at
mobilemavericks.eu.
Twitter:
@GeorgeOsborn

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Understanding ASO1

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App Store Optimization (ASO) definitions
“App Store Optimization, or ASO for short, is the art of altering your app
store title and its keywords to gain a higher ranking in search results on
the App Store.”
Dan Counsell, award winning iOS developer who created Clear
“App Store Optimization means everything that helps your app being more
visible in app stores.”
Johannes Borchadt, inventor of the term ASO in 2009
“A fair amount has been written about search optimization for the App
Store – that is, the practice of getting your app to rank higher for certain
search terms when someone is browsing the app store.”
Meaghan Fitzgerald, CMO at 23 Snaps

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ASO covers two main areas
Metadata and external factors
determined by the App Store that
drive the search engine.
• On Page Factors – keywords,
app name and other relevant
metadata.
• Off Page Factors – download
numbers, user ratings etc
These factors drive search to
your app.
Algorithm Factors
Marketing assets that are uploaded
with the app to help sell it to
consumers.
• App Description – editorial to sell
the app.
• Screenshots and Icons – images
to draw users in.
• Videos – coming soon to iOS 8.
These factors convert views into
installs for your app
Conversion Assets

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How Does ASO Directly Help You?
It brings you a higher quality of user
It brings free downloads in good numbers to your title
It increases the visibility of your app in the store1
2
3

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Discovery driven by curation, charts and
then search – first two hard to break into
Curation Driven UA Driven

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Search harder to make impact in due to
small screen and “swipe to discover”
2195 results for
“messaging apps”
992 results for
“hotel booking”

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ASO Increases Downloads
A case study from MobileDev HQ
saw a game developer increase
downloads nine fold simply by
changing their keywords and app
name.
Source: MobileDevHq

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ASO brings in engaged users with a similar
quality level to purchased users.
Source: Localytics

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On Page Factors2

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On Page Factors In Action
App Name
Developer
Name
App Icon
Screenshots
(between one
and five)
Description
(more below
the line)

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On Page Factors In Action
App Price
Category
In App
Purchase
Names
Keywords
aren’t visible to
users

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On Page algorithm factors
Factor Description Importance
App Name The name of the app listed on the store e.g.
“Angry Birds”
Keywords 100 characters worth of keywords to drive the
search engine e.g. “feather, physics, puzzle”
Category The category of app that you believe your app
fits into e.g. “Games”, “Lifestyle”
Developer Name The name of your studio e.g. “Rovio”
In App Purchase
Names
The names that are given to any in app
purchases you provide in app e.g. “megabucks”
or “remove ads”

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Key principles for strong keywords
Keywords cannot move your position in search ranking
App Store engine driven by phrases, not semantics
Main value is in the long tail, not in competitive terms
1
2
3

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Keyword theory in practice
Example: Match Three Game
A company are making a wizard themed Match Three game and are looking to distinguish
their title from the crowd. On store research produces the following results:
“Puzzle Game” = 2191 hits “Match 3” = 2188 hits “Match 3 Magic” = 82 hits

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Top Tips for Keyword Research
Use your common sense before you research
Research with a keyword tool or keyword planner
Search social media to look at the consumer language
Use your imagination to increase your options
1
2
3
4

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Case Study: Photography App
App Mission Statement
A new photography app is launching
and wants to reach as broad an
audience as possible. This is their first
app and they want to make it as
successful as possible.
Step 1: Brainstorm Ideas
• Look at the main aim of the app
and consider what kind of
instant reactions you have to
the subject matter.
• For our case study, terms like
photography, photo, camera,
filter, lens will be the kind of
terms that associate obviously.
• It is very simple to do this for
any other app and it is a good
first step to getting your
keywords sorted.

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Using Keyword Planner
Step 2: Research Terms
• Familiar to many who use Ad
Words/SEO research, it allows
you to enter terms and
discover related phrases.
• To make it more effective, you
can add qualifications to your
search (category, negative
keywords etc) to help out.
• Can also use specialist
keyword tools to identify
keywords used by rivals or that
are good for your app.

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Look for good words to pick out
Following Words Produced from research included ‘Popular’, ‘Editing’
‘Panoramic’, ‘Image’, ‘Suite’ and ‘Gallery’.

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Social media as inspiration
• While it can be hard to know what to
look for, Social Media is another good
place for trying to find search phrases.
• For our photography app, one phrase
has been dominating since the Oscars
in particular – ‘selfie’.
• Twitter and Facebook are the main
places to search, other sites depend on
their fit with app theme (Pinterest good
for creatives)
Social Media Research

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Keyword research shortlist
Time to select the terms for your app name and keyword fields
Keyword Research Results
Common Sense Keyword Planner & Social
Media
Imagination
Photo, Filter, Lens,
Camera, Photography,
Snap, Shoot, Picture,
Portrait, Landscape
Image, Editing, Studio,
Gallery, Tool, Suite, Popular,
Panoramic
Selfie, Groupie
Lomography, SLR, Touching
Up, ‘Photo Shopping’

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App Name vs Keywords
Field Pros Cons
App Name • 10.3% increase on keyword
visibility in app name field.
• Helps explain app to passing
users.
• Too many words in an app name
is against the rules.
• Overly long names truncate on
store.
Keyword Field • Greater flexibility to pick
keywords.
• Good way to build combinations
with app name keywords.
• Only 100 characters to play with.
• Less impact on each individual
keyword.
Now you’ve got keywords to feature, have to work out whether to put them into
the App Name or into Keywords – each has pros and cons.

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The final result: Keywords allocated
App Name: Photo Editor: Your All
In One Photography Companion
Keywords: Filter, Image, Gallery,
Studio, Editing, Tool, Selfie,
Picture, Camera, Portrait,
Landscape, Quality (100
characters)
Combinations: Photo Editor,
Photo Filter, Photography Tool,
Photo Editing, Picture Editing,
Portait Photo, Photo Tool, Editing
Tool
Lots of permutations to explore

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Examples of keyword tools
Service Their Pitch Website
“MobileDevHQ is the leading enterprise
organic app marketing platform.”
https://www.mobiled
evhq.com
“Perform App Store SEO, track your
competitors, check out popular keywords,
dispense your apps' promo codes effectively.”
www.appcodes.com
“App Marketing made simple.
Market Intelligence that apps can't live
without.”
https://sensortower.
com
“App getting lost in the crowd? We’ll help you
to stand out”
http://app-
promo.com

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Choosing categories: Weather App
A weather app is being released
and the developers need to
choose a category. After filtering
the categories, they discover the
following categories and their
market share.
Weather - 0.38%
Utilities - 5.36%
Reference - 2.75%
News - 2.54%
After thinking about the context in
which most people discover
weather forecasts (from News),
they choose these categories:
Primary = Weather
Secondary = News

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Off Page Factors3

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Off Page factors explained
Factor Description Apple’s Aim Problems they
cause you
Engagement The number of opens and
re-opens an app gains
during its lifetime
Show user
engagement with an
app
A user decides
whether they are
engaged or not,
even if you use
push notifications
Download
Numbers
The number of downloads
an app has generated
during its lifetime and over
a period of time (download
velocity)
Demonstrable historic
value as well as
current popularity.
Competition with
UA heavyweights
User Reviews The score that users have
given to your app.
A quality control
measure.
Users often use
reviews to vent,
rather than critique

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There are three ways you can improve
your Off Page ASO performance
Integrate social media to drive virality and engagement
Purchase quality users to boost your downloads
Use rate and review pop ups to boost your reviews
1
2
3

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Three reasons to integrate social media
deeply within an app
It can help to aid word of
mouth discovery and
virality
It can increase an app’s
functionality
It can help engage users
for longer

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UA techniques: good and bad
• Gaining organic users through
search optimization.
• Using word of mouth and social
media integration to generate
natural interest.
• Purchasing advertising within
reputable ad exchanges,
networks and websites
(Facebook).
• Cross promotion with
developers and brands.
White Hat
• Using bot farms to buy fake
installs.
• Purchasing large quantities of
incentivized users for the
purpose of bursting up the
charts.
• Using platforms banned by Apple
within their store (App Discovery
etc).
• Failing to return investment – not
black hat but important all the
same!
Black Hat
✔
✔
✔
✔
✕
✕
✕
✕

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Improve Reviews: Make a great app
Difficult to define precisely what a quality app is, but you can usually identify quality
when you see it…

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Make a great review pop up
A good pop up or rate and review form can alert you to criticism AND help you to
get a higher proportion of good reviews for your app.
Are you enjoying using
the app?
Please leave us a nice
review
We’re sorry to hear that –
please leave us feedback
Feedback emailLeave Review
“Yes, I am
enjoying it”
“No, I’m not
enjoying it”

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Conversion Assets4

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How conversion assets work
App Store
Assets filter
users through
to download or
away from the
app
Traffic from search,
social media, UA etc
goes into the funnel
Installs the app
Doesn’t Install

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Conversion assets identified
App Icon
Screenshots
(between one
and five)
Description
(more below
the line)

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Key conversion asset rules
First impressions matter
Design conventions change regularly
Brevity is the soul of success on the App Store
1
2
3

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App Icons: Your icon, in context

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Bringing character to your icon
Examples
• Character and characters
create recognition for your app.
• When combined with broader
branding around the
company/app, they can
instantly sell strengths.
• Icons can only communicate
small amounts of information;
character design circumvents
that.
• Character creates a mental
shortcut for users.
Why character matters

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Other best practice for icons
Best practice ✔ ✗
Follow the main design
trends
Avoid text on the icon
Keep things simple,
understandable and clear of
clutter

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Screenshots: Your best foot forward
Example- Duolingo
• Screenshots are the dominant visual
conversion asset for search results.
• Each of the potential five screenshots
needs to be as good as possible to
capitalize on this.
• First screenshot in particular needs to
captures attention and sell the benefits
of the app.
• Duolingo – ‘Learn a language for free.
Forever.’ – very strong.
Make Screenshots Matter

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Show off your strengths
Example - Bump
Top Tips
• List your main app
features to find
strengths.
• Work out way to
visually communicate
them.
• Bump a great
example of using
screenshots to show
strength.

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Create an informative narrative
Example – Swiftkey Note

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Top tips for App Store Descriptions
Keep a
friendly tone
Inform
Master the
first line

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That’s all for now
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