ASO GUIDE 2020

ASO GUIDE 2020

INDEX

Introduction to the ASO Guide 2020

2019 ASO news

ASO On and Off-Metadata factors on the App Storeand Google Play

ASO On-Metadata factors

Google Play and App Store long description

ASO & Keywords

Traffic resources

4

Visual Assets for Google Play Store and Apple App Store

Ratings & Reviews

Conversion Rate

ASO and User Adquisition (UA) campaigns

Android vitals

Visibilty through SEO

Seasonal ASO

ASO checklist

48

57

64

68

76

82

88

92

12

20

25

32

35

44

INTRODUCTION TO THEASO GUIDE 2020

14

IN 2019, USERSDOWNLOADED 204 BILLIONAPPS WORLDWIDE

The worldwide number of app downloads in 2019 was of 240 billion

(204,000,000,000), meaning a 45% increase in the 3 last years and a 6% one

in the 2 last ones, excluding re-installs and apps updates (data taken from

App Annie’s report State of Mobile 2020).

Most of these downloads are coming from emerging markets such as India,

Brazil, and Indonesia.

App downloads from users from more developed markets such as USA,

Japan, and South Korea have diminished, but users are still looking for new

apps. In 2019, 12,3 billions downloads were reached in the US, 2,5 billions in

Japan and 2 billions in South Korea.

120B

100B

80B

60B

40B

2016 2017 2018 2019

20B

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240B

200B

160B

120B

80B

40B

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Data: State of Mobile 2020 by App Annie

GROWTH FROM 2016 TO 2019

45%Worldwide

80%China

190%India

5%United States

40%Brazil

70%Indonesia

5

As for the main stores, in 2019’s last quarter, App Store

had more than 1,5 million apps available while Google

Play reached a total of 2,5 million apps in its store,

according to Statista. With this data, your app is right in

the middle of a fierce competition to get to be

discovered by users. How to make an app visible?2.570.000

Google Play Store Apple App Store Windows Store Amazon Appstore

1.840.000

669.000489.000

NU

MB

ER O

F A

PP

S

3.000.000

2.500.000

2.000.000

1.500.000

1.000.000

500.000

0

Image: Number of apps available in leading app stores as of 4th quarter 2019 Statista

IN 2019, USERS DOWNLOADED 204 BILLION APPS WORLDWIDE

WHAT IS ASO?

ASO stands for App Store Optmization and this is the

optimization process of an app (the listing as well as the

product) with 2 main goals: increase visibility in Search

and in Browse / Explore in the app stores, and improve

Conversion Rate to visit and to download.

In PICKASO, we believe ASO is the base of any App

Marketing Strategy as, as well as helping to get more free

organic downloads, it has a direct impact on user

acquisition costs and, in the end, on business.

6

APP DISCOVERY:SEARCH & KEYWORDSTRENDS

As we’ve just seen, App Store Optimization (ASO)’s main

objective is to improve visibility in the stores and the

organic downloads volume. However, how do users

discover new apps?

65% of App Store installs are generated by concrete

keywords search (generic or long-tail, as well as

branded with which users demonstrate direct

intention).

A study from ASO Stack reveals that on the App Store, 86%

of the top 100 most searched keywords are branded, and

that non-branded keywords within this top 100 are linked

to mobile games or apps from the categories: “games”,

“vpn”, “free games”, “photo editor”, “music”, “calculator”,

“weather”, among others. This means that users tend to

search for concrete brands that they have known

previously through other channels.

7

HOW MANYSEARCH KEYWORDSARE BRANDED?

100%

92% 90%86%

80.5%

68.33%

60.75%58.4%

Top 10 Top 25 Top 50 Top 100 Top 200 Top 300 Top 400 Top 500

BR

AN

D P

ERC

ENTA

GE

100%

90%

80%

70%

60%

50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

0

An experiment realized by Sebastian Knopp, Growth and

Product Strategist at appkeywords.net identified that on

the App Store, suggested keywords in the autocomplete

section in Search are also dominated by brands. The study

shows that within the 260 suggested keywords, only 13 of

them (5%) aren’t branded.

Another data that needs to be highlighted is that 12% of

Daily Active Users (DAU) are looking for apps on a daily

basis, and that 50% of them are looking for apps on a

weekly basis. Within a month, Google processes a total of 6

million unique sentences in search on Google Play Store.

Short and mid-tail keywords are still dominated by brands,

together with very competitive generic keywords. However,

ASO tools can help you to look for keywords for your

project, such as TheTool who also enables you to see

installs per keywords on Google Play Store. By expanding

8

HOW MANY SEARCH KEYWORDS ARE BRANDED?

the total number of keywords you are working within the

On-Metadata fields of your listing, you are expanding the ways

your app can rank in the stores as well as how users can

discover your app and download it.

Voice search on App Store and Google Play are increasing

exponentially and are becoming a new variable that you need

to take into account for the ASO optimization of the listing of

every app. The more natural & semantic the language in the

listing, the better the stores will understand the topic of the app

or mobile game.

The appearance of voice assistants, such as Cortana, Siri, Alexa

or Google Home, made that users’ behavior is changing. These

assistants are offering apps in their web search as a result, apps

which are located on Google Play or on the App Store, and they

are even reaching concrete categories in the stores. For

these reasons, app marketers now face a new challenge:

make the most of voice search.

To learn more about how this tendency is affecting your

app’s visibility and ranking in the stores, we recommend you

to read this post from PICKASO where we explain how to

optimize your ASO strategy to be able to adapt to voice

search.

VOICE SEARCH ON APP STORE AND GOOGLE PLAY

9

HOW MANY SEARCH KEYWORDS ARE BRANDED?

MOST DOWNLOADED CATEGORIES ON APP STORE AND GOOGLE PLAY

Downloads Customers' expenses

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Rank Category

Games

Tools

Entertainment

Communications

Photography

Social

Music & Audio

Video Players & Editors

Productivity

Shopping

-

-

-

-

-

-

1

3

-2

-1

Rank changevs. 2017

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Rank Category

Games

Social

Entertainment

Lifestyle

Music & Audio

Productivity

Communications

Health & Fitness

Dating

Education

-

-

-

1

2

-

-3

1

1

-2

Rank changevs. 2017

Downloads Customers' expenses

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Rank Category

Games

Photo & Video

Entertainment

Utilities

Social Networking

Shopping

Lifestyle

Finance

Productivity

Education

-

1

-1

-

-

-

1

-1

2

-

Rank changevs. 2017

1

2

3

4

5

6

7

8

9

10

Rank Category

Games

Entertainment

Social Networking

Music

Photo & Video

Lifestyle

Health & Fitness

Productivity

Books

Education

-

-

-

-

2

-1

1

2

-3

-1

Rank changevs. 2017

Source of the 2 graphs: The State of Mobile 2019, App Annie

10

HOW MANY SEARCH KEYWORDS ARE BRANDED?

All this data is showing us how important it is to work on a

well-defined App Store Optimization (ASO) strategy for your

mobile app or game, different and adapted to each store, with

the objective of increasing visibility (in Search and in Browse /

Explore) and Conversion Rate to download.

11

2019 ASO NEWS

212

2019 ASO NEWS

A few months ago Google announced you can add 'tags' to your list of applications depending on the category selected, because they vary for games.

The categories and tags will help users to find new applications on Google Play, as well as their ranking.

NEWS DESCRIPTION APP STORE GOOGLE PLAY

Tags

Since mid-2019, it is possible to create up to 5 custom app listings in Google Play Store, which can be shared for more than one country.

Each country has its own habits, ways of speaking... So it is important to adapt the texts and visual elements to each of them.

Custom app listings

13

Since August 2019, a new way of calculating the average rating of Google Play apps has been implemented. Now, recent valuations are granted more importance while the oldest ones have less impact (still, it does not mean that they do not matter).

Therefore, it is very important to constantly analyze the ratings and reviews that our app receives, and always answer them.

NEWS DESCRIPTION APP STORE GOOGLE PLAY

New average rating calculation

The 160 characters (30 in the App Name, 30 in the Subtitle and 100 in the Keywords Field) that are available in the App Store to optimize an app listing with keywords usually fall short.

Since 2019, the keywords used in app listings in other languages are ranking for the main language. However, not all languages are ranking in the one for which we want to improve the positioning of our app. Have a look at this article to know which language are ranking for which locale.

Therefore, for Spain, Spanish (Spain), English (United Kingdom) and Catalan can be used, which means that you would have up to 480 characters available to optimize your app.

Interactions between app listing elements of different languages

2019 ASO NEWS

14

Since September 2019, promotional videos play automatically in the stores listings of Google Play Store.

It is also the case for some brand search results for some specific brands (not all of them).

APP STORE GOOGLE PLAY

Google Play autoplay

2019 ASO NEWS

NEWS DESCRIPTION

15

ASO TRENDS AND NEWS 2020

In App Store and Google Play, more and more apps and highlights are shown to users in a personalized way, leaving behind a unique interface in which they showed all users the same recommendations when browsing the stores.

This customization depends on the user’s searches and activity, as well as the apps / games he has installed on his device.

APP STORE GOOGLE PLAY

Content customization

Like for iOS apps, Google is working on a native prompt to request ratings and reviews directly from the app without having to go to the store. Everything indicates that by the middle of this year 2020, it will be available for Android developers.

Native prompt for ratings

NEWS DESCRIPTION

16

Google made it clear recently that a high error rate significantly reduces Browse / Explore visibility in Google Play Store. In addition, it also impacts the project’s keyword rankings since after a decrease of the error rate, you can see an increase in keyword rankings.

So avoiding errors / blocks / crashes in apps have a direct correlation with the possibility of being recommended / featured on Google Play Store.

APP STORE GOOGLE PLAY

Avoid errors and blocks to get more visibility

It is not only very important to have a strategy on when to request user reviews, you also have to define and apply a strategy to answer to these reviews.

Answering all the reviews (especially the most recent ones) will give you a better image near the users, in addition to improving feedbacks and your engagement with them, causing them to occasionally re-enter the store to improve the rating they left in their previous assessment.

This is especially important in the Google Play Store as, since the end of 2019’s summer, the most recent ratings have the more impact.

Ratings & Reviews strategy

ASO TRENDS AND NEWS 2020

NEWS DESCRIPTION

17

The trend in dark mode use in mobiles is constantly growing, so app listings screenshots need to be adapted both in App Store and in Google Play so that they keep on being properly visible both on “dark mode” and on “clear mode".

APP STORE GOOGLE PLAY

Dark Mode

Currently, 70% of users with mobile devices use voice searches. But everything indicates that in 2020, 50% of the searches will be made through voice searches.

Voice searches

Increase in Explore / Browse traffic: Top Charts, Featured, Similar Apps, recommended apps...

More Explore / Browse traffic

ASO TRENDS AND NEWS 2020

NEWS DESCRIPTION

18

Two new categories were added (“Developer tools” and “Graphics & Design”)

APP STORE GOOGLE PLAY

New categories

ASO TRENDS AND NEWS 2020

NEWS DESCRIPTION

19

ASO ON AND OFF-METADATAFACTORS ON THE

APP STORE AND GOOGLE PLAY

320

ASO ON ANDOFF-METADATA FACTORSON THE APP STOREAND GOOGLE PLAY

The ASO factors are the elements of the apps that have a direct

impact on the ASO strategy, both in visibility (Search and

Browse / Explore) and in Conversion Rate (to visit and to

download).

DEFINITION

These factors are the elements that can be edited / modi-

fied by developers or marketers directly from App Store

Connect and Google Play Console.

ASO ON-METADATA FACTORS

They ASO Off-Metadata factors that we cannot be controled

directly from developers, although you can have some

influence on them. They almost entirely depend on the

available marketing budget, the market response to your

product and the marketers' expertise.

ASO OFF-METADATA FACTORS

21

ASO ON Y OFF-METADATA FACTORS ON THE APP STORE AND GOOGLE PLAY

App Name: 30 characters

Title: 50 characters

Subtitle: 30 characters

Short description: 80 characters

Keywords Field: 100 characters

Promotional Text: 170 characters

Long Description: 4.000 characters

Description: 4.000 characters

Category

Developer name

Icon

Screenshots

Feature graphic

Video Preview

URL, Package Name or Market ID

In-App Purchase

Android Vitals

Downloads volume

Downloads speed

Ratings volume

Average Rating

Ratings

Reviews

Backlinks

User Engagement

ON

-MET

AD

ATA

FA

CTO

RS

OFF

-MET

AD

ATA

FA

CTO

RS

22

VISIBLE ASO FACTORS INTHE STORE LISTING

FEATUREDIMAGE

APP NAME

TITLE

DEVELOPER

ICON

VIDEO PREVIEW

ICON

TOPCHARTS

SUBTITLE

SCREENSHOTS

DOWNLOADS

TOP CHARTS

LONGDESCRIPTION

AVERAGE RATING

RECOMMENDED AGE

23

� �� 4,3

DEVELOPER

PROMOTIONAL TEXT / WHAT`S NEW

SHORT DESCRIPTION

DESCRIPTION

RATINGS

REVIEWS

VISIBLE ASO FACTORS IN THE STORE LISTING

24

ASO ON-METADATAFACTORS

425

ASO ON-METADATAFACTORS ONGOOGLE PLAY STORE

In an Android app on Google Play, the Title is one of the ASO On-Metadata

factors that has the most impact. It is important that this field contains the

main keywords of the project, together with the app name or the brand.

There are 50 characters available in this field.

It is the second most important and

impactful field within Google Play’s

product page. It can be filled with up

to 80 characters. It mainly affects ASO

search and conversion.TITLE

SHORT DESCRIPTION

/50

/80

26

ASO ON-METADATA FACTORS ON GOOGLE PLAY STORE

This is the largest On-Metadata field of a

Google Play app, with a total of 4.000

characters available, and it has a direct

impact on ASO visibility both in Search and in

Explore. It is important that the text looks

natural and that its content does not only

include keywords for which you which to rank

but also synonyms, antonyms and related

words to enrich semantic. This way, Google

Play will be able to identify what the app is

about. Nowadays, over-optimization (the

excessive repetition of keywords) is,

according to us, counterproductive.

Long Description has a direct impact on ASO

Search, but not that much on Conversion

Rate as, according to some studies, less than

2% of the users that visit an app listing unfold

the Long Description to read its full content.

LONG DESCRIPTION

/4.000

27

The app Category in Google Play is a factor that does not directly impact ASO in Search, but

that does Explore. Google Play uses this field, among other things, to know what an app is

about and this has an impact on Similar & Recommended Apps. It is possible to experiment

with the Category to discover which brings out the best benefits in terms of visibility, traffic

and Browse organic downloads.

CATEGORY

In Google Play’s case, developers can edit and customize the Developer Name that appears

publically on the listings. With a 50 characters limit, it is recommended to use keywords there

to improve their ranking. Also, the use of emojis is allowed to help increase Conversion Rate to

download. It is possible to change the Developer Name (that need to be approved by Google)

so you can try and test it to see what are the impacts of these changes.

DEVELOPER NAME

ASO ON-METADATA FACTORS ON GOOGLE PLAY STORE

28

ASO ON-METADATA FACTORS ONAPPLE APP STORE

The Subtitle, that can include up to 30 characters and was introduced together with the launch

of iOS 11, is the second most important field of ASO for Apple App Store.

It and its main role is to briefly describe the app. It is important that is includes keywords and,

besides having a direct impact on Search ASO, it also does on Conversion Rate to download.

SUBTITLE

The App Name is the most important and impactful On-Metadata field on the App Store. This

field needs to contain the most important keywords of the project, together with the name of

the app or of the brand. 30 characters are available in this field.

APP NAME

30

30

29

Apple App Store’s Description does not impact Search ASO as Apple does not take into account

what appears in this field. However, it does have an impact on Conversion Rate to download,

and most of all the first lines. The most important things from the app needs to be featured

there, such as awards, and you should use a CTA (call to action) there to invite users to down-

loads the app. Up to 4.000 characters can be written in this field.

DESCRIPTION

The Keywords field of a mobile app or game on the Apple App Store needs to include keywords,

as its name indicates. It has a maximum length of 100 characters and should not contain

keywords that were already used in the App Name or in the Subtitle. It is important not to use

spaces between the keywords, but only comas “,”. For example:

“keyword1,keyword2,keyword3…”

KEYWORDS FIELD

100

4.000

NOT VISIBLETO THE USER

ASO ON-METADATA FACTORS ON APPLE APP STORE

30

The Promotional text, limited to 170 characters, was introduced together with the launch of

iOS 11 and does not have any direct impact on Search visibility. This means that the

keywords used in this field will not help the app rank. However, it does have a direct impact

on Conversion Rate to download. For this reason, you need to use this field as a marketing

tool (with CTA, offers, news, etc.) to convince users to downloads the app. Contrary to other

fields of the App Store Connect, the Promotional text can be edited anytime, without

needing to release an update of the product.

Just like on the Google Play Store, the app Category is a factor that does not directly impact

Search ASO on the Apple App Store. However, it does have an impact on Browse visibility.

App Store Connect enables developers to choose 2 categories for apps (Primary and

Secondary) and 2 categories and up to 4 subcategories for mobile games.

CATEGORY

PROMOTIONAL TEXT

ASO ON-METADATA FACTORS ON APPLE APP STORE

31

GOOGLE PLAY AND APP STORELONG DESCRIPTION

532

GOOGLE PLAYLONG DESCRIPTION

As commented earlier, and unlike what happens on the Apple

App Store, the content of the field has a direct impact on Search

ASO on Google Play Store. As a result, the Long Description

needs to include keywords all along its content.

This Long Description on Google Play Store offers great freedom

to write, create a visual structure and use different elements

such as emojis, colors & HTML tags (H1, H2, H3, B, I). This will

enable you to give more ASO weight to some keywords as well

as make its content stand out for users to unfold the Long

Description to read it.

Nowadays, it is not recommended to proceed to keywords

over-optimization, i.e. to excessively repeat keywords we want

to rank. This technique did work a few years

ago, but this is not the case anymore. Google

Play Store is evolving with time and thanks to

artificial intelligence advanced techniques and

NLP (Natural Language Processing), Google

Play Store “understands” the topic of an app,

which means that the more natural the content

and the more synonyms, antonyms and related

terms, the best.

This field can be edited without needing to

send an update in Google Play Console and is

limited to 4.000 characters. Also, thanks to

Google Play Store Experiments, it is possible to

carry out A / B tests.

33

APP STOREDESCRIPTION

Apple App Store’s Description does not allow neither emojis nor HTML tags use.

However, some visual elements can be used to help organizing the content better

and thus, help its reading: , - , · , > , < , * , • .

Unlike what happens with Google Play Store’s Long Description, Apple App Store’s

Description field can only be edited when submitting an update of the app and, in

case you use visual elements that are not allowed, the update won’t be accepted.

34

ASO & KEYWORDS

635

ASO &KEYWORDS

According to Apple, 65% of the downloads on the Apple App

Store are generated by searches, and on the Google Play Store

this is very similar. For this reason, the app listing needs to be

optimized to appear in the best rankings possible for the

keywords defined for the project.

Keywords optimization in App Store Optimization is a process

that should be continuous:

Create a list of all the possible keywords and combinations of

keywords related to the project. To do so, you need to run a

market and competition research.

INVESTIGATESTEP 1

Analyze and prioritize keywords according to their

relevance, level of competition and search volume / traffic.

For new apps, it is recommended to work with high-traffic

and low-difficulty keywords.

PRIORITIZE

Optimization of the listing with the selected keywords. The

optimization depends on the store for which you will work on

ASO.

OPTIMIZE

Search rankings monitoring and analysis of improvement

possibilities.

MONITOR / MEASURE

REPEAT THE PROCESS

STEP 2

STEP 3

STEP 4

STEP 5

36

STEP 1: KEYWORDRESEARCH

As a first step for your research, try to write down many

keywords that may be related to your application or game,

based on the type of app, its category, its features and the

functionality of the app or the problems it solves.

Keywords research in one of the principal foundations of

Search ASO and one of the first steps that needs to be taken

when preparing the listing of a new mobile app or game. A right

keyword research will help defining the keywords that you will

need to optimize in the listing.

BRAINSTORMING

The perfect place to get inspired in terms of keywords for your

app or game are the listings of your direct ASO competitors. To

get a list of keywords used by your competitors (or any other

application), you can use the Keyword Density feature in The-

Tool that allows you to analyze the density of the keywords of

any store listing on Apple App Store and Google Play Store.

Grant special attention to the keywords used in the most im-

portant fields in terms of rankings according to each Store:

“App Name”, “Subtitle” and “Keywords field” in the App Store,

and “Title”, “Short Description” and “Long Description” for

Google Play. To study the Keywords field of any app, you need

to use an ASO tool as it is a private field that is not visible in the

listing.

LOOK AT YOUR COMPETITOR’SKEYWORDS

37

The Keyword Suggest tool by TheTool also enables you to

get ALL the suggestions in any language and for any

keyword.

At this point you should already have a long list of keywords

and keyword combinations related with your app, at least 60 /

80 words. You can make this list grow looking at the suggested

keywords in the Apple App Store and in the Google Play Store.

You can do it manually of thanks to an ASO tool such as

TheTool:

Monitor all the keywords that you consider relevant to your lis-

ting in order to analyze and prioritize them during the next

steps of the implementation and to follow-up the next months

after the first optimization.

SEARCH FOR SUGGESTED KEYWORDSIN THE STORES

1.

2.

You can use the autocomplete suggestion in the list of

monitorized keywords in TheTool.

STEP 1: KEYWORD RESEARCH

38

STEP 2: SELECT AND PRIORITIZEKEYWORDS FOR THE OPTIMIZATION

Once you have the potential keywords for your app or game,

you must analyze and prioritize the ones that will be easy to

rank for first, and then to get downloads from. Once prioritized,

it is time to optimize the listing.

The difficulty indicates the level of competition for a specific

keyword (the higher the difficulty, the harder to rank for the

keyword). Traffic provides an estimated volume of search for

that specific keyword. Currently, the popularity score in Apple

TRAFFIC ESTIMATION AND DIFFICULTY

Search Ads is the only “traffic” data that can be used for the

App Store (only for the countries where ASA is available).

For Google Play, right now, there is no official data given

from Google about search volume.

Try to find the perfect balance between low or medium

difficulty and high traffic. If you don’t have a very high

marketing budget, don’t work on branded or generic

keywords with high difficulty.

39

STEP 2: SELECT AND PRIORITIZE KEYWORDS FOR THE OPTIMIZATION

The Installs Per Keyword feature in TheTool enables you to see

exact data (taken thanks to the Google Play Console

integration) to know which keywords or keywords combinations

are bringing your mobile app or game the more installs on

Google Play. Based on this data you can prioritize the keywords

to implement in your listing optimization.

INSTALLS PER KEYWORDS INGOOGLE PLAY STORE

Not using enough combinations. More than 75% of

visits to an app listing are coming from combinations of

long keywords (also known as “long-tail”).

Work just a few keywords. We recommend to work

with 60-110 keywords for both stores. Still there is no

problem with working with hundreds of keywords.

Not being patient enough. The time you will have to

wait to start seeing results will depend on the difficulty

of each keyword, on the On-Metadata optimization and

on the Off-Metadata efforts.Using very generic keywords with high search & traffic

volume. In terms of visibility in the stores, it’s better to rank

in first positions for low traffic keywords than to rank in Top

100-150 for high traffic keywords.

AVOID COMMON MISTAKES

40

STEP 3: OPTIMIZATION

Use the most important keywords in the App Name / Title, in

the Subtitle / Short Description and in the Keywords Field and

make sure you include the rest of the search terms and

keywords combinations in Google Play’s Long Description (this

field is not ranking in the App Store).

Monitoring keywords ranking, their evolution and comparing

this data to your competitors’ one can help you to understand if

there is room for improvement, to define your UA strategy and

to know the impact of your app’s visibility on downloads.

41

STEP 4: MONITORKEYWORDS

Once you have identified, analyzed, prioritized and optimized

the keywords in the store listing, it’s time to monitor and get in-

formation sobre their rankings, both for our project and for the

competition. You can do this thanks to TheTool in 93 countries. STEP 5: REPEAT THEPROCESS

ASO is very dynamic: new trends, new competitors,

changes in the stores… Also, it is always possible to do a

new Keyword Research, optimize the store listing, carry

out experiment, etc. ASO is a marathon, not a sprint.

42

CHECKLIST FOR KEYWORDRESEARCH AND ASO OPTIMIZATION

Keyword Research:

Brainstorm to identify an initial list of keywords.

Find inspiration and study your competitors’ keywords.

Find suggested keywords and keywords combinations.

Optimize the textual elements of your store listing

and check keywords density to see if there is room for

more optimization. Don’t forget the visual assets as well.

Analyze and prioritize keywords based on their traffic

and difficulty, relevance and performance in terms of

number of installs and Conversion Rate.

01

03

Track your keywords and compare your rankings with

your competitors ones to get valuable information.04

Repeat the process!

0502

To sum up, this is the list of actions you should follow during

the investigation, selection and optimization process for

keywords on the App Store and Google Play:

43

TRAFFIC SOURCES

744

TRAFFIC SOURCES

The ASO formula is based on getting (more) organic downloads. To do

so, together with a good On-Metadata optimization, you will need to get

non-organic and organic downloads. Downloads are a very important

Off-Metadata ASO factor and without them, it will be hard to get more

visibility, traffic and organic downloads.

The ASO formula is:

Your mobile app or game needs to have a certain

level of engagement / retention for users.

However, ASO is not only about downloads.

Together with them, you need to be able to get

positive ratings and reviews from the users.

Having said that, where can downloads come from?

What are the main sources of traffic of mobile apps

and games? Let’s study this in details, knowing that

downloads can be organic (generated by the proper

stores without any external influence) or

non-organic (generated by external influences such

as ads or campaigns in the developer’s own

channels).

Traffic Conversion Engagement

*Conversion is the relation between traffic and downloads.

45

ORGANIC DOWNLOADS

Organic downloads are, as we commented earlier, the ones

that are made from the app stores without any type of

external influence, through Search (keywords) or Browse /

Explore (Featured, Top Charts, Similar Apps, etc.)

NOTE: All of the mobile app or game downloads (or almost all of them) are made from the Apple App Store and the Google Play Store, expect from the download of APK files for Android devices (normally, these are apps that Google do not allow in its store), the pre-installed apps and the downloads that are external to Google Play in the case of some Android apps (for example, from search results on Google web).

46

NON-ORGANIC DOWNLOADS

Non-organic downloads are the ones that, even if they were

generated from the app stores, were previously externally in-

fluenced. This occurs in the case of user acquisition paid cam-

paigns (Facebook Ads, Apple Search Adsm Google Ads, TikTok

Ads, etc.) or campaigns in your own channels (Member Get

Member, newsletter / email, SmartBanner, etc.)

Apple Search Ads and Google Ads UAC downloads are

generated from the app stores, but after a click on a paid

promotion campaign (external influence), which is why they

are registered as non-organic downloads.

The same way, downloads generated from web search (SEO)

are also registered as non-organic, as they are not 100%

generated from the store and there was an external

influence, in this case the web search.

47

VISUAL ASSETSFOR GOOGLE PLAY STORE

AND APPLE APP STORE

848

VISUAL ASSETS FOR GOOGLE PLAY STOREICON

Final size

Format

Color profile

Max size file

Shape

Shadow

512 px × 512 px

PNG of 32 bits

sRGB

1024 KB

Full square (Google Play performs the

masking dynamically; the radius will be

equivalent to 20% of the icon size)

None (Google Play processes shadows

dynamically; see the "Shadows" section

below for how to include shadows in

artwork)

1

SPECIFICATIONSNUMBER

49

VISUAL ASSETS FOR GOOGLE PLAY STORESCREENSHOTS

Format

Minimum size

Maximum size

Aspect ratio

JPEG or PNG 24 bits (no alfa)

320 pixels

3840 pixels

16:9 (horizontal) 2:1 (vertical)

8 per

compatible

device

SPECIFICATIONSNUMBER

50

VISUAL ASSETS FOR GOOGLE PLAY STOREFEATURE GRAPHIC

Format

Size

JPEG or PNG 24 bits (no alfa)

1024 px × 500 px

1

SPECIFICATIONSNUMBER

51

VISUAL ASSETS FOR GOOGLE PLAY STOREVIDEO

Duration 30 seconds to 2 minutes1

SPECIFICATIONSNUMBER

52

VISUAL ASSETS FOR APPLE APP STOREICON

1 1024 px × 1024 px

PNG

sRGB or P3

No transparency

Square without round corners

Size

Format

Color profile

Transparency

Shape

SPECIFICATIONSNUMBER

53

VISUAL ASSETS FOR APPLE APP STORESCREENSHOTS

10 per

compatible

device

6.5"(iPhone XS Max, iPhone XR)

1242 px × 2688 px 2688 px × 1242 px

5.8"(iPhone X, iPhone XS)

1125 px × 2436 px 2436 px × 1125 px

5.5"(iPhone 6s Plus, iPhone 7 Plus, iPhone 8 Plus)

1242 px × 2208 px 2208 px × 1242 px

4.7"(iPhone 6, iPhone 6s, iPhone 7, iPhone 8)

750 px × 1334 px 1334 px × 750 px

SPECIFICATIONSNUMBER

54

VISUAL ASSETS DE APPLE APP STORE - SCREENSHOTS

4"(iPhone SE)

640 px × 1096 px640 px × 1136 px

1136 px × 600 px1136 px × 640 px

640 px × 920 px640 px × 960 px

960 px × 600 px960 px × 640 px

3.5"(iPhone 4s)

12.9"(iPad Pro (2nd generation &3rd generation))

2048 px × 2732 px 2732 px × 2048 px

11"(iPad Pro)

1668 px × 2388 px 3288 px × 1668 px

SPECIFICATIONSNUMBER

10 per

compatible

device

55

VISUAL ASSETS DE APPLE APP STORE - SCREENSHOTS

10 per

compatible

device

10.5"(iPad Pro, iPad Air)

1668 px × 2224 px 2224 px × 2224 px

1536 px × 2008 px1536 px × 2048 px

2048 px × 1496 px2048 px × 1536 px

768 px × 1004 px768 px × 1024 px

1024 px × 748 px1024 px × 768 px

9.7" High resolution(iPad, iPad mini)

9.7" Standard resolution(iPad, iPad mini)

SPECIFICATIONSNUMBER

56

RATINGS & REVIEWS

957

RATINGS & REVIEWS

The ratings and reviews that users leave in an app's listing are

one of the most important ASO off-metadata factors,

because they directly impact store visibility (Search and

Explore) and Conversion Rate to download. Not only is it

important that the application has good reviews and a high

average rating, but the algorithms also take into account the

keywords that users include within their reviews (especially

in the Google Play Store).

What impacts users opinion the most is the product, at every

level: quality, features, errors, etc. This is why, together with

asking for ratings and reviews to users as a strategy, you also

need to take GREAT care of the product as it is the base of the

whole business.

Google Play average rating is global and calculated for all

the countries in which the app is present; in the App Store,

on the contrary, each country has its own average rating.

It is important to design a good strategy when asking

the users for ratings, because both volume and

appreciation can change dramatically if we do not detect

which are the ideal moments to request it. For example, it

is not recommended to request reviews very early in the

user experience, when he has not yet had a minimum use

of the app or game. It would be a good time after the user

made an in-app purchase, logged in several times,

confirmed a reservation, got to complete several levels of a

game, etc.

58

The most important thing is to ask for the rating during a

"happy moment" in the app use. This is when users are the

most inclined to leave positive ratings or reviews. In addition,

we can try to “divert” negative ratings of 3 or less stars to a

private channel of communication with the app so that they

are not effective in the store. This way, we can try to solve the

problem the user is facing directly and personally, and prevent

the average rating from decreasing.

By analyzing and answering one and two stars ratings, not only

can we find and understand why users are not satisfied, but we

can also ask for a change in their rating to make it becomes

positive. Likewise, it is important to answer all comments,

positive and negative, as much as possible.

The ideal is to get natural ratings above four stars and for

this, it is recommended, in addition to having a good

product, to have the minimum amount of ANRs and errors.

We recommend enhancing the reception of ratings and

reviews with the use of the iOS 10.3 User Feedback

Prompt, with which the user can leave a rating without

leaving the app (his homonym for Google Play is expected to

arrive during the year 2020). We can also use the

development of an in-home SDK or third-party SDKs.

RATINGS & REVIEWS

59

Reviews are a very interesting information channel for app

developers. They help to detect if the application suffers from a

bug, users provides them with ideas of product innovation,

which can be taken into account for future updates and provide

you with new keywords that you are not working on yet.

rating received after a “Do you like the app?” and a “We know

you love our app, please rate us!”, with which you can induce

a positive feeling assessment and increase the total ratings

volume. As always, test until you find the way that gives

you a better and more effective result.

Another successful move in your ratings strategy is to make

the most of the pre-launch of your app in a beta-testers

environment. In addition to enabling to avoid negative

ratings related to bugs and crashes, it also enables

developers to get very valuable and honest feedback on how

to improve the app / game before launching it.

RECOMMENDATIONS:

Answers to user reviews must be personalized and you

should avoid any template, although you can have a series of

generic answers for thanks comments or bugs / errors to speed

up the process.

The way and language that we use when asking for ratings

is very important. You can see a big difference between the

RATINGS & REVIEWS

60

It is important to focus on negative feedback that includes pos-

sible improvements or that detects bugs, and the ones that are

featured with the most “likes”. The first reviews that appear

as featured on your Product Page are crucial and have the

greatest impact on your app’s conversion rate. Be sure to

answer featured reviews, even if users only say they are satis-

fied.

Finally, we also recommend reporting offensive reviews and

spam that can damage the reputation of your game / app wi-

thout any reason.

RATINGS & REVIEWS

61

HOW TO GET POSITIVERATINGS & REVIEWS?

Having a good product that covers an existing need on the market.

Avoid publishing an app full of bugs not to lose potential users.

Manage users’ unsatisfaction by offering a direct and private answer channel.

Make use of “Review Prompts” inviting users to give their feedback to improve their experience

through an in-app message.

62

RATINGS AND REVIEWS:DIFFERENCES BETWEEN APPLE APP STOREAND GOOGLE PLAY STORE

The user can leave its rating directly without having to visit

the store and leave the app thanks to the native prompt.

The ratings and cumulated average score can be reset.

A highlighted review is shown (and you have to swipe right

to see the rest).

A new rating can be requested 3 times a year or after each

update of the app software version.

APPLE APP STORE

With the change of algorithm in August 2019, most recent

valuations have a greater impact than historical ones.

Up to four featured reviews are shown in the mobile app

or game listing.

A new rating can be requested with each new update.

GOOGLE PLAY STORE

63

CONVERSION RATE

1064

CONVERSION RATE

Conversion Rate is the ratio that measures the number of

installs that an app receives among the total number of

visitors that gets to the store listing. In the case of App Store

Connect, it also allows you to measure the ratio between

installs and impressions, although this data for Search and

Browse traffic sources can be distorted by the fact that the user

can install an app without the need to pass by the store listing,

the volume of installs being greater than that of visits to the

listing.

This ratio allows you to know the effectiveness of the listing of

an app when it comes to convincing a user to download it. The

higher the Conversion Rate (CvR), the greater the effectiveness

of the listing when converting visitors into installers.

Conversion Rate depends largely on the total traffic that

reaches the app listing and the quality of this traffic. For

this reason it is important to differentiate Conversion

Rate by traffic source, to know from which source

the best traffic is coming and the one that converts

best to download, so that we can quickly detect if any

particular traffic source is bringing us traffic from worse

quality to act accordingly.

It is common that the traffic that comes from Paid

Marketing campaigns is of better quality since the

user, when getting to the listing, has already shown

an initial interest in the app. If the traffic of these

campaigns is not generating a good Conversion Rate, it

When we analyze the Conversion Rate, some factors

come into play in which we can influence to a greater

or lesser extent:

65

may mean that the targets of these campaigns are not the

most appropriate, or that the listing is not optimized.

A very good way to try to improve the Conversion Rate,

especially as far as visual elements are concerned, are

the experiments (A / B test) that Google Play Console

allows you to carry out. Try different creatives, both in

terms of messages / CTA / copy as well as colors and

visual composition, which will allow you to discover what

users like the most and to adapt your app listing to their

preferences to increase Conversion Rate and thus,

achieve a greater number of installs.

In the case of the App Store, in order to perform

experiments or A / B tests of the visual assets of the

listing, you will have to use external tools such as

SplitMetrics, StoreMaven or TestNest, among others.

You can also use the “Creative Assets” of Apple Search

Ads campaigns.

CONVERSION RATE

Once a user reaches the store listing, visual elements are of

great importance to convince him to install the app.

According to a market study, less than 40% of the visitors of

the product page of an app remain there for more than

three seconds, so it is crucial to get their attention in this

short period of time. To get the user interested in your

product and make them click on the listing or download

button, the icon, the screenshots and the video (in you

having one) and the feature graphic (only on Google Play)

play a very important role. These are the elements that have

more relevance, since the texts do not have as much weight

in the first impact.

66

rating for a better one can generate great confidence in

the other users, in addition of an improvement of the

average rating of the app.

(*) It is common that the greater the amount of traffic, the lower the CR, but

this is not necessarily bad, since you will be getting more traffic to the app

listing and therefore more installs.

CONVERSION RATE

The third key factor for the Conversion Rate is the average

rating the app has in the stores, as well as user reviews. App

stores are still a marketplace in which a user interested in a

product (in this case an app) will take into account what

other users think about it. An average score lower than a 4*

is usually a problem when it comes to achieving an

adequate Conversion Rate, as well as if there is a high

number of bad reviews by other users.

An adequate customer support strategy, in which interest is

shown to help the users to solve their doubts or complaints,

and once resolved the user is encouraged to change its

67

ASO AND USER ACQUISITION (UA)CAMPAIGNS

1168

ASO AND USER ACQUISITION(UA) CAMPAIGNS

Going deeper into the relation between ASO & UA, a

synergy can be reached between the two strategies (even if

it depends on a lot of factors) to manage a sustainable and

long-term organic growth for your app of mobile game.

One thing is clear:

ASO & UA share the same objective: strengthen business.

Successful app developers share one same thing: they

understand that in the world of apps, there is a direct link

between paid campaigns (UA) and the results that can be

obtained with ASO (the organic funnel).

For example, the lower the UA campaigns cost, the better the

visibility of the app within category rankings and overall (Top

Charts) as well as keywords ranking. This way, the lower it costs

to get a user / an install from paid campaigns and the most

downloads you can generate, the more organic visibility your

app will get.

69

The increase in paid installs also increases your organic

traffic:

ASO AND USER ACQUISITION (UA) CAMPAIGNS

To reach an effective balance between ASO & UA, it is necessary

to understand how paid campaigns can impact the global

organic visibility of your app or game.

NOTE: Paid UA downloads are not the only ones impacting visibility in the stores. It always happens with organic downloads and the ones generated through your own channels. This means that all the downloads have an impact on ASO.

Organic traffic includes an audience that comes from keywords

search and users browsing the stores (Explore).

With an average of 60% of installs coming from organic traffic, it

is crucial to study how this valuable source of traffic can impact

your UA strategy.

The total installs volume impacts the category ranking of

your app or game, which can positively impact your

explore traffic as well. The higher is an app ranked in Top

Charts (category or overall), the more Browse / Explore

downloads it will receive.

Paid traffic (UA) is also related to search results. The more

total downloads, the better the keywords ranking and the

visibility in rankings, which favors the best opportunity for

the app to be discovered through users search for

keywords related to the product.

PAID USER ACQUISITION (PAID UA) IS STRONGLY RELATED TO

ORGANIC TRAFFIC

70

acquisition channel that is used (Facebook Ads, Google

Ads, Apple Search Ads or display networks, among others).

For each generated paid installs, there is a gain in organic

installs. The key is to find the perfect balance of how

much you need to invest in acquisition to improve the

volume of organic and non-organic downloads, without

investing more than optimal numbers for conversion. To

reach this, you need to monitor competition (for example,

in which category are they and their ranking in Top Charts)

and the factors that impact this correlation:

This relation can vary according to some factors, such as the

quality of the sources of traffic, if it is an app or a game, its

category and the relative ranking in each of the Top Charts.

Let’s start by looking only at the first point: the total volume of

daily installs from paid traffic determines the app ranking in

Top Charts (in its category and in overall). As a consequence,

the users have more opportunities to find your app when

browsing the store, which is a big step to get more organic

downloads.

However, the number of necessary downloads to reach a

certain ranking changes according to the app or game, its

operative system, the market and the current

circumstances. It depends on the competition and the

HOW CAN YOU PERFECT THIS BALANCE IN YOUR FAVOR?

UA investment.

Downloads distribution per channel.

Category ranking of the app.

Total installs, paid installs, search installs, browse

installs.

ASO AND USER ACQUISITION (UA) CAMPAIGNS

71

Another important consequence of this relation is that the

effective cost per install (eCPI) and how it decrease thanks to

organic traffic. For example, if 1.000€ was invested in Facebook

Ads and 1,000 installs came, the cost per install (CPI) = 1€.

However, thanks to the organic traffic that came as a result of

these acquisition campaigns, the effective CPI (eCPI) is calculated

dividing the total investment per the total of installs (organic and

non-organic).

Thus, coming back to our example, if 1.000 organic installs were

also generated, eCPI = 0,50€, ie. half of the CPI. The relation

between the increase in investment and organic installs isn’t

linear either. Every mobile app or game is different…

The optimization of the store listing, and especially of the visual

assets, is even more important as it allows to get more installs

without increasing traffic (Conversion Rate) and thus make the

most out of the investment in paid UA.

One important thing to take into account is that the quantity of

organic installs received from Top Charts does not increase in

a linear & proportional way. An increase in UA investment

does not directly imply an increase in rankings, keywords

visibility or total organic downloads. And it’s even quite the

opposite: the higher the app in Top Charts, the hardest to reach

a higher ranking because of the exponential relation between

rankings and installs. This means that it is necessary to analyze

the combined impact of ASO & paid strategies to get a perfect

balance between investment in acquisition and organic uplift.

ASO AND USER ACQUISITION (UA) CAMPAIGNS

72

APPLE SEARCH ADS & ITS RELATION TOKEYWORDS OPTIMIZATION

In 2016, Apple introduced Apple Search Ads to improve the

discoverability of the apps for potential users segmented by

keywords, localization, gender and if they installed or not a

concrete app previously. This tool is quite effective to increase

the volume of installs and to control the reach of specific

keywords.

However, it can happen that organic installs cannibalize

themselves and that we end up paying for users that already

had the intention to install a specific app himself through

search in the store.

Cannibalization is a risk for the keywords that the app is already

ranking high and for branded keywords (when users look for an

app or game with the specific brand name). This especially

happens when the app appears in position 1, 2 or 3 for

these keywords.

Nevertheless, if you use this tool well, you can definitely

73

APPLE SEARCH ADS & ITS RELATION TO KEYWORDS OPTIMIZATION

increase organic traffic and your results. We recommend that

you increase the bidding of the keywords for which the app

ranks in lower positions as well as generic keywords (which

would be mid or long-tail keywords).

To achieve this, you will need to experiment. Make changes in

your ASA campaigns and analyze the organic installs that the

app / game receives. If you notice a negative correlation, it

could be because of cannibalization. On the contrary, if organic

traffic increases, the strategy is working.

74

ASO & UA: THE POWER OFCREATIVE CONSISTENCY

The third aspect of the relation between ASO & UA are the

benefits of creating a cohesion through the whole

acquisition funnel, which has an impact on the whole effort of

the marketing strategy.

The acquisition plan starts when a determined value

proposition is made in a campaign so that users click on an ad.

From this moment, App Store Optimization is essential, as well

as creative consistency: the value proposition that has been

promoted in the acquisition campaigns must be reflected in the

store listing, especially in the visual assets. A unique message

all along the funnel increases conversion rate and thus reduces

acquisition costs.

A user attracted to an specific sale offer can fall out of the

funnel if, when getting into the store, he does not find this

sale offer reflected in the listing. On the contrary, if the

expectations that were created correspond to the store

presence, conversion rate to download will increase.

An endless optimization loop can be created and

conversion rate can increase by working on improving the

different fields of the store listing and maintaining a

creative consistency with acquisition campaigns.

To conclude, we can say that when ASO & UA work hand

in hand, the final result is better than the sum of their

individual results.

75

ANDROID VITALS

1276

ANDROID VITALS

Android Vitals is a Google Play initiative to improve the

stability and performance of Android devices. When a

user runs an app, its Android device records several

metrics: the stability of the app, the starting time of the

app, the battery usage, the processing time and the

denials of permissions. Google Play Console adds this

data and displays it in the Android Vitals control panel:

SEE DETAILS

ANR error rate

0,47%Last 30 days Previous 30 days Inappropriate

behavior limit

SEE DETAILS

Failure rate

1,09%Last 30 days Previous 30 days Inappropriate

behavior limit

Batery

Metrics

Excessive background Wi-Fi networksearches 0,12 % 0,12 %0,13 %

Last 30 days Previous 30 dayscompared to

other applications

Stability

Metrics

ANR error rate 0,02 % -0,01 %0,03 %

Last 30 days Previous 30 days compared toother applications

Failure rate 0,03 % -0,03 %0,03 %

SEE DETAILS

SEE DETAILS

SEE DETAILS

77

ANDROID VITALS

The data panel mainly highlights the "Crash Rate" and the "ANR

Rate", which are the fundamental aspects to which developers

should pay the most attention and to which Google give the

most importance. The other data that we can see in this panel

should also be monitored to ensure that it does not have a

negative effect on the app, as well as on the visibility in Google

Play Store.

An above-average crash rate negatively affects user experience,

which can end up generating bad ratings in the store listing.

In addition, during the last months we have been able to obser-

ve that Google is penalizing apps that exceed what they have

called the “bad behaviour threshold” when it comes to maintai-

ning their visibility within the store. In terms of Explore traffic,

Google penalizes them by decreasing their presence in similar

apps and featurings, and in terms of Search traffic lowering

keywords ranking in search results.

Below, you will see the results of some customers of

PICKASO for which we have been able to observe this type of

behavior.

78

INCREASE OF VISIBILITY IN SIMILAR APPSAFTER REDUCTION OF CRASH RATE

The SVRank is a metric available in TheTool, the ASO tool that

shows, for any country, the position of an app in the Google

Play Store, classified by the “strength” of their referring apps’

profile. It means that the better SVRank, the greater the

visibility in Similar Apps and therefore the higher the explore

traffic that will go to the listing of the app.

In the following example, we can see how an app that did not

have any visibility due to a crash rate superior to 4% begins

to appear in Similar Apps and its SVRank increases

considerably by reducing this crash rate to reach a

percentage below the bad behaviour threshold limit set by

Google.

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Top 1

Top 2

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79

PENALTY FOR AN INCREASINGANR RATE

In this second example we can see how at the end of September, due to an error in the app where the content did not load

correctly, the errors were increasing drastically, and this increased the ANR rate as well. The effect of this rise in ANRs was a

Google Play penalty for the position of the keywords that the app was ranking for. Once the error was solved, on October 20th, the

keywords began to recover their positions and we can see how, over time, they even improved the positions they had before the

increase in errors.

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80

PENALTY FOR AN INCREASING ANR RATE

In the App Store, we have not been able to see such a direct

correlation between the increments of crashes and the visibility

of an app. But, although App Store does not seem to take into

account the crash rates as a ranking factor for now, the frequent

blocks and errors in an app will also affect the ratings and

reviews, so it is equally important to keep them as low as

possible, also because negative ratings and reviews do have an

impact on ASO.Google penalizes apps that exceed what they call "bad

behaviour threshold". Therefore, if you have experienced

that the organic installs of your app have fallen dramatically

or that Explore and / or Search traffic have reduced and you

do not know exactly why, check your Crash Rate and the ANR

Rate, and make sure that they are below the limit set by

Google, since if they are above this, Google has most likely

penalized your app.

CONCLUSION

81

VISIBILITYTHROUGH SEO

1382

VISIBILITYTHROUGH SEO

SEO (Search Engine Optimization) and ASO (App Store Optimi-

zation) can be distinguished as 2 different disciplines, but they

both have a lot in common. It’s more, SEO has a great relevance

in your ASO strategy, since that all users may find your app

through web searches made from a mobile device.

Web searches from mobile devices have increased so

quickly in the last years that they already surpassed all the

searches made from any other device. According to

“Ditendria”, 52% of the total of internet searches comes

from mobile devices.

One of the most relevant things to consider is that all the

apps available on Apple App Store and on Google Play

Store have a public URL which Google tracks, indexes and

positions in web search results for some searches made by

iOS and Android devices. These results can show up

depending on the intentionality of that search from the

user and simple apps results or “App Packs” are displayed.

SEO ASO

83

TYPES OF ORGANICSEARCHES RESULTS INWHICH APPS AREDISPLAYED

these are the most common ones in searches concerning a

specific app. These “snippets” contain the name of the app,

the total number of ratings, the accumulated average rate

and a snippet which describes the app, together with a

download button.

This type of results usually appears after making searches

related to the brand of a concrete app (like for example the

proper branded name of the app).

SIMPLE RESULTS

84

TYPES OF ORGANIC SEARCHES RESULTS IN WHICH APPS ARE DISPLAYED

Los App Packs are groups of apps suggested in Google search

results in mobile searches.

Usually, 3 relevant apps are displayed for the keyword that was

searched (query sent by the user to the browser), but there is

also an option to drop down the results to see more relevant

apps. These results take great importance when dropped down

to see more apps as they then take all the screen space of the

device.

Each app result that appears in this packages contain its app

name / title, its icon, its accumulated average rating and the

total number of ratings.

APP PACKS

All these results are delivered based on the type of device

the user is using, meaning that iOS devices will display App

Store apps results; while Android devices will display

results from Google Play.

85

LINK BUILDING: THE IMPORTANCEOF BACKLINKS IN SEO AND ASO

Besides, as the URL of the store listings are indexing, you need

to take into account one of the most important strategies in

SEO for ASO: link building.

Link building are all the actions carried out to get links

(backlinks), preferably in a natural way, to the app URL in App

Store or Google Play (Google Play more more importantly),

which come from third party webs. This way, you can improve

SEO for iOS and Android apps and ASO for Android apps.

It’s important to know that for all link building strategies,

there’s a couple of things you need to take into account:

It’s very important to get links from webs that are related

to your app and that are have an important presence in

the sector.

WHO LINKS YOU?

86

LINK BUILDING: THE IMPORTANCE OF BACKLINKS IN SEO AND ASO

Having a lot of links to the store listing does not imply a direct

increase in its positioning. They must be quality links - if else,

they won’t have any positive impact. Also, the increase in links

to the store listing must be logical, as it is not very natural that

in very little time, the number of links increases drastically.

HOW MANY LINKS DO YOU HAVE? The anchor text is the visible text of a link. This visible text

provides information to the user who is reading the text to

give him more value information but also to place a

keyword to strengthen. For instance, this text about “SEO

for apps” links to an article of our blog. A link is not always

put on a text but it can be linked to a picture. In this case,

ATL will be the attribute with the “Anchor Text” function.

ANCHOR TEXT

The more and better links a store listing gets, the more

visibility it will get in Google web both for iOS and Android

apps, and the better the ASO positioning in Google Play

Store.

CONCLUSIONS

20Ahrefs Rank

31K +483

Backlinks

Live 16.2KHistorical 79.9K

4.38KReferring domains

Live 3.74KHistorical 5.64K

-9

82UR

88DR

*Data taken from Ahrefs for the app Super Marion Run on Google Play

87

SEASONAL ASO

1488

SEASONAL ASO

In the app stores, just like on other markets (both online or

offline), demand fluctuates by category depending on the time

of the year. It seems obvious that the search popularity of

certain keywords is influenced by the period of the year, so

taking advantage of these opportunities by applying some

changes to your app listing can help you generate extra

downloads in some types of mobile apps.

Christmas, Valentine’s Day, Black Friday, seasonal sales or

sports events (the World Cup, Champions League…), among

others, represent great opportunities in terms of optimization

for thousands of e-commerce app published on the stores.

Thus, you can work ASO as part of your marketing strategy

for each season, in 2 ways:

Adding seasonality to your ASO keywords strategy can help

you benefit from higher search popularity for certain

seasonal terms and even show your app to audiences you

cannot reach during the rest of the year. During certain

periods of the year, users change the way they interact

with app stores. In fact, there are seasonal trends for

search terms: some of them are obvious and linked to

holidays such as “Christmas”, but also others less obvious

terms, linked to a longer period, like “tax return”.

KEYWORDS OPTIMIZATION(SEARCH)

89

SEASONAL ASO

Once you find relevant keywords for your product, you can also

use them in Google Ads or Apple Search Ads search campaigns.

However, keep in mind their cost will be higher in seasonality

periods because a lot of advertisers will be bidding on these

specific keywords.

Same happens to the visual assets of your listing: creating them

with seasonality in mind can have a positive impact on

Conversion Rate to download. If, for example, you want your

app to rank for the Black Friday campaign, you can accompany

your keywords strategy with a screenshots update, with visual

elements such as discount percentages, or even with an app

icon update with some graphic elements that allows users to

understand that if they download the app, they will find

VISUAL ASSETS OPTIMIZATION- CONVERSION RATE

discounts related to this campaign.

(*) Did you know that in Mexico, Black Friday is not celebrated but “Buen Fin”

(Good End) is?

90

SEASONAL ASO

In the following graph extracted from Google Trends we can view how relative search popularity from “buen fin” (in red) in

Mexico is indefinitely superior to that of “black friday” (in blue), and the periods for both searches do not match 100%.

5 may. 2019 8 sept. 2019

75

100

50

25

0

buen finblack friday

91

ASO CHECKLIST

1592

ASO CHECKLIST

Identify your keywords list and broaden it with keyword

suggestions to get mid and long-tail keywords to rank for.

Add one or two Top Keywords to your App Name / Title

together with the brand name. This will help your app to

start being visible on the stores (Search).

Use an ASO tool, such as TheTool, to track keywords in

Apple App Store and Google Play Store. Select the ones

with the highest traffic and the lowest degree of

competition.

Analyze your competitors’ apps and take a look at their

user reviews to find more keywords and ideas to

implement to improve user experience.

01 04

Use Short and Long Description (Google Play), Subtitle

and Keywords Field (App Store) to add keywords to reach

the most common terms searched by user.0502

03

93

Spend time to create the perfect icon: try with different

background colors, apply unique identifying elements

within your category and make it different from those of

your competitors. It is really important to work with a

strong brand identity within your app’s visual assets.

Create an engaging video and add it to your listing, the

first seconds are crucial!

Make the most out of all the available screenshots and

use short and direct sentences as well as Call To Action

(CTA) to catch the attention of the users that arrive to the

store listing.

06 09

07

Show your app’s best features in the 2 first screenshots

and in the first autoplay video. 08

Use real images of your app’s interface and encourage

users to download it with a Call To Action highlighting

your product’s benefits.10

Do A / B Testing in all the visual elements to identify the

best option to get the best CvR (Conversion Rate) to

download and / or visibility.11

ASO CHECKLIST

94

Encourage users to post positive feedback (ratings and

reviews), identify loyal users and motivate them to rate

your app at the right moment (“sweet moments”).

Listen to users and use their feedback to improve your

product and / or identify bugs that your app might be

experiencing in some mobile devices or software

versions.

12

Provide your users with a Customer Service page or a

Support chat to avoid negative feedbacks in your app

listing and offer them individualized and customized

assistance.

13

Reply to negative reviews quickly so that users can change

their feedback and increase your store public average

rating.14

15

Update your app frequently, at least once a month.

16

Get backlinks from webs to your store listing in Google

Play Store and Apple App Store to increase its visibility in

web search rankings and in ASO ranking in Google Play. 17

ASO CHECKLIST

95

Localize your app listing, and if the conversion works,

think about localizing all the content of your app as long

as the product allows it. For example, a content app or a

game with lots of texts.

18

The main ASO KPIs are the organic downloads and the

revenue.19

ASO is a process that needs to be monitored and

optimized steadily! 20

ASO CHECKLIST

96

OUR TEAM

DANIEL PERISCEO

MIRIAM PELÁEZCMO & Co-founder

FRAN LÓPEZCOO

RUBÉN BAQUEROCTO

JUANMA CANOHead of Growth & UA

DIDAC ESTEBANFront-End web developer

ALEJANDRO MELEROASO Specialist

FRANCESCA JOELEMobile Account Manager

GABI BAELLAASO Senior

JUAN SÁNCHEZBack-End Developer & IT

ANTONIO RABANERAMobile Account Manager

DANIEL FLORESGrowth & UA Specialist

MAURICIO AWAKArt Director

CRIKY PÉREZCreative Marketing Manager

JORDI BERTRÁNGraphic Designer

MAUD PANIERComms & Events Manager

BORJA GARCÍA-PEÑAASO Specialist

CARLOS PÉREZASO Specialist

ALEX HOSTALETMotion Designer

XAVI PASCUALUX/UI Designer &

Front-End Developer

97

THANK YOU!