
Apple Introduces Search Ads Basic - dottrap
https://searchads.apple.com/basic/
======
jlgaddis
Since others in the thread are discussing a lack of "targeting" and such, see
also "Search Ads Advanced" [0], which allows you to "refine your audience" \--
"by gender, age, and show your ads only to devices located in specific
geographic areas."

[0]:
[https://searchads.apple.com/advanced/](https://searchads.apple.com/advanced/)

~~~
IBM
That's not very targeted. Real targeting would be using the contents of your
email, iMessages, browsing history, etc.

~~~
yoz-y
I will assume that you do not actually want this. However I do feel that there
could be a bit of more targeting options without being creepy.

For example Apple could infer categories of users according to their Appstore
profile and permit you to target people by their trade.

~~~
giancarlostoro
Also if DuckDuckGo can target you based on what you're searching there and
then, is that not targeting? It's not stalk based targeted advertising, but
you're still an ideal target since they're showing you something you're
searching for, in some cases it might not be fully relevant to what you
wanted, but close enough to be shown (not sure how highly relevant DuckDuckGo
ads become relative to search terms).

------
thisisit
How long before we see a post that people are being fooled into installing
some copycat apps which are nearly identical to original apps but are getting
promoted by Search Ad Basics?

~~~
nodesocket
Isn't Apple's detailed vetting the difference between the App Store and Google
Play? Apple should be able to catch these scammer apps.

~~~
desertrider12
Maybe 5 years ago, but I don't think they have any quality bar now. For every
decent quality game on the app store there are dozens of terrible clones:
[https://youtu.be/yU6WC4dpaHM?t=12s](https://youtu.be/yU6WC4dpaHM?t=12s)

~~~
fenwick67
Omg that first one even uses the default Unity player model, it looks worse
than most Ludum Dare games

------
noncoml
The App Store ads are a disgrace. 100% of my older relatives get fooled and
install the first app that comes up in App Store when searching for something.

The only thing that gives Apple an edge over Google/Amazon is that they are
not an ads company or retail shop.

Such a pity seeing them to want to move into that space.

~~~
Cookingboy
There are even ads now in the News app.

I mean, I paid $1k for the iPhone X and iOS, why the hell do the native apps
come with ads?

What's next? Ads in Calendar and Mail?

~~~
marcell
Those ads are probably to pay the news companies, not Apple. They probably
don’t get any money from Apple so they need some revenue to justify licensing
their content for Apple news.

~~~
dbbk
Yes. If there weren’t ads, publishers would make no money on their content and
it would make no sense to publish through Apple News.

------
bluetwo
I hate to whine but I hope ads are clearly labeled as ads, and also that this
doesn't replace their efforts to make the app store and app discovery more
friendly.

~~~
varenc
Apple's help docs show how the ads appear:
[https://searchads.apple.com/v/help-
basic/a/images/overview/h...](https://searchads.apple.com/v/help-
basic/a/images/overview/how-ads-look_large_2x.jpg)

They seem quite clearly marked as ads.

~~~
noncoml
Yet my elderly parents(50+ and 60+) and quite a few non-techie friends tap on
the first result that comes up when I ask them to install an App.

It’s a reason to not buy them a premium Apple device next time.

~~~
sosborn
Is the Play store better about this?

~~~
aerotwelve
No, but Apple is supposed to be better than Google about this.

What a shame.

------
ikeboy
Related:

I think many companies can run their ads as pay for performance. eBay's ads
are a fixed cost of the product sale - the higher you set it, the more often
your ad shows but you only pay if it leads to a sale.

Platforms simply have so much data and scale they can do a much better job of
targeting than their customers can. It's not efficient for lots of marketers
to test out lots of ads, carefully track conversions, and decide what to spend
on. Just let the platform maximize ads given a certain amount per sale, and
the platform will naturally target based on what converts best (and since this
is Amazon scale or Facebook scale, they can do these tests automatically for
every campaign and get statistically significant results very quickly).

I wish Amazon would roll out eBay style ads. They have all the data and could
do a much better job than sellers, and could capture a significant portion of
the added value it would provide.

------
FriedPickles
Wow, I just set this up for an app and it took less than 60 seconds. That's
surprisingly fast. Good job Apple.

~~~
arielm
Its definitely fast, but... is it actually going to be effective for the cost?
Probably not in the long term.

Having used this “one click” setup on Twitter and Facebook before I know these
campaigns are increasingly ineffective.

That said, the App Store is a different kind of ecosystem so things could go
differently.

~~~
ktta
It's pay-per-user-install so I think it is very easy to determine if it is
worth it for you/

~~~
mmacvicarprett
This will canibalize part of your organic traffic thus even if the cost per
install is lower than your users lifetime value this is not obvious.

------
jeffjose
Advertisers love segmenting and targeting their audience. With Apple's stance
on privacy, how effective will these days be?

In other words - I thought it was widely understood that Apple made excellent
products and was poor in services that required personalization.

~~~
us0r
> With Apple's stance on privacy, how effective will these days be?

IMO Apple's stance on privacy is a bit smoke and mirrors when they allow
tracking services like flurry to exist in apps.

~~~
arielm
I don’t think we can hold Apple responsible for 3rd parties like Flurry. Those
companies will always find a way to do what they do because there is
incredible value in having access to such data (as a developer).

------
bob_theslob646
The better question is what is the purpose?

Don't apps sell themselves?

This seems incredibly similar to pay per click.

Just because someone downloads and an app doesn't mean that they're going to
use it.

If only there was some sort of retention statistic on how often an app is
downloaded and deleted.

I just hope that quality does not suffer. I'm genuinely curious to see if this
will drive user engagement/retention

~~~
jclardy
Apps haven't sold themselves for a while now, unless you have a specific
reason people should share you (see HQ Trivia's growth.) If you build the
world's best todo app it will have zero traction without a massive marketing
budget because the competition is already settled. And if you build something
new, but niche, you have the same problem - you need to get to the top of
search results, but you can't do that without download quantity.

You do get retention stats from Apple, I think it also breaks it down via
source (organic vs search ad). Also I'm not sure why people are just realizing
this now, these ads have existed for the past 6 months or so. This is just a
way to set it up faster for people that don't want to configure their
targeting.

------
bitmapbrother
The ads are very insidious. I've never seen such deceptive ads on the Google
Play store, but here we are on the App Store.

------
amluto
> No expertise needed. > > Setting up your account is easy. Simply tell us
> your app > and monthly budget. Our intelligent automation creates your > ad
> and matches it to interested users.

Wow -- you don't have to have any marketing competence whatsoever. Just pay
Apple per install and they'll magic it up.

------
almostdigital
And here we go, slipperiest of slopes

------
cameron67
To me this looks like an indirect way for Apple to extract more money from
developers.

Since it's so easy to set up a campaign that does not lose money (it's pay per
install), imagine _every_ developer setting up a campaign with their app's
price as maximum bid (ignoring revenue shares to simplify). Lots of installs,
but zero revenue for developers.

------
emersonrsantos
I don't want to buy installs, I want more engagement that I can't buy but need
to deliver.

~~~
shostack
This is about risk. You want less risk and so does Apple. Since app quality is
a crap shoot, they won't and don't need to offer that kind of model. Likewise,
you should build into your model how much you can afford to spend knowing some
subset of installs will be lower quality.

------
yoz-y
Apple store had search ads for a while now, does this mean that they are out
of beta?

------
verytrivial
I can't see how this is different from payola. (Saying that Google does it too
is not an argument, btw.)

------
eganist
Ah, damn. There goes Apple's Privacy Favoritism.

~~~
wlesieutre
[https://searchads.apple.com/privacy/](https://searchads.apple.com/privacy/)

> No user tracking - Search Ads does not profile users based on their search
> queries, and no data from other Apple Apps — including Health, Apple Pay and
> HomeKit — is used to deliver ads.

> No data sharing - No individual user data is exposed to advertisers, only
> aggregate campaign delivery information is made available.

~~~
stingraycharles
For how long, though? If this service will become successful (which it likely
will be), there will be a huge monetization opportunity by allowing more
targeted ads e.g. based on other app installs.

~~~
ajharrison
Apple is in the hardware business. They don’t want to get into ads.

~~~
richforrester
Without meaning to be a tit;

> Search Ads Basic

Why does this not count as "getting into ads"? Genuinely don't see the
difference. And to be fair, the product kinda puzzles me in the first place.
Is it really only an ad at the top of app store search pages?

~~~
ajharrison
Let me clarify for you: They’re not _seriously_ in the ads business and they
never will because it’s full of privacy issues. They’re using ads here to help
people find the app they’re looking for - that’s it. It’s contained within the
App Store to help people find ads. How much rev has apple made from iAd? Prob
not a lot

------
tim--
> Available in U.S. storefront only.

Wait, what? Why is it only in U.S. storefronts? Does this mean I have to walk
into an Apple store to get the Ads?

~~~
jacoblambda
no it means that ads are only being rolled out to the US app store at the
moment

------
gbugniot
[off-topic] Is the MacBook Pro 15 available in gold now?
[https://searchads.apple.com/v/basic/a/images/overview/hero_m...](https://searchads.apple.com/v/basic/a/images/overview/hero_medium_2x.jpg)

