

How to double your app's downloads with keyword optimization - mrborgen
http://blog.discofingers.com/blog/2014/10/8/how-to-double-your-downloads-with-keywords-optimization

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Someone1234
Is this an advert for Sensor Tower? Certainly reads like one.

Is there any way to get this information (competitor's keywords, keyword app
usage, and popularity) without paying $78/month? How do "Sensor Tower" get it?

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mrborgen
Hi there, I am the author of the article.

I have no connection to SensorTower, other than a couple of mails I have sent
to them, to suggest features and improvements.

However, SensorTower has been the core of our optimisation strategies, so it's
just how I had to write this article.

I do think they are to expensive, yes, but I use them since I know that they
work. Appcodes is cheaper, only 15 USD per month, but I haven't tried them in
a while. However the found is commenting this thread.

Maybe he has something to add about their new upgrade?

Wish someone from AppAnnie/SearchMan/MobileDevHQ would join the discussion to.

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Pistus
Thanks for a great article. Do you know if the keywords used in reviews have
any impact on rating? I assume not since it's the first thing to be gamed.

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mrborgen
Thanks!

I am not sure, but I don't think so, for the same reason as you.

However, I have heard your overall ratings (and I suspect comments too) will
affect your rankings for keywords in general. One of the best way of climbing
the keyword ranks is by getting great ratings.

~~~
kolinko
I spent a ton of time testing the Apple's search algorithm for AppCodes.com -
didn't find any relationship between ratings and keyword ranks.

Here's a summary of what I found out: [http://www.slideshare.net/kolinko/new-
rules-in-app-store-sea...](http://www.slideshare.net/kolinko/new-rules-in-app-
store-search)

Basically - neither downloads, nor ratings, nor description counts.

~~~
mrborgen
Thats interesting. How do you think they rank them then?

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kolinko
No idea - whatever we did, we never managed to move apps' positions one way or
another.

I've also seen apps that have few downloads, few rankings and lousy reviews,
but get positioned higher than competitors that are more popular and have
better rankings. Although popularity seems to have some influence.

What I'm telling people is to see if they rank high. If they do - keep the
words/phrases. If they don't - forget them, and look for some other ones.

~~~
mrborgen
That last sentence pretty much sums up ASO :)

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romaroma
Appstore optimization makes sense when you have 50 daily downloads but want to
have 100. Relying on search results only wont make you lot of money there.

Anyway in most cases you can start with buggy SensorTower to find out what
keywords will bring you more relevant traffic at lower competition. After than
just keep tracking things with a free AppAnnie ASO tool.

~~~
androidb
SensorTower is buggy and annoying, I much prefer AppAnnie & MobileDevHq. I
compared[1] them a while back and ended up concluding that the free tiers of
AppAnnie/MobileDevHQ are enough to do some basic ASO.

[1] [http://www.androidb.com/2014/07/10-tools-to-help-with-
google...](http://www.androidb.com/2014/07/10-tools-to-help-with-google-play-
store-optimization-for-your-app/)

~~~
kolinko
A nice writeup. As for AppCodes.com, you missed some stuff we offer:

We've got competitor tracking, support for other languages and data export
(downloading csv with the search phrases+results). We also support the pre-
launch analysis :) There's also an AppStore prediction tool that is quite
unique compared to the competition ( [http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/12/appcod-
es-launches-app-stor...](http://techcrunch.com/2012/03/12/appcod-es-launches-
app-store-prediction-tool-tells-developers-which-keywords-work/) )

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androidb
I'll look at that again and update it, thanks for the heads up. Maybe these
were features you've added later, as I tested all those tools.

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niklas_a
But what nobody tells you about ASO is that these users are much more
unqualified than the other users you get. Downloads coming from friend
referrals or reading an article about your app are much more likely to give
you a good rating or convert into a paying user.

~~~
mrborgen
Hmmm.. What do you base that upon? My stats tell a different story. The
downloads are usually of high quality.

This of course depends wether or not you manage to keep the keywords highly
relevant. And the technique I am describing usually forces people to be more
specific and add more relevant keywords. (Rather than what most app developers
do, which is adding generic words like "fun,game,kids,book,music").

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mrborgen
Hi everybody!

Thanks for all comments, if anybody need some tips / advice regarding their
own App Store Optimisation, feel free to contact me at:

per@discofingers.com

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chrismoen
How much does a keyword in the title actually matter in ASO?

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mrborgen
It matters quite a lot. More than the regular keywords. Therefore you should
squeeze a few of the most important keywords in the apps title. But it
shouldn't get to spammy, as I have a feeling that that scares people away.

If you have an exact match (i.e. "music maker") between search and title, you
chances of ranking high increases significantly.

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andreash
Have you tried SearchMan for analysing keywords?

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mrborgen
Just slightly. Might be that they are equally as good as SensorTower. I just
got used to SensorTower early on, and have been using them since.

Also tried Appcod.es for a while, but the seemed to stop improving their
service.

Anybody else who knows other potential good tools for keyword optimisation?

~~~
kolinko
Hi, AppCodes founder here - we recently made a major design update.

As for adding new features: anything specific you were missing?

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mrborgen
Hi! Good to hear, would love to try it out. I liked the service when I tested
it a couple of years ago.

However, what made me not return was your paywall, which is placed right after
the login. In other words, I could do anything without paying.

Given all the free tools out there, this approach made me skeptical.

I am not an expert on SaaS, but I suspect it would be better to give people
some kind of freemium option.

~~~
kolinko
It really depends - there's been some posts on HN criticising the freemium
approach:

\- [http://www.tylernichols.com/web-development/i-am-done-
with-t...](http://www.tylernichols.com/web-development/i-am-done-with-the-
freemium-business-model) \- [http://blog.rapportive.com/is-freemium-right-for-
you](http://blog.rapportive.com/is-freemium-right-for-you)

When building AppCodes I decided to sacrifice the learning curve for the ease
of use once the tool is understood.

This kinds of products don't work well when published with freemimum plans -
people don't try to understand the product, skip the tutorials, sign up for
free, spend 5 seconds evaluating the tool, and unless the learning curve is
very calm - leave.

What I prefer is for people to take a while and make sure they understand the
ASO process ( [http://www.slideshare.net/kolinko/appcodes-app-store-
marketi...](http://www.slideshare.net/kolinko/appcodes-app-store-marketing-
toolbox-11535165) ), and then - once signed up, to spend a while learning the
tool. The expectation is that the ones that go through this will get a better
experience afterwards. The ones that won't - there's a no-questions asked
refund :)

Another thing with freemium is that it works best with products that people
use consistently for months and years. While this might be the case for web
SEO or for app sales tracking, in case of App Store SEO it really isn't. You
want to spend 3-5 months setting up your position, and once it's all set and
you can forget about it.

If I was running a freemium service, I'd have to find some tricks to keep
bringing people back. I'd also be more inclined to gear the service towards
the app developers with more than one app - because only those devs would
bring in the profit.

I don't track our competition too closely, but the last time I checked, that
was what they were doing. Publishing charts of your position, and sending you
e-mails of your daily rankings (even though rankings in the app store rarely
ever change), and moving towards Enterprise customers. They also tend to
deliver an interface that's easy to learn, but not that effective really (e.g.
they don't bother distinguishing between iTunes keywords, and App Store search
phrases). At least that was the case with the ones I checked...

If you disagree, I'd greatly appreciate a reply :)

~~~
mrborgen
I see your point. Especially about the retention part. It's not really a
prouct which people use for years. Though I wonder; could it be? What if you
included daily downloads stats too? I use AppFigures for that, but I really
with they would include keywords intelligence to, so that I didn't have to use
so many services.

The thing is though, when I don't even get to see the interface before I pay,
I would really need a lot of good reviews from friends before I sign up.

You should clean up your front page to, it's a but messy. Don't mean to be
rude it's just my honest opinion.

Love your Slideshows by the way! :)

~~~
kolinko
Thanks for the feedback. As for the daily downloads - as you said - we'd have
to compete with AppFigures.

As for seeing the interface - did you see the demo? (
[http://www.appcodes.com/demologin/](http://www.appcodes.com/demologin/) ).
Not trying to make a sale here, just curious.

Thanks for the feedback regarding the front page. Can you be a bit more
specific here? What seems too messy for you? (btw. e-mail support@appcodes.com
if you'd like a free account as a "thank you")

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rsendv
When are you launching Disco Fingers?

~~~
mrborgen
Thanks for asking! We might send it in to Apple today actually. Our dealine
was two weeks ago, but you know how it its :)

Do you think it looks interesting?

In hindsight, we probably should have published this article after release...
Didn't even dream of getting on the front page of HN.

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redbar0n
How about localisation?

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mrborgen
That's extremely important, yes, and we do that too. We'll write an article
about that later on.

In general, you should localize both keywords and screenshots (and maybe even
title, but that depends) for the following languages:

\- Spanish \- Portuguese \- French \- Italian \- Russian

We also do it for Chinise and Japanese.

The key here is to find translators who understand the game, which can be
difficult if you are talking to traditional translation agencies. I find that
some people on Odesk and Elance with marketing and translation experience do a
great do at this. And they are quite affordable :)

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kolinko
What's worth noting is that in U.S. Apple seems to position apps both for
american and spanish keywords.

In other words: if you have spanish words in your keyword list, Apple will
consider them in the U.S. search.

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mrborgen
I know, thats a nice little "secret". What do you think would happen if you
added a bunch of engligh words in the spanish localisation?

