Table Of ContentApp Store Optimization (ASO)
White Paper
Part 1
Breaking the Discovery Code-
How to Achieve Top Search Rankings
Author
Ryan Weber, Co-Founder / Chief Product Officer, NativeX
Contributors
Japheth Dillman, Co-Founder / Chief Creative Officer, YetiZen
Hugh Kimura, Marketing Manager, Apptamin
Gabe Kwakyi, Co-Founder / CEO, Incipia
©2016 NativeX Holdings LLC. All rights reserved. No duplication without attribution. No part
of this publication—digital or otherwise—may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by
any means—except as noted below.
A person having registered to receive this publication is hereby granted permission to copy
and publish a portion of it not to exceed [2] consecutive pages provided that the content is
attributed to the copyright holder, NativeX Holdings, LLC and the publication includes a link
back to the NativeX website where a user may register and obtain access to the publication in
full. Full republishing of the entire white paper is not permitted.
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 1
Executive Summary
App Store Optimization (ASO) is the process of improving various elements of app submission
and marketing techniques to help achieve higher ranking in an app store’s search results. With
67% of users reporting that the last app they downloaded was found via an app store search,
learning how to improve search ranking within those stores has become one of the most critical
publisher ASO requirements. This white paper addresses the various free and paid solutions
available to better understand the scope of what to do in order to achieve better app visibility,
discoverability and conversions.
What Questions Does This White Paper Answer?
• What is ASO?
• What motivates users to download an app?
• How are users finding/ discovering apps?
• What impact do paid installs have on organic installs?
• What do you need to measure for effective search discovery?
• How do you pick the right keywords?
• What tools are available to help with keyword selection?
• How does relevance, difficulty and popularity affect keyword prioritization?
• What are On-Page and Off-Page influence factors?
• Which On-Page factors can improve your search rank?
• Which Off-Page factors can improve your search rank?
• How do you optimize paid campaign delivery for the purpose of influencing
Off-Page factors?
• What can you do in your app to influence Ratings and Reviews to improve
ranking and conversion rate?
• What are best practices for optimizing your app store click-through
& conversion rates?
• What tools are available to help with AB Testing to determine best assets to use?
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 2
Introduction
In the competitive sea of over 1.51 million apps available in each of the Google Play and Apple
App Stores, many developers have experienced the “Invisible App Syndrome” - the crushing
reality of publishing an app that never finds an audience because the audience never finds the
app.
The goal of this white paper is to analyze what motivates users to download apps, how they find
apps, and to suggest practical ways of App Store Optimization (ASO) to improve visibility and
results. This white paper is presented in two separate documents. This is Part 1, which focuses
on the impact of Search Discovery (the way the majority of users are navigating to find the app
they want to download).
Part 2 will cover ways to improve App Store Chart Ranking (For both Category and Overall
rankings).
1Statista: Number of apps available in leading app stores as of July 2015 -
http://www.statista.com/statistics/276623/number-of-apps-available-in-leading-app-stores/
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 3
App Store Optimization (ASO)
Optimizing mobile apps to rank higher in an app store’s search results is known as App Store
Optimization (ASO). The higher an app ranks in an app store’s search results, the easier it is for
potential users to discover and download the app.
Motivation to Download
Different users have different motivations for downloading an app. These motivations can gen-
erally be broken down into seven separate categories as follows:
1. Specific Tasks: Users need an app to accomplish a specific task or fill a need
2. WOM: Word of Mouth (Recommendation from trusted source)
3. Ad: Users view and respond to an advertisement for the app
4. Top Charts: Users influenced by app visibility on App Store charts
5. Already Using: Users have either previously used the app or the services of
the company/brand offering the app
6. Social - Organic: Users aware of app through social media (Facebook, Twitter, etc.)
7. Other: Users motivated by something besides these factors listed
Figure 1. Motivation for Last App Downloaded (Android & iOS)
2
Tune: The State of App Discovery in 2015 -
https://www.tune.com/blog/new-white-paper-the-state-of-app-discovery-in-2015/
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 4
How Users Are Finding Apps
Figure 2 (below) shows that 67% of users found the last app they downloaded by using search.
Search dominates the means by which users find the apps they are motivated to download.
Figure 2. App Downloads: Search vs Direct
Paid Downloads Increase Organic Installs
The algorithms used by the app stores heavily favor downloads. A study completed by Tune on
thousands of apps across both Google Play and Apple App Store found that for every paid install
an app receives, it can expect to see an additional 1.5 organic installs (1.5 being the “organic
3
multiplier”). Apps that achieve top chart ranks have been seen to have their organic multiplier
4
grow from 3x to up to 10x .
Because downloads can both directly and indirectly influence how these various motivation
types learn about and find the app, it is important to understand the ways App Store
Optimization (ASO) can maximize your organic install multiplier to take
advantage of this effect.
3
Tune: Understanding the Relationship between Paid and Organic Marketing -
https://www.tune.com/blog/new-white-paper-understanding-the-relationship-between-paid-and-organic-marketing/
4
Yetizen -
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 5
How to Improve Search Discovery Effectiveness
STEP 1: MEASURE PAID & ORGANIC INSTALLS
“If you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it.” - Peter Drucker
Start by ensuring you are measuring the results of your ASO efforts so that you can determine
the impact of each change made.
Measuring Organic Installs - It’s common practice in the industry to calculate your organic
installs by this simple equation:
Organic Installs = Total Installs - Paid Installs
• Total Installs - the number of installs reported by the app store.
• Paid Installs - the number of installs reported by your mobile measurement platform
(ex. AppsFlyer, Tune’s Mobile App Tracking, Kochava, Adjust, etc.)
Google and Apple have recently begun providing expanded and useful app store analytics, such
as app engagement and app store search data (in both stores: Apple by opt-in data from devices
running iOS 8 or later) and the quantity of organic installs (Google).
Tune’s paid “App Store Analytics” service seeks to estimate the organic sources of installs by
splitting up your total organic installs based on your chart, feature, and keyword listings in the
store and their relative influence to your visibility and downloads.
STEP 2: PICK THE RIGHT KEYWORDS
Keywords in ASO are both singular and multi-word phrases searched for by users to find apps.
How do you determine which keywords to use to improve app discovery? Begin by creating a list
based on what words you believe are good matches for your app.
Then, compare your list against the results found from one or more of the popular keyword
research and analytic providers (listed below in Figure 3) that can help you identify potential
keywords based on analysis of your app, seed keywords, competitor’s keywords, and more.
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 6
Mobile Action
Sensor Tower
Figure 3. Comparison Chart of Various Keyword Research & Analytic Providers
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 7
SearchMan
TUNE’s App
Store Analytics
App Annie
Figure 3. Cont Comparison Chart of Various Keyword Research & Analytic Providers
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 8
*Keyword Popularity - means they provide information useful for understanding how frequent-
ly users are searching for the keyword.
**Keyword Difficulty - means they provide information useful for understanding how difficult a
keyword will be to rank for (# of apps, strength of apps).
***Organic Install Sources - means they provide information useful for understanding the # of
installs being driven by keyword.
****Total App Results - means they report on the number of apps indexed for a keyword
(more apps means more competition for rank). Keyword Difficulty is more opaque so it’s good
to know the total number of results in addition to the difficult score to better understand what
you are up against.
In addition to specialized ASO tools, there are several other useful methods to identify rele-
vant keywords for your app. For example, use tools like Google Keyword Planner tool, Google
Trends Tool, Keyword Tool. Or manually type in a singular, seed keyword into Google.com or
the Google Play or Apple App Store search and review the auto fill results. Also consider using a
thesaurus to identify suitable synonyms to identify alternate but similar keywords.
Determine Which Keywords Will Be Most Effective
Once you have a list of potential keywords that you want to use, you need to edit and prioritize
your list. (Limit of 100 characters for Apple App Store) There are three factors you must consider
in selecting keywords for your app in order (Listed from highest to lowest priority):
1. Relevance
2. Difficulty
3. Popularity
Relevance
Which keywords best match my app?
The relevancy of your keywords is the most important factor to start with. Achieving rank for
keywords irrelevant to your app will not have any benefit. if your app has nothing in common
with the keyword, users will either not download or will immediately delete the app, and
possibly leave a negative review if they feel tricked.
©2011-2016 All rights reserved to NativeX Holdings, LLC. 9
Description:While the presence of many apps and a higher difficulty score do mean it is .. out of NYC, managing clients including Airbnb, Cvent, the NHL, and.
