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3 App Store Optimization (ASO) Strategies You Should Be Testing for 2020

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App Masters13:37Open on YouTube
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The bottom line

To get downloads in a crowded app store, test three things: copy and screenshots that raise conversion, a short brand name tied to your main keyword, and emojis or symbols that make your listing stand out. Old keyword tricks are now common knowledge, so winning means being more persuasive, more memorable and more visible in the search results.

Key takeaways

  • Search results are crowded, so conversion is the first lever to test. 0:48
    • A Google Play experiment on a phone number app found that a social proof short description beat the keyword-heavy version by about 15%.
    • Keyword rankings can dip even as conversions rise, so check for a net benefit.
  • Screenshots and short descriptions work as ads, because they are what shoppers see in search. 2:35
    • Adding one social proof screenshot with customer logos raised an older client's downloads by 91%, with no keyword or subtitle changes.
    • On iPhone the first three screenshots matter most, and on Google Play the short description does.
  • A short brand name linked to the main keyword builds search volume over time. 3:37
    • Unplug (meditation), Slumber (sleep stories) and Playlist (music) each rank for their generic term and also get branded searches.
    • Big dating apps like Tinder and Bumble each get more searches than "online dating".
  • Reverse dictionary tools help find brand names and keywords with search volume. 7:04
    • OneLook turns "meditation" into related words such as stillness, reflection and restfulness.
    • Check those words in an ASO tool for volume and for how many other apps already use them.
  • Emojis, symbols and a current year make a listing stand out and feel new. 8:51
    • Emojis worked in a Google Play short description and in a developer name, and a "2020" icon made an app look up to date.
    • iOS blocks emojis, but some developers use Unicode symbols in their app names to stand out.

As the app store gets more and more crowded, it's harder and harder to stand out, so as an indie developer or founder you're going to have to find little ways to make your app stand out.

Steve P. Young

Chapter summaries

0:00 Why old ASO hacks fade, and how to test conversion

Awareness is hard to win in the store, so the listing text must persuade rather than just carry keywords.

  • Old hacks stop working because the algorithms keep changing. 0:17
    • Apple and Google keep testing their ranking to give users the best experience.
    • Staying ahead means running your own experiments, not copying what worked before.
    • Three strategies are offered for 2020, starting with conversion.
  • Write the short description like an ad, not a keyword list. 0:48
    • The tip came from Laura at AppTweak (apptweak.com).
    • The winning text read like a Facebook ad and used the app's big numbers.
    • The old version was packed with target keywords.
    • After the switch, keyword rankings slid very little.
    • Short descriptions on Google Play still carry heavy ranking weight, so test both versions.

3:37 Build a short brand tied to your keyword

A brand name that echoes your main keyword lets one name earn both generic and branded search traffic.

  • Good app names are short and hint at the keyword. 3:37
    • Unplug suggests letting go to meditate, and Slumber suggests sleep.
    • Playlist fits a free music app that imports any playlist.
    • Calm, another client, was featured by Apple.
    • Slumber was also featured by Apple, helped by beautiful screenshots.
  • Branded search volume is a foundation you can build on. 5:50
    • These clients already drove downloads from their own brand terms.
    • An ASO specialist then builds on that base.
    • The stated goal is to grow downloads 2X, 3X or even 10X.
    • The name ranks for the keyword and also becomes a search term itself.

6:49 Finding brand names with a reverse dictionary

A reverse dictionary turns one main keyword into many brand name candidates that already carry search volume.

  • OneLook gives far more related words than a thesaurus. 7:04
    • Paste the candidates into an ASO tool. Keep the ones with volume that few other apps use.
    • Steve P. Young has shared this tool since 2014, when he started the podcast and YouTube channel.
    • Other candidates he reads out include "mystic" and "musing". He hasn't researched any of them yet.
  • A brand name with almost no traffic can grow as the app gains downloads. 8:28
    • As the app ranks for the main keyword, awareness lifts the brand name's own searches.
    • His example is a name starting at a traffic score of about 2.
    • He has seen the same thing happen with other apps.

8:48 Standing out with emojis, years and symbols

Keyword tricks are common knowledge, so small visual details in the name, icon and description decide who gets the tap.

  • The few things shown in search results are where to stand out. 9:15
    • On iOS, shoppers see the app name and screenshots. On Google Play, they see the name and short description.
    • The "2020" meditation icon came out while it was still 2019. It has 5,000+ reviews and ranks decently for "meditation".
    • A year badge makes an app feel new and not left unupdated.
    • The 2019 badge on another app is read as one more trick it uses.
  • Fitness apps on Google Play are the best place to spot new hacks. 10:07
    • An emoji in a fitness app's developer name caught his eye and made him want to click.
    • He says developers in this category are very competitive and willing to try other things too.
  • Symbols in iOS app names help an app win simple searches. 11:39
    • Apps such as Equilibrium use an infinity symbol, a square and shapes in the name.
    • Searches like "square", "shapes" or "infinity" show these apps standing out from plain names.
    • He thinks the symbols are Unicode. He doesn't know which ones Apple allows.

In the growth library

Steve P. Young, Founder of App Masters, app marketing agency. Three ASO experiments to test: optimize for conversion with social proof, build a keyword-related brand name, and use emojis and symbols to stand out in search results. Social proof tests gave a 15% lift on Google Play and a 91% download increase on iOS without changing any keywords.

More from App Masters · The whole library, and ask it anything

Transcript367 lines
0:00

what is up app nation it is Steve P young founder of at masters dot-com the police you go when you want actually bad content related to helping you grow downloads for your mobile app today I want to talk about some of the ASO experiments that you should be testing in 2020 look the brutal truth is it's very difficult to get any type of awareness in the App Store these days and it's always a constantly ever-changing algorithm that Apple and Google are always testing because they want to make sure the end user us the end user has the best experience and so some of the hacks that used to work may not be working anymore so how do you really stay ahead in 2020 well I want to go through three different strategies just for you number one optimized for conversions look guys this was a tip that I got from Laura from apt week Gradius so told that you guys should check out is called apt week.com but she

0:59

said use your short description to optimize for conversion and so I said all right Laurie I'm gonna give it a shot and see what happens so here's the results from one of our clients this is the Google Play experiment that we ran and here's what we saw that actually using social proof had a better install rate from a conversion perspective than just having the current version and the current version obviously had a lot of different keywords that we were trying to target whereas the social proof version said we had this was for a phone number app and essentially we had 800 thousands of cities but we're it's really highlighting the social proof of the app and talking about some of the big numbers that were included within the app and rather than having making sure that we had all the right keywords we just said hey look this is what a good ad would look like right when I say ad like a Facebook ad this is what we

1:59

would be be saying in a Facebook ad in our screenshots and so we decided test it out and we actually saw really good results in that there was a about a 15% increase in terms of performance and so we applied that social proof version and we didn't see too much of a slide when it came to keywords now short description in the Google Play Store is still highly weighted so make sure you test with your versions out and see which one performs better because maybe your keyword rankings take a dip even though your conversions go up so maybe there's a net benefit there I also wanted to talk about social proof and screenshots so when you think about optimizing for conversions think about also optimizing your screenshots always for conversions and so this I'm gonna quickly go through this because I've talked about this at length in other videos but essentially here's one of our older clients and we saw a 91% increase

2:51

in downloads without any changing without changing any keywords the subtitle nothing and we saw a great improvement in downloads almost double the downloads into what they we did we added this one main screenshot because for the iPhone the first three are gonna be really important on Google Play the short description is really important because that's what's shown in the search results right so when you think about optimizing for conversions things to think about what's showing in the search results on Google Play it's gonna be these the short description on iOS it's gonna be these first three screenshots and so you want to really make sure that you have the social proof in your search results and this is this customer has some amazing customer of their own using the app and so we highlighted the logos in there number two here's what I've noticed is the apps out there that really think from a

3:41

long-term perspective they build a brand and I want to go through some of the examples that I've experienced with some of my past clients have done really well in the app space right unplug so this is a great meditation app and you're gonna start to see a theme so let me see if you guys can pick it up but unplug is a meditation app and obviously unplug is a great name for a meditation app right you're letting go you're unplugging from everyday life and you're really starting to meditate and really be calm right in the calm is another one so this was a great app another client of ours and this was featured by Apple this is also featured by advil slumbers and it's an app that does sleep stories so it helps you fall asleep they're fantastic well design app we're able to get it featured by Apple and their screenshots are beautiful as you can see but slumber fall asleep slumber makes sense right they're starting to

4:36

build a brand and the last one when I highlight is another app that I've been working with for a very long time and we've been doing really really well on his playlist and it's a music app it's a free music app so you guys should definitely check it out you can import any playlist that you want and you can stream this music for free now I pay for Apple music but if you don't want to pay for any of these streaming services like Apple music or Spotify you can use playlist and stream all your favorite playlists music for free sort of like camp Pandora but you get to decide what kind of songs you want to listen to so check it out and it's cool because it's a it's a way that you can share playlists and listen together but it's a really good app but I love that name playlist for a music app right and so if you think about building a brand you think about keywords and brand and what are some key words that are very short

5:29

and very sweet but that are also related to the main keyword that I want to rank for so unplug meditation slumber sleep stories sleep in general write playlist music they're all this brand is related to the main generic ASO keyword that I will rank for so that's what I'm talking about when I say building a brand it allows you to do both one rank really well for the keyword that you're ultimately trying to go after and then secondly the brand name itself start starts having search volume as well so when I started doing ASO for these clients like I came up with something that was easy because they were already ranking well for their branded terms playlist slumber and unplug they're able to drive downloads just from that branded term because there's already search volume for that so that's why I'm talking about you're able to leverage your brand name and really have the search volume there already without

6:26

really not doing that much with a so you get a professional like me working on a so we're able to really 2 X 3 X 10 exit the downloads but you start having some foundation already and you're brand starts having volume so if you think about the online dating space I can tell you for a fact that tinder Bumble you know coffee meets bagel all the big dating apps have a greater search volume than online dating so think about building a brand and I'm gonna give you a tool that I really love using when I'm thinking about terms that are related to the main term that I want to use and this tool is called one look like I've shared this since what 2014 few down 13 when I first started sharing content through the podcast and YouTube channel but one look is an awesome tool that I use to really think about different keyword ideas and so if you put meditation into one look and it's essentially at this source right but

7:22

it's a reverse dictionary and gives you so many more keywords than that thesaurus would and so it's called one look reverse dictionary and I'll link it up into the description as well but here you can see all the different keywords or brand names that is related that are related to meditation and you can find one you can put all these keywords into your favorite ASO tool and see which ones have volume and which ones have other apps called this if there aren't too many then you could start ranking well for these keywords because they will have search volume so let me try to find one stillness right that might be one look I haven't done research yet but that might be one minute that's interesting right meditation obviously or mediation reflection reflection musing thoughtfulness so like these becomes certain keywords that you may one want to have in your keyword field but to also name your app this particularly

8:16

phrase because then you're able to leverage the search flying that comes with these particular keywords so like mystic might be interesting to do to think about to restfulness you know and then hopefully as you start picking up steam for your downloads and ranking well for meditation what will happen is the brand name if it doesn't already have traffic in the very beginning let's say you find one it has like a two traffic right but because you're starting to build that brand name get some awareness that brand name will start picking up and I've seen that with other as well and the last one is to use emojis to stand out look again it is very very difficult everybody knows the keyword optimization tricks everybody knows a lot of different stuff out there and so one way you want to stand out is to use emojis make your icons stand out make your app name stand out make your short description stand out kind of like what

9:08

I just said before with social proof so you can want to use you want to leverage emojis to really make something stand out within the search results because if I'm looking for a meditation app I'm gonna start looking at what the search results show that's the app name and that's gonna be the screenshots on iOS on Google Play it's gonna be the app name a short description so how do you make sure that your app stands out in this whole sea of search results so let's go through some examples I saw Walt doing some research alright so here's one I did meditation as you can see as of this recording it's still 2019 but they're starting to leverage 2020 already so now you can start to see like hey oh I'm already thinking ahead this icon really stands out to me it says 2020 let me go check out that yeah and they've done really well right like if they got five thousand plus reviews it's it's ranking decently for

9:57

meditation when I look for it and so this stands out to me as having something uniquely different than all the other search results out there and when I talk about mo G's check out this one that I found as well I did exercise cuz I gotta tell you guys if you ever want to figure out like what people are doing look up fitness type of apps in specially on Google Play they're gonna be doing some really creative things and so if you're thinking about what what are the new hacks pay attention to the fitness category except these guys are really competitive and willing and do other things but the one thing I want to point out here is he's using emoji in his developer name didn't know that was possible but that's what he's doing and guess what stood out to me I saw this little emoji in the search results not made me want to click on it and so that's why I have this particular screenshot because this actually stood

10:45

out to me alright the next one and this was a pass podcast guess of mine and they talked about this frequently actually they talked about this in the interview but the the app they're using emojis in the short description and they be tested it and they said look it performs a lot better with having emojis in there if you listen to that episode he talks a lot about the different tricks in there and so I'm assuming obviously the 2019 little badge is gonna be a little another trick and so as you can see 2020s already starting to happen and that other app is starting to really utilize at 20:20 and so what I want to point out is by having that year it makes your app feel newer like up-to-date rather than something that's been around that maybe hasn't been updated and with that type of 20/20 being called out it makes it feel like it's new to brand new and everybody loves brand new stuff right now on the

11:39

iOS side I want to show you guys this developer and I've done this trick a bunch of different times but essentially you can see through their apps that they're using these little things little symbols on iOS now on iOS you can't use emojis and I don't know what kind of symbols these are so I don't know what Apple allows you to use and what they don't but I'm pointing to these guys because obviously they've been able to use a bunch of different and for the developers out there I think it's Unicode right that you can pull out these things but you can see like they've done some really cool stuff in making their app name stand out equilibrium they have this little symbol shapes one-line the infinity symbol this square they're using these things so when you start searching for something very simple like maybe square or square it or shapes or infinity slice that you're able that these apps actually

12:31

stand out a lot more than your other apps and that's what the whole point is as the app store gets more and more crowded more more app developers are continually coming into the space it's harder and harder to stand out and so you don't know as an indie developer or as a founder you're gonna have to find little ways to make your app stand out and I love this because it sort of fits in line with the app name as well alright guys that's it as we move on to the new year like there's gonna be some exciting new things iOS 13 has completely changed the game for ASO within Apple and then I'm sure Google is doing no time more stuff as well so stay tuned I hope to share more and more content with you in the upcoming year and I look forward to we seen you guys because we got some events planned for next year as well so look be on the lookout for that that's it I'll see you on the next video you