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How to Increase Organic Downloads Without Changing Keywords

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App Masters10:39Open on YouTube
Chapters show their main points

The bottom line

Organic downloads grow when more of the people who see your listing install, and the icon, the screenshots and the ratings drive that. Fixing them lifts downloads and rankings without touching keywords, which hit a ceiling.

Key takeaways

  • Once keywords are set, the listing's conversion rate decides how many downloads you get. 0:39
    • Keywords eventually hit a "glass ceiling", when no obvious new ones are left to add.
    • The listing work goes on top of that keyword foundation and lifts organic ranking and downloads further.
  • A more appealing app icon can double downloads. 2:13
    • In a 2016 test of the app Three Minute Mindfulness, changing only the icon doubled downloads.
    • The icon is the first thing users see, so a visually appealing one wins more installs.
  • Screenshots that state the benefit and lead with social proof also double downloads. 5:08
    • For the signature app eSign Live, downloads rose 98% and conversion rate 91%, while impressions stayed flat.
    • Only the first three screenshots show in search results, so they matter most.
  • More star ratings push keyword rankings higher. 8:46
    • Apple's iOS review prompt can be shown three times per 365 days, and it brings in a lot of ratings.
    • Ratings are the stars and reviews are the written text. The prompt is fully white hat, so there is no need to buy reviews.
  • On iOS you cannot A/B test the listing directly, so test creatives with Apple Search Ads. 6:50
    • Google Play allows live A/B tests.
    • A friend's best first three screenshots were not the ones he expected, and reordering them raised downloads.

The app icon is the first thing users see, so if you have something visually appealing, they're more likely to download your app.

Steve P. Young

Chapter summaries

0:00 Why the listing beats keywords

Work on the store listing raises downloads through conversion, and exposure follows.

  • Three listing tips raise downloads without any keyword work. 0:27
    • No keyword research and no spreadsheets are needed.
    • Each tip comes with a real case study.
    • The focus is conversion, meaning more of the people who see the app install it.
    • Better conversion also helps exposure, though that is a side effect.

1:14 Tip one: the app icon

A visually appealing icon is the most critical listing asset, and the winner is hard to guess.

  • The better icon is often not the one you would pick. 1:26
    • Viewers are shown icons A and B and asked to choose. B won.
    • Rich, a friend of Steve's, ran the test on his app.
    • He changed nothing else, not even the keywords.
    • The test is from years ago and is still valid today.
    • Steve has made many videos on icons on his channel.

2:51 Tip two: screenshots

Screenshots convert when they explain the app fast and use the customers' own words.

  • New screenshots lead with the app's purpose, then social proof. 3:11
    • The old set was plain screens of the app.
    • The first new shot says "simple electronic signatures", so the purpose is clear at once.
    • The second shot shows the well-known companies that use the app.
    • Features and benefits come after those two shots.
    • The app is a signature app, formerly eSign Live and now called Once.
  • The words for screenshots come from your own reviews. 4:34
    • Look through reviews in App Annie for phrases customers say they love.
    • Put those phrases in the screenshots.
    • The keywords were not changed, so the before and after comparison is valid.
    • Steve has a separate video on how to make compelling screenshots.

5:20 Screenshots that lift conversion

Flat impressions prove the screenshots caused the gain, and a homepage layout makes them work.

  • Flat impressions show the lift came from the screenshots, not the keywords. 5:22
    • The keywords were untouched, so steady impressions were the goal.
    • Downloads per impression almost doubled.
    • Steve's reaction to the flat impressions: yes that's what I wanted.
    • The same screenshot change doubled downloads without adding any traffic.
  • Lay the screenshots out like a website homepage. 6:04
    • The first screen is the headline: the main theme of what the app does.
    • The second screen shows customer logos.
    • The next screens list other benefits.
    • Benefits go front and center so people get the app instantly.
    • Nearly every homepage has these same three parts.

6:50 Testing which three screenshots win

iOS has no live listing test, so Search Ads stand in for it.

  • Search Ads let you compare screenshot sets on iOS. 7:01
    • Google Play lets you run live tests as often as you like.
    • On iOS, run ads with the same words and different screenshots.
    • The results show which three screenshots perform best.
    • Only the creative changes between ads, so any difference comes from the screenshots.
    • A follow-up on running this test with Search Ads is promised.

7:32 Reviews through the iOS prompt

The built-in prompt gets real ratings from your own users with almost no work.

  • The review prompt is an easy, honest way to collect ratings. 7:39
    • Apple makes it simple, so buying reviews is unnecessary.
    • Three prompts a year sounds small, but most users answer the first one.
    • It takes little code to add.
    • Typical user behavior: tap yes, I like this game, and submit.
    • Steve just added it to one of his own apps and will report back.

9:05 Three fixes on top of the keyword base

Icon, screenshots and reviews are cheap tests that keep rankings climbing after keywords are done.

  • Test the icon, screenshots and reviews once keywords are set. 9:12
    • Each is a simple fix that needs no keyword change.
    • The keywords are the foundation, and these fixes climb the ladder above it.
    • The result is higher organic search placement and more downloads.
    • Organic growth is the point, because anybody can spend money.

In the growth library

Steve P. Young, Founder of App Masters, app marketing agency. Three listing changes can lift organic downloads without touching keywords: the app icon, the first screenshots, and ratings from the iOS review prompt. Case studies show doubled downloads from an icon change alone and a 98% download increase from new screenshots.

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

Transcript276 lines
0:00

coming up I'm gonna show you three simple ways to increase your downloads without touching your keywords stay tuned what is up app nation it is Steve P young founder of at masters comm you know the place you go when you want action-packed content in the app business and today I wanted to create this video because I'm gonna show you three simple ways to increase your downloads without doing any keyword research without pulling all my crazy spreadsheets together and just really focusing more on your app store listing so it's more about increasing your conversions rather than your exposure all right which is gonna help your exposure as well but you don't have to touch with these three simple tips you don't you're not even gonna touch your keywords all you're gonna do is focus on these three two simple tips imma show you real case studies where we've been able to dramatically increase downloads

1:05

with these three simple tips so without further ado let's get to it here we go alright here we go let's go let's get into this how do you increase downloads without changing your keywords number one tip can you guys guess it the app icon it is so stinkin critical I've shared these this case study for a very long time now and it's something that I love this case study cuz just shows you the power of the app icon alright so I'm gonna give you a little test I know if you guys have seen this before if you if you've been on any of my webinars I've used this case study before but here it is alright a versus B so I'm gonna give you a second since this is not some interaction but which icon do you think one A or B it was actually B check this out this my friend rich who's got a great app that you guys should check out it's called a three minute mindfulness so it's searched for that in the app store but rich did this test way back in

2:10

2016 and it's still valid today but he increased I mean he doubled his downloads just by changing the app icon he didn't change anything else no keywords no nothing just change the app icon and saw a dramatic increase in downloads and that's the power of how a really visually appealing app icon I've created tons of videos on this so go search on YouTube for this on my channel but the fact is the app icon is the first thing users see so if you you have something visually appealing they're more likely to download your app and that's what rich was able to do to change nothing else nothing else but is that by cohn alright number two this is the easy one screenshots alright i'm gonna show you a screenshot of some of my clients in case study that we did and it's so powerful i'll show you the power of the screenshots alright so this is again conversion optimization here it is here's the old screenshots and here are

3:11

the new screenshots so this is for a a signature app you guys go check it out it's called once banned now but it's it was formerly called e sign live and this was a client that we helped with their screenshots and I started thinking through like what would make sense the thing about this company and the reason why I really loved working with them is they've got some major players okay some major players using their app okay using their platform so if you look at this here's what these screenshots used to look like where it's just pretty much if I can be so honest it's pretty much shots of the actual app right screens of the actual app and here's what we did look we wanted to call it simple electronic signatures boom that's pretty simple this this visual kind of tells you exactly what the app does right you can sign it so boom I wanted that as the first one just to tell you exactly what the app but does and then secondly

4:05

look guys I always say this lead with social proof so we led with this we said hey II signed live is used by all these great companies that you know of and then so forth we went into some of the other features other benefits now features other benefits that the app provides later on and I have another video so I'm gonna try to link this all up into the show notes into the app description but another video that shows you like how to create compelling screenshots because this is so valuable and the thing that I do if you don't wanna watch that video is I look at my reviews so if you go into your app Annie and you look at all your reviews they're gonna be certain phrase is that your clients your customers are saying that they love the mouse those are the ones those are the words to use in your screenshots all right very simple so let's look at the results what did this old one do and this new

4:54

one do and here's what we did to make sure that we had valid stats is we didn't change the keywords we're like okay let's compare after these new screenshots were posted and then versus before here's what happened and ninety-eight percent increase in downloads we doubled downloads just by changing those screenshots so this old versus new and you get double the screenshots now impressions were flat which is good because I didn't want because we didn't change the keywords so impressions say pretty flat I was like yes that's what I wanted and then we got double the downloads just by changing those screenshots right and then we got a 91% so if you want to look at the overall a 91% increase in the conversion rate so if you compared the downloads over impressions we're able to almost double that as well now what you want to do is focus on the first three screenshots they are the most critical why because those are the three

5:55

screenshots that actually appear in the search results okay those are the ones that are gonna catch a users eye right and if you don't know see the way I like to do it is always talk about the benefits talk about what the app does a front and center so that people instantly get it right kind of think about it like a web page you got the headline which is the first screen right the main theme that people see and then you got the logos there is always logos featured in our customers are right so same thing here that's what we're doing and then we're talking about the features three four right if you think about any website out there those are the three core components that you're gonna they're gonna have on the homepage right you have the headline that tells you a little bit about what the website does this is what the app does second part section would be the logos of our customers and then third part is just

6:46

other benefits to the app right that's the way I like to frame it out but if you really want to a be test on iOS now Google Play you can a/b test all you want right it's it's live you can do there's other videos to show you how to do that I have that on the channel but if you want to do on iOS you can't do that the way to do it is do search ads and I'll create another video on this but you can test different creatives using the same words and different screenshots to see which best which three screenshots are gonna perform the best you know I had a friend of mine who did the same exact thing you saw that hey the first three combinations that I thought we're gonna work weren't actually the best combinations so he moved them around put him to the first three and he saw an increase in downloads okay so that's because he tested it doing using Apple search ads and I'll show you how to do that as well

7:32

and lastly guys it is reviews reviews are so stinking important to have okay because right now Apple makes it so easy for you to do that okay you don't have to do any blackhat stuff which I've shared in the past to buy reviews and things like that you don't have to do that you can do that with your end users using the iOS review prompt this is it okay so you can do this the way that Apple has set this up is you can prompt your users three times every 365 days that's three times within a year now you may think that's very little but I'll tell you it's not because the first time users will actually see this generally what I do is just sit yes I like this game and submit and so if you do this you're gonna see a ton of ratings so the way that the review system is set up ratings are the stars reviews are actually the written reviews you're gonna get a ton of ratings if you just put this into your app and it's very

8:35

easy to implement it's something I just implemented one of my app so I'll tell you how that goes but it is a no-brainer okay you don't have to do any blackhat stuff it's all completely white hat but it's something that you should do because the more ratings star ratings that you're able to accumulate the higher your keyword rankings are going to be it's a given proof okay we're doing a lot more tests in the app masters Academy on keywords if you want to check that out go to app masters Academy com but here are three simple tips that you can use to increase your downloads without without changing your keywords I'm back just to summarize all right number one app icon number two screenshots and number three the reviews three simple no-brainer no-brainer things that you should be testing to improve your downloads without touching your keywords because frankly with the keywords things sometimes you're gonna

9:28

hit a ceiling all right you're gonna hit that glass ceiling plate what other keywords can I possibly put in there these are pretty obvious these are the only ones I can go after right and so this is how you leverage it more advanced beyond the keywords how do you think through that you do these three things and use your keywords because you've already optimized it you put the foundation on and you start doing these three things you're only gonna climb up the ladder in terms of getting a higher organic search results and more downloads for your app all right all right guys one last thing if you haven't hit subscribe please do so I've met my son that I can't get to you bet me he said daddy daddy you can't get to 5,000 subscribers until September so root for me don't root for my cute ten-year-old son move for me I'm gonna try to get 5,000 subscribers by the end of August so let's see if I make it and I want to

10:20

ask you guys a question as well so leave it in the comments below what strategies do you use to try to increase your downloads without touching the keywords organic downloads please okay because anybody can spend money so organic downloads without touching your keywords and I'll see you on the next video