ASO knowledge that you must know for app promotion (including Android and iOS), ASO optimization strategy

As everyone knows, ASO refers to the search optimization of the app store. For startup companies, ASO may be one of the few promotional methods with small investment and high output. According to official data from Wandoujia, 65% of distribution volume comes from search. For Chinese users, this empirical data should be similar in other stores. It is conceivable that if your application covers enough hot words and ranks high, the number of users it brings in will still be considerable.

Then there are two purposes for ASO optimization :

1. By covering hot words, ranking high can bring in more natural users.

Generally, the top three rankings will share more than 70% of the traffic for this hot word, so our goal is to enter the top three rankings for hot word searches;

2. More brand exposure.

A higher ranking naturally means more exposure opportunities, which can also tell a good story for startup teams in need of financing.

1. ASO Optimization for Android Stores

There are many Android stores. Some stores provide the function of submitting keywords in the background, while others do not; some stores have weights in the text in the app description, while others do not.

The overall optimization idea is: cover hot words + optimize download volume + optimize comments

When it comes to covering hot words, the weight of keywords submitted in the background is generally relatively large, so focus on finding some words with high traffic and low competition and put them here. The size of the traffic can refer to the popularity of the search hot words (which will be explained in detail later), Baidu Index, etc.

Of course, if the text in the application description has weight, there will be more room for play, and there is no need to stick to the word limit of the keywords submitted in the background.

According to incomplete statistics from Badao, the stores that have weight in the product descriptions of the Android app store include: Wandoujia, 360, Android Market, Xiaomi, etc.

In terms of download volume and comment optimization, the price is relatively transparent, and comments are generally 1 yuan each. The price varies according to the store, but generally it's a few dozen yuan for 10,000 downloads.

If you want to ensure the ASO effect, it is recommended to increase the download volume continuously. As for how much download volume you should do at a time to achieve the desired effect, you still have to figure it out on your own. You are also welcome to discuss with me. The effect verification can be viewed through the monitoring function of CoolChuan.

2. Appstore ASO Optimization

Since the promotion channels of the IOS system are relatively single, most APPs are now optimized for the Appstore.

The overall optimization idea is: cover hot words + search download activation + optimize comments

There are currently two main schools:

1. Technical flow

　　This is mainly achieved by optimizing the app subtitles and keywords and continuously iterating small versions. Technical experts should avoid over-optimization, such as adding very long subtitles, which may result in failure in review at best and the risk of being removed from the shelves at worst. Generally speaking, through several ASO optimizations, the application can cover more than 300 hot words and have a search ranking within the top 50. However, if you want to put some hot words in the first position, you also need to combine it with the following points wall flow to achieve it.

2. Offers Wall Flow

The principle is to let users search for hot words, find your app, download, install and activate it by completing tasks. When purchasing the quantity of points wall, give priority to the WeChat points wall, which does a better job in anti-cheating. For example, if you need to purchase 8,000 quantities of traditional points wall to be the first, you may only need to purchase 5,000 quantities of WeChat points wall to achieve this.

In general, the technical flow and the points wall flow should complement each other. First of all, you have to ensure that you cover the hot words so that users can find you by searching for keywords and complete the task: search-download-activate. If the hot words you want to target cannot be searched, then there is no way to achieve ASO through the points wall flow. Generally speaking, words ranked within the top 10 may be optimized to the first place through the points wall flow.

Another way to play is "subcontracting". The principle is to reskin the main package and launch a batch of new apps. One app can only write keywords of 100 characters, then N apps can write keywords of N*100 characters. Different apps promote different keywords, and ultimately through in-app pop-ups or advertising spaces, users of the sub-packages are upgraded to the main package.

It is recommended to ask a friend to help you with the comments. It is not recommended to use a fake review. Apple is quite strict in checking the fake reviews. Don't take unnecessary risks. According to my experience, in the first three days after the new version is launched, optimizing 20-30 comments every day will have the best effect, and you don’t need to do a lot.

3. How to choose hot words to cover?

As a rule, the real stuff is usually saved for last.

Now that we know the optimization ideas of ASO, how do we choose hot words? There are two main aspects to consider: you should choose hot words with large traffic and low competition.

1. How to choose hot words with large traffic

To measure the size of the traffic, you can look at the popularity of the search terms. For example, if the popularity of hot word A is 5000 and the popularity of hot word B is 7000, then hot word B has a larger traffic.

In addition, after selecting some main words, search for the word in the appstore, and the words in the drop-down associative words are also of reference value. It can also assist Baidu Index to verify the size of traffic. I won’t go into details, but there are still some differences between web search behavior and mobile search behavior.

2. How to choose hot words with low competition

The difficulty of competition depends on the business personnel's understanding of the entire industry's competitors. You need to observe every day what words the competitors are crazy about on each points wall, try to avoid these hot words, and give priority to words with less competition difficulty.

The verification effect can be verified through the ASO index newly launched by appannie and asou. The higher the index, the better the ASO.

In addition, asou's "asou Trends - Search Rankings" can show the distribution of hot words in each category, which is also helpful for optimizing keywords. Those who are interested can study it. Generally speaking, the ranking of optimized hot words will not fluctuate much if there is no competition from competing products, so it can be said to be a one-time solution.