Promotion of the program in the Apple Store, on the example of a completely specific application
This post is an attempt to summarize my short experience of promoting programs in AppStor and start discussing ways to promote
For almost a year I was engaged in promotion, promotion and organization of sales of applications distributed through Cydia (software catalog for jailbroken iPhones), I had absolutely no experience in working with the official store.
And so, recently there was a proposal to help (not for free) in the promotion of products, and in particular the game - a game that you can promote, promote and sell.
Now, after two months of rapid filling of cones, there is almost no space left on my head - as a consequence, it’s time to share experiences and clean up the space for new ones :)
')
At the time of this writing, it takes:
- 7th place top paid apps (places go to Russian app store)
- 4th place top paid games
- 1 place top paid action games
- 2 place top paid board games
to reach these places you need to have 40 - 50 purchases * in the last three days
There is a “Lite” version, free, with banner ads from AdMob, and the inability to play through wi-fi.
- 31 place top free apps
- 13th place top free games
- 8th place top free action games
- 1 place top free board games
to reach these places you need to have 250 - 300 downloads * in the last three days
* Again for the Russian appstore.
The idea was simple: a sea battle with the usual Russian rules and a nice interface, but the appstore isn’t - hence you have to do it.
- lyrical digression : I am not a programmer and not a manager - therefore, I will not comment on the mistakes made on these fronts.
Taking into account the dynamics of the store, they decided to work in stages: first we release the battle against the computer, then the addition with the network game via wi-fi, then the addition with the game via the Internet, the global list of players, registration and other mods.
At the first stage there were no special problems. The sea battle came out and was accepted with a bang by both the public and bloggers and thematic resources - suffice it to say that currently the number of downloads of the 'lite' version noticeably exceeds 100,000 copies.
But then the problems started. We are going to release the Wi-Fi version as a separate, paid product. Price, like many other programs - $ .99. (At the same time, an “update” was released with an advertisement and a “buy wi-fi version” button)
But a separate product is a new product_id and, therefore, it gets to the new moderator.
So it went on to rework and wait ... a month and a half.
And the market is very fast, the average life of the application, well, if the days.
In the process of waiting, the number of downloads per day fell first to tens of thousands, and then to thousands.
When wi-fi sea battle came out, we were faced with the fact that we greatly overestimated the success with the free version. This is where the bumps, experiments, and the active search for sources of experience began.
Error one: time diversity.
The free version is much better paid, regardless of the price. This is an axiom.
The lifetime of the entertainment program is days.
For a month and a half, the main audience had had enough time, and even the most dedicated fans were tired of waiting for the opportunity to pay. We did not give them the opportunity (on time).
THOSE. the whole mass of downloads is not a resource and, most likely, not a potential audience.
Download update version of light ~ a third of the total number of downloads.
The number of transitions to the paid ~ 1% of the number of updated.
Error two: unpreparedness.
This is all my mistake.
It was not prepared in advance:
- localization of pages in appstore to the main languages ​​in priority countries.
- interesting screenshots explaining what has changed (screenshots from the free version were taken)
+
- Wrong evaluation of the success of the free version of bloggers.
- no agreement on reviews in thematic publications has been prepared.
Mistake three: Wrong distribution of efforts across markets.
In markets where there was already success, it did not consolidate, in markets where it was not there, it never appeared.
Now only the second week of sales has gone, and mistakes can still be rectified, but nevertheless they are and worth remembering.
Release of the free version.
According to very unreliable statistics, up to 10% of those who download the free version buys a paid one. And although this figure depends on what you have for the application and for what price, giving the opportunity to try your application is a very good idea.
Qualitative description in different languages
The description should be interesting and relatively short. Few people read it, but so that if they started, they would find all the information of interest.
Although English and international language, but reading a hefty description in a foreign language is more difficult than in one’s own language, so you should stock up with a copy of your description in at least Italian, French and German.
And yes ... it is not necessary to write in English with errors. Trust the translation to a native speaker. Better yet, trust him and writing the text.
Reviews in appstore.
A very important point: marketing wars and one two negative reviews in a row are frequent in appstore, especially if you have practically no reviews, they can kill sales.
Output: to encourage users to write positive reviews, or write them yourself. And at the same time have 3-4 (5-10) accounts for strategically important countries in the event of an attack by competitors.
Informative screenshots
You can put any pictures on the screenshots. Including something explaining innovations or gameplay. Visit iBeer and FlyControl
Frequent updates
Subjectively, this is a good idea. The only thing is to add something new, and not to send the same binary.
Clarification: as soon as you receive a letter of approval of the application, you need to go to appstore and change the availability date of the application to the current number (by default it is on the day the binary is downloaded), then there is a high chance that the application will light up on the first two pages "- and get the starting acceleration.
"Spam" for bloggers and thematic publications.
If you have a good product, and even free, and without advertising, it will feel, describe and distribute without you. But nevertheless, you need to write in any case.
The difficulty is that popular resources are filled up with heaps of promotional codes and requests for reviews (i.e., which are not overwhelmed by you, and most likely are not interesting).
Exit: make connections, communicate in advance, and not during peak sales (more precisely and in advance and during).
Twitter and other social networks.
On Habré lately, the question is often raised, do companies really need twitter? The topic of social media is also more than popular abroad.
The only thing you can say ... do not let the marketer, who did not work with the Internet, (even very good) on Twitter. With a high degree of probability nothing good will come out.
At least at first.
You should not wait for quick returns either, but if you gradually develop and strengthen your presence, over time even one tweet can give a lot.
Paid review from bloggers and thematic publications
I will immediately say my experience: of those who you need, take units for the review. As a rule, the impact of reviews in such places is low - at an average price of $ 200, costs do not beat off.
The exceptions are major regional resources, like iPhones.ru, and if the product is really interesting.
Banners on the same resources
It is more expensive than the previous one, and the performance is less.
AdMob and other contextual advertising.
One hundred dollars take about five to ten minutes, they say you need to spend $ 2000-3000 per day to get a tangible result. I have not tried to admit.
Discounts.
Discounts are a good thing. Many users and resources are watching them so as not to miss the moment, there is an option that your program will be noticed and sales will go.
However, with the price of $ .99 difficult to make a discount.
Contests for money
The performance tends to zero. Slightly higher than the banners.
But there is a reservation, if the contest is really interesting information about it (and, accordingly, about the program) go for a walk through the blogosphere, which you actually need.
Spam "psevdoposovetudydrugu"
ITunes has a feature - advise a friend. A form is given, and a letter is sent to the indicated address with some enticing text, a letter of a certain type, in a standard Euplo form.
There is an option to send a couple of thousands (tens / hundreds of thousands) of letters on a sheet in a similar pattern, supposedly from tuna ...
Imho use it is not worth it, the return is small, and many spam (including me) do not like it very much. I'm not talking about the fact that your addresses can get into the spam database, and the domain name does not like Google.
But such methods also have a place to be.
Payment of purchases
It sounds weird, but nonetheless. The idea is that the position of the program in the ratings is calculated on the basis of sales in the last three days. And if you make a sales spurt in three days, you can go to the top. And in the top of the right country the money is repaid guaranteed, especially ~ 70% of this money will come back to you anyway.
The difficulty is that in order to get to the top of the right country you need at least a thousand (and actually more) purchases per day, so think about how much money and effort you need to invest.
And yet, the question is how to implement it. I have not yet seen the successfully implemented options, but I believe with pleasure that they are or will be.
The peculiarity of appstore's ecostructure is such that the user does not need to leave it. As a rule, the majority does not come out. That is, you should not hope that flooding hundreds of small resources and resources you will get a huge increase in sales. There will be a certain growth, but obviously not the size I want.
Therefore, it is very important to have a quality page in the store. It will be a shame if someone does not try your ingenious program just because of bad screenshots or descriptions with errors.
Of course, the program should like and do what the user expects from it. It will be great if it has a BONUS. Some very nice functionality that the user does not expect to see and which you have not advertised. So he will receive (according to his feelings) two times more than he expected, and certainly will not be lazy to leave a positive comment.
Programs that no one comments - no one needs. Each country has its own appstore, with separate pages of comments;) And, naturally, more comments are believed in the native language.
Yes, if your program will approvely respond, for example, to tuaw.com - you should expect a rather big sales growth. So if you do not have a familiar blogger on a large resource, you should get acquainted with it.
And finally, my opinion is that you shouldn't spend money on advertising until your application brings you a good profit. Better to invest additional resources in the development. More quality design and texts. Good testing, user-friendly interface ... Spend time communicating with users in 2-3 large forums, finally.
It is possible without investing money in advertising * to make a super popular product. Be creative through this restriction, through restrictions it is more interesting :)
* - except for texts and screenshots as advertising.
According to the free version with ads: now it's the seventh day as she is in appstore,
average number of ad requests per day - 230 000
hits - 50,000
such a difference is a joke of admob, they said to my letter: “I am sorry, it happens” - it would be interesting to find out ways to increase the number of hits. In those moments when advertising is requested, but not shown from the server, an error comes.
average daily earnings: - $ 1.5
The amount of current earnings: $ 13.8
There you have it, i.e. You can earn, but on a VERY popular application.
For almost a year I was engaged in promotion, promotion and organization of sales of applications distributed through Cydia (software catalog for jailbroken iPhones), I had absolutely no experience in working with the official store.
And so, recently there was a proposal to help (not for free) in the promotion of products, and in particular the game - a game that you can promote, promote and sell.
Now, after two months of rapid filling of cones, there is almost no space left on my head - as a consequence, it’s time to share experiences and clean up the space for new ones :)
')
Actually the game: Sea Battle Classic iTunes
At the time of this writing, it takes:
- 7th place top paid apps (places go to Russian app store)
- 4th place top paid games
- 1 place top paid action games
- 2 place top paid board games
to reach these places you need to have 40 - 50 purchases * in the last three days
There is a “Lite” version, free, with banner ads from AdMob, and the inability to play through wi-fi.
- 31 place top free apps
- 13th place top free games
- 8th place top free action games
- 1 place top free board games
to reach these places you need to have 250 - 300 downloads * in the last three days
* Again for the Russian appstore.
First, I’ll start with a brief history of how it came about and what was done, and then try to summarize how the methods work.
The idea was simple: a sea battle with the usual Russian rules and a nice interface, but the appstore isn’t - hence you have to do it.
- lyrical digression : I am not a programmer and not a manager - therefore, I will not comment on the mistakes made on these fronts.
Taking into account the dynamics of the store, they decided to work in stages: first we release the battle against the computer, then the addition with the network game via wi-fi, then the addition with the game via the Internet, the global list of players, registration and other mods.
At the first stage there were no special problems. The sea battle came out and was accepted with a bang by both the public and bloggers and thematic resources - suffice it to say that currently the number of downloads of the 'lite' version noticeably exceeds 100,000 copies.
But then the problems started. We are going to release the Wi-Fi version as a separate, paid product. Price, like many other programs - $ .99. (At the same time, an “update” was released with an advertisement and a “buy wi-fi version” button)
But a separate product is a new product_id and, therefore, it gets to the new moderator.
So it went on to rework and wait ... a month and a half.
And the market is very fast, the average life of the application, well, if the days.
In the process of waiting, the number of downloads per day fell first to tens of thousands, and then to thousands.
When wi-fi sea battle came out, we were faced with the fact that we greatly overestimated the success with the free version. This is where the bumps, experiments, and the active search for sources of experience began.
Error one: time diversity.
The free version is much better paid, regardless of the price. This is an axiom.
The lifetime of the entertainment program is days.
For a month and a half, the main audience had had enough time, and even the most dedicated fans were tired of waiting for the opportunity to pay. We did not give them the opportunity (on time).
THOSE. the whole mass of downloads is not a resource and, most likely, not a potential audience.
Download update version of light ~ a third of the total number of downloads.
The number of transitions to the paid ~ 1% of the number of updated.
Error two: unpreparedness.
This is all my mistake.
It was not prepared in advance:
- localization of pages in appstore to the main languages ​​in priority countries.
- interesting screenshots explaining what has changed (screenshots from the free version were taken)
+
- Wrong evaluation of the success of the free version of bloggers.
- no agreement on reviews in thematic publications has been prepared.
Mistake three: Wrong distribution of efforts across markets.
In markets where there was already success, it did not consolidate, in markets where it was not there, it never appeared.
Now only the second week of sales has gone, and mistakes can still be rectified, but nevertheless they are and worth remembering.
Main promotion options:
Release of the free version.
According to very unreliable statistics, up to 10% of those who download the free version buys a paid one. And although this figure depends on what you have for the application and for what price, giving the opportunity to try your application is a very good idea.
Qualitative description in different languages
The description should be interesting and relatively short. Few people read it, but so that if they started, they would find all the information of interest.
Although English and international language, but reading a hefty description in a foreign language is more difficult than in one’s own language, so you should stock up with a copy of your description in at least Italian, French and German.
And yes ... it is not necessary to write in English with errors. Trust the translation to a native speaker. Better yet, trust him and writing the text.
Reviews in appstore.
A very important point: marketing wars and one two negative reviews in a row are frequent in appstore, especially if you have practically no reviews, they can kill sales.
Output: to encourage users to write positive reviews, or write them yourself. And at the same time have 3-4 (5-10) accounts for strategically important countries in the event of an attack by competitors.
Informative screenshots
You can put any pictures on the screenshots. Including something explaining innovations or gameplay. Visit iBeer and FlyControl
Frequent updates
Subjectively, this is a good idea. The only thing is to add something new, and not to send the same binary.
Clarification: as soon as you receive a letter of approval of the application, you need to go to appstore and change the availability date of the application to the current number (by default it is on the day the binary is downloaded), then there is a high chance that the application will light up on the first two pages "- and get the starting acceleration.
"Spam" for bloggers and thematic publications.
If you have a good product, and even free, and without advertising, it will feel, describe and distribute without you. But nevertheless, you need to write in any case.
The difficulty is that popular resources are filled up with heaps of promotional codes and requests for reviews (i.e., which are not overwhelmed by you, and most likely are not interesting).
Exit: make connections, communicate in advance, and not during peak sales (more precisely and in advance and during).
Twitter and other social networks.
On Habré lately, the question is often raised, do companies really need twitter? The topic of social media is also more than popular abroad.
The only thing you can say ... do not let the marketer, who did not work with the Internet, (even very good) on Twitter. With a high degree of probability nothing good will come out.
At least at first.
You should not wait for quick returns either, but if you gradually develop and strengthen your presence, over time even one tweet can give a lot.
Paid review from bloggers and thematic publications
I will immediately say my experience: of those who you need, take units for the review. As a rule, the impact of reviews in such places is low - at an average price of $ 200, costs do not beat off.
The exceptions are major regional resources, like iPhones.ru, and if the product is really interesting.
Banners on the same resources
It is more expensive than the previous one, and the performance is less.
AdMob and other contextual advertising.
One hundred dollars take about five to ten minutes, they say you need to spend $ 2000-3000 per day to get a tangible result. I have not tried to admit.
Discounts.
Discounts are a good thing. Many users and resources are watching them so as not to miss the moment, there is an option that your program will be noticed and sales will go.
However, with the price of $ .99 difficult to make a discount.
Contests for money
The performance tends to zero. Slightly higher than the banners.
But there is a reservation, if the contest is really interesting information about it (and, accordingly, about the program) go for a walk through the blogosphere, which you actually need.
Spam "psevdoposovetudydrugu"
ITunes has a feature - advise a friend. A form is given, and a letter is sent to the indicated address with some enticing text, a letter of a certain type, in a standard Euplo form.
There is an option to send a couple of thousands (tens / hundreds of thousands) of letters on a sheet in a similar pattern, supposedly from tuna ...
Imho use it is not worth it, the return is small, and many spam (including me) do not like it very much. I'm not talking about the fact that your addresses can get into the spam database, and the domain name does not like Google.
But such methods also have a place to be.
Payment of purchases
It sounds weird, but nonetheless. The idea is that the position of the program in the ratings is calculated on the basis of sales in the last three days. And if you make a sales spurt in three days, you can go to the top. And in the top of the right country the money is repaid guaranteed, especially ~ 70% of this money will come back to you anyway.
The difficulty is that in order to get to the top of the right country you need at least a thousand (and actually more) purchases per day, so think about how much money and effort you need to invest.
And yet, the question is how to implement it. I have not yet seen the successfully implemented options, but I believe with pleasure that they are or will be.
Total
The peculiarity of appstore's ecostructure is such that the user does not need to leave it. As a rule, the majority does not come out. That is, you should not hope that flooding hundreds of small resources and resources you will get a huge increase in sales. There will be a certain growth, but obviously not the size I want.
Therefore, it is very important to have a quality page in the store. It will be a shame if someone does not try your ingenious program just because of bad screenshots or descriptions with errors.
Of course, the program should like and do what the user expects from it. It will be great if it has a BONUS. Some very nice functionality that the user does not expect to see and which you have not advertised. So he will receive (according to his feelings) two times more than he expected, and certainly will not be lazy to leave a positive comment.
Programs that no one comments - no one needs. Each country has its own appstore, with separate pages of comments;) And, naturally, more comments are believed in the native language.
Yes, if your program will approvely respond, for example, to tuaw.com - you should expect a rather big sales growth. So if you do not have a familiar blogger on a large resource, you should get acquainted with it.
And finally, my opinion is that you shouldn't spend money on advertising until your application brings you a good profit. Better to invest additional resources in the development. More quality design and texts. Good testing, user-friendly interface ... Spend time communicating with users in 2-3 large forums, finally.
It is possible without investing money in advertising * to make a super popular product. Be creative through this restriction, through restrictions it is more interesting :)
* - except for texts and screenshots as advertising.
Update
According to the free version with ads: now it's the seventh day as she is in appstore,
average number of ad requests per day - 230 000
hits - 50,000
such a difference is a joke of admob, they said to my letter: “I am sorry, it happens” - it would be interesting to find out ways to increase the number of hits. In those moments when advertising is requested, but not shown from the server, an error comes.
average daily earnings: - $ 1.5
The amount of current earnings: $ 13.8
There you have it, i.e. You can earn, but on a VERY popular application.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/63845/
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