iPhone iTunes Search Engine Optimization
There are 25,000 applications in the iTunes iPhone App Store and nearly 1 billion App Store downloads to date. It has taken 1/3rd the time to hit one billion downloads in the iTunes App Store than the same number of music downloads.
I have only two questions for you.
1. Where the hell is your application? Still on the fence? Good luck with that.... your competition is wrapping up their release and scooping up your market as you read this!
2. With all this competition, how do you get noticed?
Engineering perspective aside -- you can't argue with the numbers. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is here to stay. Take a look at the sales jumps in Abby Crabby. 350% according to AppSales and about 150 ranking points according to MobClix. Sure the SEO text looks like something a robot spewed into the iTunes listing but it works. The biggest benefit was finally getting back into page two of the Games.Kids category on the iPhone App Store. We'd fallen out since that Y2K9 snafu.
What's SEO look like... we'll the numbers are pretty, but the text not so much! "Been scuba diving? This is not a village of fishing ice cream scoops blocked with emoji. The virtual creeps stuck with bejeweled bugs, penguins, pets, or god forbid a pocket of crazy puppy bunny to peekaboo. Zombies do not doodle in flight with a wolf vampire on the trails in Oregon."
What does it mean? Well, look at it closely. It's basically a spot on hit for most of the top games and applications. Try a search in iTunes, you'll see what I'm talking about.
A while back people started including a list of the top applications in their descriptions. "People will like this application that enjoyed: xxx, yyy, zzz... " This worked for a while. However, at some point a few weeks back Apple clued in. This no longer works. Based on some experimenting with my SEO block above I'd say there is a scoring system. If you score too high, you're out. And when I say out... I mean out. If you include too many high scoring words, you won't appear searches for anything in your description -- anything. You'll only appear for searches matching your title.
Give it a try, just don't go crazy.
I have only two questions for you.
1. Where the hell is your application? Still on the fence? Good luck with that.... your competition is wrapping up their release and scooping up your market as you read this!
2. With all this competition, how do you get noticed?
Engineering perspective aside -- you can't argue with the numbers. Search Engine Optimization (SEO) is here to stay. Take a look at the sales jumps in Abby Crabby. 350% according to AppSales and about 150 ranking points according to MobClix. Sure the SEO text looks like something a robot spewed into the iTunes listing but it works. The biggest benefit was finally getting back into page two of the Games.Kids category on the iPhone App Store. We'd fallen out since that Y2K9 snafu.What's SEO look like... we'll the numbers are pretty, but the text not so much! "Been scuba diving? This is not a village of fishing ice cream scoops blocked with emoji. The virtual creeps stuck with bejeweled bugs, penguins, pets, or god forbid a pocket of crazy puppy bunny to peekaboo. Zombies do not doodle in flight with a wolf vampire on the trails in Oregon."
What does it mean? Well, look at it closely. It's basically a spot on hit for most of the top games and applications. Try a search in iTunes, you'll see what I'm talking about.
A while back people started including a list of the top applications in their descriptions. "People will like this application that enjoyed: xxx, yyy, zzz... " This worked for a while. However, at some point a few weeks back Apple clued in. This no longer works. Based on some experimenting with my SEO block above I'd say there is a scoring system. If you score too high, you're out. And when I say out... I mean out. If you include too many high scoring words, you won't appear searches for anything in your description -- anything. You'll only appear for searches matching your title.
Give it a try, just don't go crazy.
posted by JMathews at
10:12 PM
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