What is the Future of App Store Optimisation (ASO)?

go-mashmobile.com

Promoting an app in the app stores has changed a huge amount over the years, as the competition has increased. Gone are the days when you could simply create an  app, put it in the app store and expect multiple downloads with very little effort. Now you need to stand out and App Store Optimisation (ASO) is one of the key elements of a mobile app marketing campaign.

But as Google changes more and more to offer more targeted results to its users, and therefore generating more and more money from advertising, changing the landscape for SEO, it is clear that the app stores will change too, adjusting the landscape for ASO.

We spoke to a number of experts in the field about where they believe ASO is going. Please do share your thoughts in the comments box below!

Rob Holmes, CEO of IPCybercrime.com LLC“An app store is essentially an online marketplace, no different than eBay or Amazon where thousands (and sometimes millions) of sellers compete for visibility. Because of this, optimization within the marketplaces has become big business. Marketplaces themselves make a lot of money by upselling features to their merchants with the promise of more visibility. eBay has done this practically from the start. Alibaba charges thousands of dollars for priority ‘Gold’ status. App stores are somewhat new, but the model is no different than any other marketplace. Where there are customers there is competition.”

Eric Wroolie, Director at Overpass
“ASO gets more and more difficult every day. As the number of apps submitted every day increases and the market gets more and more saturated, it seems to be all keywords are getting overused. We’re all begging for reviews and 
optimising our screenshots. I think the only way to truly gauge how good an app is will be by the number and quality of reviews. I truly believe that the app markets will give more credibility here. It’s chicken and egg . . . so we’ll need to start looking at ways outside of the app store to get people in. We’re all working from the same ASO plan books . . . and most ASO material out there is geared for iOS. We’ll see ASO change to favor 
Google Play a lot more.”

Maya Mikhailov, co-founder and CMO of GPShopper
“Just as Google has improved it’s SEO algorithm over the years to reward useful, quality content and penalize optimization “tricks” (like link building and keyword-stacking), the app stores are increasingly following suit. Factors such as installs and uninstalls, reviews and ratings, and even use frequency will soon dominate app store search success.”

Aykut Karaalioglu, CEO of Mobile Action
“App Store Optimization continues to become more sophisticated today than it was yesterday. In the future, Apple and Google will recognize install/uninstall rates, engagement, retention and ratings/reviews data. This will allow app developers to focus optimization efforts on keywords, images, descriptions and, most importantly, on in-app user activity.”

What do you think?
Do you see the future of ASO being much different to current ASO?

What Can Periscope Do for Hospital Marketers?

healthleadersmedia.com

Twitter's livestreaming app, Periscope, is beginning to show its potential as a way for hospitals to engage with patients and amplify a health system's brand, says Mayo Clinic's social media director.

Usually, when hospitals and health systems begin using a new social media app for marketing purposes, I've already had the app on my phone for months. So when I started reading about hospitals using Twitter's free, livestreaming broadcast-video app Periscope, I was surprised. And, honestly, I was a little alarmed. Was Ithat far behind?

An informal survey among friends, family, and acquaintances to determine if I needed to step up my social media game taught me that baby boomers had no idea what on earth I was talking about, fellow millennials had heard of it but hadn't bothered to download the app, and my friend's teenage sister had it but said she liked Snapchat better.

I did find one demographic of enthusiastic, early adopters. People who worked in advertising. Fishy, I thought.

This discovery lead me to launch a more in-depth investigation into Periscope's audience, potential benefits, and an exploration of whether hospital marketers should really be spending time on the latest trend.

The Basics
Periscope is a video app that lets users broadcast glimpses of their lives. It's similar to Snapchat's stories feature, except it's live, more interactive, and has no time limits. Twitter bought the platform for $100M back in January to compete with Meerkat, its live-broadcasting predecessor.

The app, which gained popularity around March, syncs with your Twitter account and sends you alerts when someone you follow is broadcasting. If you catch the feed live, you can like and comment in real time. Otherwise, you can watch the recording for 24 hours after it was posted, without the interactive elements.

Both apps have their share of high-profile users, though Periscope seems to have attracted more celebrities. One of the most successful is Ryan Seacrest, who has 93,000 followers— a feat that is less impressive when you realize he has 13.5 million followers on Twitter.  

Periscope gained 1 million users in its first ten days, but it's unclear how many have joined since then. It's fair to venture users have increased significantly— Periscope users shared their livestreams on Twitter 1.5 million times since its inception through May 22, according to Adweek. And the official Periscope account has 5 million followers.

Hospital Early Adopters 
A few pioneering hospitals and health systems began testing the Periscope waters this summer. Mayo Clinic, unsurprisingly, is a frontrunner with 3,100 followers (versus more than 1 million Twitter followers). The health system used the app to broadcast a tour of its Historical Suite on July 7. Mayo reported that the tour went well, with 466 live viewers and nearly 5,000 hearts (likes).

"Mayo Clinic has patients from every U.S. state and over 140 countries every year, and we saw the opportunity to help those considering Mayo Clinic get a preview of what they can expect when they come here," says Lee Aase, director of Mayo Clinic Center for Social Media.

"We also think it will be great to offer behind-the-scenes views of some of the unique features that make Mayo Clinic special. As we've explored it further, we see many more opportunities."

Aase and his team have created a landing page to explain Periscope and its purpose to patients. The health system has also found a way to give its broadcasts longevity beyond the 24-hour window by posting the recording on its YouTube channel.

The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, another Periscope early adopter, has 221 followers (versus 15,600 on Twitter). The hospital has made several broadcasts, including a triathlon on July 26 and an achilles tendon repair surgery on June 22. Both are no longer available for viewing.

The Verdict
I'll admit, when I embarked on this little investigation I was skeptical— Periscope broadcasts seemed like an awful lot of work for only 24-hours of exposure to a limited audience. I wondered if it might go the way of last year's trendy video app Vine, which even Mayo Clinic hasn't updated since mid-March.

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 But now that I've seen the creative ways hospitals are using the app and adapting to give the videos more staying power, I'm beginning to see its potential. Marketing tips include announcing your Periscope broadcast on Twitter, turning on location tagging, and engaging with followers in real time.

"We see Periscope as immensely more practical in healthcare than Vine because it allows in-depth and interactive communication," Aase says. "We're in the first six weeks of a six-month pilot with Periscope, and based on the response we're seeing so far it seems likely we'll continue with Periscope beyond the pilot phase."

Down the road, Mayo hopes to broadcast more tours, as well as some "Ask the Doctor" segments and "Day-in-the-Life" profiles. It's also looking into using Periscope as a recruitment tool. Outside of healthcare, Periscope was recently used to broadcast Twitter's earnings call.

10 ways to monetize your mobile app

thenextweb.com

Building a mobile app these days is easy. However, monetizing that same app has become nearly impossible, given how saturated the market is with free options (and potential customers unwilling to pay).

So to find out how founders can make money from their app, I asked a group of entrepreneurs from YEC the following:

Monetizing a mobile app has only gotten harder. What’s one overlooked strategy that actually works?

Their best answers are below:

1. Signups and Emails

If you have a newsletter, push it through your app. There’s nothing wrong with having an app that drives consumers to your website. It may not be the easiest thing to track, but it works. Remember that your app is just another leg of your brand chair. It does not have to survive on its own but does need to add value to your audience. – Brendon Schenecker, Travel Vegas

2. VIP Levels of App Useage

I think that having two versions of your app, a free/cheap version and a paid version is important. It’s part of the strategy of giving your customers a taste — a trial period to get a sense of all that your app can do — and then building from there. You want your customers to integrate this app into their lives and then realize they can’t live without it when it comes time to upgrade. Beefing up your upgrades is a big way to establish your product’s importance and value to your customers as well. – Rob Fulton, AudioLumin™

3. Advertising

Despite developers adding in-app purchasing and subscription services to their applications, users prefer to get a service for free and only a small percentage of users will ever pay real money. Diversified ad products with multiple units of different sizes work the best on mobile. Pair these ad products with an eye for data and metrics, and you can command great CPMs and CTRs. – Catherine Cook, MeetMe

4. SMS Marketing

Part of your app’s strategy should include asking for your customer’s mobile numbers. SMS marketing tends to be very efficient. Plus, you’ll be able to stay in touch and communicate with your customers. So whether you want to showcase a promotion, a contest, ask for feedback or build your brand loyalty, SMS marketing will help you. – Nicolas Gremion, Free-eBooks.net

5. Partnerships

Partner with a company that has a similar customer base, and findways to integrate their offering into your app for a referral fee. The key is that the partner can really benefit your customers, and that you can create an integrated experience. If you find the right partner, this can be a great source of revenue. – Randy Rayess, VenturePact

6. A Solid Content Strategy

If you’re going to take the time and effort to develop a mobile app, you’re going to have to put just as much effort into maintaining and populating it with great content/features. It’s often believed that once you’ve finished and released the app, you’re done with the job. However, that is only the beginning. It’s important to have a three to five year strategy in place after the app is released. – Cassie Petrey, Crowd Surf

7. Multiple Payment Options

If you’re monetizing through subscriptions or in-app purchases, give multiple options with one that’s asymmetrically dominated. The way The Economist did this with its subscriptions was: Option 1) Web Subscription: $59; Option 2) Print Subscription: $125; Option 3) Web and Print Subscription: $125. The most subscriptions were received for Option 3, which readers found to offer the most value. A similar pricing strategy can help you convert more and at a higher value by adapting to your mobile app’s core offerings. – Rahul Varshneya, Arkenea LLC

8. White Label Your Code

If you build an awesome app and get enough traction with a free model, you can license your code to other developers and make money without disrupting the experience for your users. Nobody likes in-app advertising, so it’s a great way to turn people away from your app. On the other hand, if you build something powerful and useful that has enough users generating buzz, you’ll attract the attention of other app developers. You can deliver value to them by helping them save the time and effort of writing code for what your app already does. – Dave Nevogt, Hubstaff.com

9. A Blended Model

In-App purchases are enticing and effective for some app users, while subscription and gated features push others to make a purchase. Instead of focusing your efforts on just adding a ton of in-app purchase options to your app, or only adding in-app advertising, try to blend a mix of a few different monetizing strategies. Include a few advertisements, some gated features and some virtual goods that can be purchased, and see how differently each user reacts. This is a great response to the fact that some users hate in-app purchases while others are addicted to them. This way there’s something for everyone. – Miles Jennings, Recruiter.com

10. A Data-Driven App Engagement Strategy

All too often, mobile app marketers are so focused on user acquisition that they lose sight of their strongest lever to drive monetization: re-engaging their current user base. In mobile gaming, the top 2 percent of users tend to be the biggest spenders, driving over 90 percent of an app’s revenue! According to a recent study by Localytics, 20 percent of users churned after using an app once. If you can leverage your in-app user data to improve retention and grow engagement by strategically targeting your current users with the right messaging, it will be much easier to cost-effectively monetize them. – Farzana Nasser, Gallop

What Will the Internet Be in 2025?

nojitter.com

A Pew Research survey hints at the future upsides and downsides of the Internet’s evolution.

Looking back can be used to help predict the future, but predicting the future of the Internet and its impact is a challenging endeavor. The history of the Internet has been populated by rapid growth of applications whose success and failure were difficult to foresee. By surveying those who are involved with the Internet, however, as well as connectivity and applications, some measure of the future can be obtained.

Experts believe that easy access to the Internet is a growth stimulator. Connecting people and the Internet of Things (IoT) will make the Internet a true utility that will become an even greater resource in everyday life. However there will be both positive and negative outcomes from the Internet's growth.

The Pew Survey

The Pew Research survey of Internet predictions, " The Web at 25 in the U.S., Digital Life in 2015" is the organization's latest report, marking the 25th anniversary of the creation of the World Wide Web by Sir Tim Berners-Lee. The survey report was produced by the Pew Research Center's Internet & American Life Project and Elon University's Imagining the Internet Center. The predictions from 1,867 respondents were collected between November 25, 2014 and January 13, 2015.

The Pew Research Center is a nonpartisan fact tank that informs the public about the issues, attitudes, and trends affecting the U.S. and the rest of the world. They do this by conducting opinion polls, demographic research, and media content analysis.

The Upside Predictions

Predictions are just that, a look into the future. Some are obvious while others are not so visible. The Pew report digests the positive predictions into eight statements. I have selected four of the predictions that I find most interesting:

1. Eventually the Internet will become so much a utility that it will be an integral part of daily life. It will be used so often that it will be expected to always there, just like electricity and water.
2. The Internet will continue to expand global connectivity, which will promote more planetary relationships and less ignorance. One of the respondents, Paul Jones, professor at the University of North Carolina and founder of Ibiblio.org, stated that "Television let us see the global village, but the Internet let us be actual villagers." I am not sure this will be true because the Internet also allows those with differing ideas and philosophies to only interact with those with similar ideas without really interacting with those of differing ideas. ISIS is an example of a body using the Internet to create a closed community of like believers.
3. The Internet will be used to make people more aware of their own behavior and the world that surrounds them. However, too much information means that some will be ignored. There are already cases where people have turned off their wearable devices because the continued data presentation was beginning to run their lives rather than benefit them.
4. One prediction that I fully agree with is the spread of education and opportunities that cost less saving real estate and teacher time while expanding the audience. Consider the Massive Online Open Course (MOOC) movement that is delivering college/university education across borders.

The Downside Predictions

In addition to the beneficial predictions, the Pew report highlighted seven less hopeful predictions. I have selected three negative predictions to discuss:

1. The Internet will continue to facilitate the division between the haves and have nots. The result will be resentment from those who know what they don't have. Counterproductive, violent actions may be the result. What the Internet will do is offer plenty of images of the resentment and protests.
2. Human behavior will continue to exist with both good and bad results. We have seen online bullying, stalking, pornography, and crime flourish. One of the respondents who is an antispam and security architect predicts that "There will be an erosion of privacy and the use of dirty-tricks social media will emerge more and more in election campaigns. Abusers evolve and scale far more than regular Internet users."
3. To combat abuses, governments and corporations will attempt to assert power, invoking more security and cultural norms. These actions can be used to limit the user's actions even when positive because the actions may interfere with the status quo. Some governments value stability above freedom.

Caveats

These predictions will be influenced by factors that may not even be visible today. A restrictive government may become financially weaker. The result could be more restrictions or the government being unable to enforce the restrictions, thereby losing control.

The advice of the report is to make good choices now and not wait to see the outcome of the Internet. I like the quote from the Pew report that sums up the best path forward, "The best way to predict the future is to invent."

How the Internet of Everything is changing the world

moneycontrol.com

Imagine you are at work and your house has been broken into. There’s more that you can do than being blissfully unaware of the theft. Technology has made it possible to connect these seemingly mutually exclusive events and in turn, prevent the theft or help nab the culprits. Yes, make way for the Internet of Everything. With IoE, you can go beyond burglar alarms. IoE may make it possible to send real-time alerts to the nearest police station or also give you a live feed of the break-in on your handheld device.

Making the world a better place

While the Internet of Things -- that refers to the connectedness between devices -- has pretty much changed the way businesses work, IoE will take things a notch higher. And how will it make this happen? Along with connecting data, processes and devices, IoE will add people to the network as well. This network will then generate intelligible information that will help create new capabilities, richer experiences and unprecedented economic opportunity for businesses. In the future, as millions of devices interact with one another with minimal human intervention, businesses and processes will become more efficient. IoE also has the potential to impact governance and make it more effective and transparent. No wonder then, that Cisco projects the total IoE-related value at stake over the next 10 years to be $19 trillion.

Living in a world where everything is connected

A Cisco report titled ‘The Internet of Everything – How Relevant and Valuable Connections Will Change the World’ rightly observes: By combining people, process, data and things, the exponential power of the Internet will allow us to create exponential responses to the extraordinary challenges faced by individuals, businesses, and even whole countries.

Let us see how IoE will benefit humans, businesses and countries:

• Humans: As humans, we are very dependent on our senses to experience the world around us. IoE has the ability to become an exponential proxy for the different types of senses. This will end up giving silent things a voice.

• Businesses: By making processes more efficient and optimal, IoE will play a key role in creating opportunities for business expansion and driving up profits.

• Countries: Governments the world over are striving to provide better and economical services to citizens. IoE has the potential to benefit the public sector and allow governments to ensure privacy, safety and security of citizens.

Transforming the world around you

From smart parking in Nice, France that alerts drivers about open spaces to garbage cans with sensors in Finland that send signals when pick-up is needed, IoE is making the unthinkable possible. Even as we speak, it is transforming cities around the world, one connected device at a time.

Cisco Internet Business Solutions Group, in collaboration with City 24/7, a company that aims at making public communications more accessible, and the city of New York, has launched an interactive platform that integrates information from open government programs, local businesses, and citizens to provide meaningful and powerful knowledge anytime, anywhere, on any device.

As India embarks on an ambitious initiative to take the benefits of digitization to its masses, IoE will play a critical role. It will make cities smarter, safer and sustainable and greatly benefit sectors such as transportation and health.

Going ahead, the Internet of Everything will play an instrumental role in helping countries fight climate change, eradicate hunger, bring down instances of diseases and save water.

IoE is the future

There no doubt will be hurdles in implementing IoE and some of its abilities may seem magnified and exaggerated now, but it certainly has the potential to change the world we live in and make it more efficient and environment-friendly. There will also be challenges related to security, privacy, and reliability of such a technology and to overcome these, governments and countries must come together and engage in discussions.

The possibilities of  IoE making the world a better place are infinite. All it needs are open minds and a spirit of co-operation between people.

How retailers can score a deal on Facebook’s mobile app install ads

internetretailer.com

Using the social network’s mobile ad network, retailers paid 9% less per thousand impressions than those who targeted consumers’ mobile news feed in the first quarter.

Advertisers looking to save money driving shoppers to download their apps can use Audience Network, Facebook’s mobile ad network that lets marketers target Facebook ads to consumers off of the social network in such apps as the Huffington Post and Shazam.

Marketers who used Audience Network to place mobile app install ads in Facebook users’ mobile news feeds and on other apps paid, on average, $8.17 per thousand impressions in the first quarter, while those whose ads only appeared in Facebook users’ mobile news feeds paid $8.99, according to Salesforce’s new report “Social.com Q1 2015 Advertising Benchmark.”

While impressions cost less for marketers who used Audience Network than those whose mobile app install ads that appeared only in consumers’ Facebook mobile news feeds, consumers were less likely to click through on off-Facebook ads and install the apps. That resulted in a cost per click for Audience Network mobile app install ads of 96 cents versus 85 cents for Facebook mobile news feed-only ads and the cost per install for Audience Network ads was $3.37, 17.4% higher than the $2.87 cost for mobile news feed-only ads.

Despite performing behind the mobile news feed, Salesforce suggests that marketers try Audience Network, and predicts more marketers will do so in the second half of the year.

The report also finds that the cost per thousand impressions in the e-commerce in the first quarter compared with the fourth quarter was $5.06 versus $5.07 (the report didn’t provide year-over-year data). However, the cost per click fell dramatically— to 31 cents from 59 cents—thanks to the click-through rate jumping from 0.87% to 1.65%.

On Twitter, Salesforce found that the cost per thousand impressions for promoted tweets, the ad unit that allows marketers to ensure that a certain percentage of consumers see a brand’s post, fell 10.8%— to $8.92 from $10 in the fourth quarter. The cost per engagement (Twitter requires advertisers to bid based on some action, such as a click on a tweet, link click or video view) rose 1 cent— to 45 cents in the first quarter from 44 cents in the fourth quarter. However, the engagement on the ads fell to 2% in the first quarter from 2.3% in the fourth quarter.

The Salesforce report is based on more than 2 trillion ad impression and 200 billion ad engagements by Salesforce Marketing Cloud customers from October 2014 to March.

App store optimization: What is it and why do I need it?

techinasia.com

What is ASO?

The concept is fairly simple. App Store Optimization (ASO) is a lot like SEO (Search Engine Optimization), except here you are trying to make your app easily visible on the App Store, Google Play, or other similar app marketplaces. You also, however, need to convince people to actually download the app. After all, what’s the point of developing and marketing an app if no one actually uses it? The key to ASO is to attract a crowd that will actually be interested and won’t uninstall your app after a few weeks. It is thus of high importance to have a good understanding of your target audience, such as what keywords they are typing into the search bar.

Why should you care?

According to a Forrester study, 63% of app discoveries occur just by browsing app stores. The search bar is the largest channel that leads to app installs. There are over a million apps on the App Store and Google Play, and they are in a never ending race to grab a higher ranking than their competitors. Everyone is utilizing any tool they can to market their app, so if you are not taking advantage of what ASO has to offer, you are falling behind.

How do I develop good ASO?

Obviously, understand what keywords are relevant and prevalent among your audience.

You can use certain services that will allow you to track which words are popular, your search rankings, your competitors’ strategies, etc. in order to optimize your ASO. However, you should also remember that while it may be easy to stuff your description with keywords, there’s a point where it just makes your app sound obnoxious.

Your app’s name is important as well. It should be short and sweet, yet catchy and informative. Realize that the keyword that is placed in the title needs to be the one that will bring in the most search traffic, so take some time to think about the best choice of word to put in the title.

Finally, take a look at the ratings/reviews of your app. Many potential app users will take a look at these, and a rating can be a huge determinant in whether or not someone converts or not. Find ways to incentivize happy users to rate your app and reply immediately to negative responses.