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When we think of mobile, we think of popular apps like Instagram and WhatsApp, or popular games. But the mobile world is a lot bigger.

Users spend more time in mobile apps than they do in accessing the Internet from their desktops and laptops. Not only is more time spent in apps, more digital content is consumed in mobile apps than on the desktop.

"Digital content" almost sounds too broad to fully appreciate the dramatic shift to mobile. We're talking articles, videos, music, blog posts, vacation photos, podcasts, whitepapers, tweets, and status updates.

Also, more text, from blog posts to articles to social media posts to whitepapers, is read from within mobile apps. More audio is consumed as music and podcasts. Also, every day, people watch hundreds of millions of hours on YouTube and generate billions of views, and 50% come from mobile devices.

Moreover, mobile makes up two-thirds of Apple's revenues. And more Google searches take place on mobile devices than on computers in 10 countries including the US and Japan.

How Users Find Apps

So, how do I get users to find and use your app?

Let's start by saying that most mobile apps are downloaded from the app stores. That's Apple's App Store and Google Play, for the most part.

The other primary ways people find apps is from ads in other apps (from small mobile games to the Facebook app), word-of-mouth, and increasingly from within another app (deep linking or applinks).

For the vast majority of mobile apps, app store discovery and paid user acquisition campaigns are the most effective channels for new users.

The good news for mobile app publishers and mobile app marketing agencies is that because most apps are downloaded from app store search, optimizing your app for discovery can put your app in front of a large, relevant user base without having to pay for each installment.

App Indexing in Apple's App Store and Google Play

Apple and Google differ somewhat in how they index a mobile app.

Apple relies heavily on the keywords used in the app title and keywords field. The combination of keywords used in the title and keywords field creates a keyword matrix.

Title: "Doggi: find a dog walker near you"

Keywords: walking, running, playing

Searching in the App Store for "dog walking" would return the above app (and likely several others). Note that the search term includes a word found in the title and a word found in the keywords field.

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Why You Need an App Store Optimization Strategy

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ABOUT THE AUTHOR

image of Dave Bell

Dave Bell is a co-founder and the CEO of Gummicube, a global provider of data, technology, and services for app store optimization.

LinkedIn: Dave Bell