In brief
ASM could offer developers an early user acquisition opportunity, but the article expects that advantage to fade as keyword competition increases. Developers need to assess conversion rates, acquisition costs, agency performance, and potential abuse; China was outside the initial rollout.
Today (September 29), Apple officially unveiled its ASM (App Store Search Marketing) service on its overseas official website and sent email notifications to developers. This brings the App Store bidding-based rankings announced at WWDC into operation. The consumer-facing launch is scheduled for October 5—during our National Day holiday.
However, the China App Store is not included in ASM’s initial rollout, and its launch date remains unknown. Those eager to start advertising can first observe overseas advertising performance and learn how to make effective use of ASM.
Campaign planning is broadly similar to bidding for rankings on search engines. Setting the campaign’s promotion budget and daily budget cap is the first step in configuring paid rankings for an app. Promotion costs comprise two components: bidding per impression and charges for completed downloads.
Apple has provided highly detailed options for customizing ad delivery. Naturally, advertisers can choose keywords to buy, but they can also create a blacklist of “Negative Keywords” to avoid terms that may attract searches without generating conversions. They can also configure the target audience and advertising schedule, rather than running ads around the clock.
Audience filters include gender, age, location, and even whether a user has previously used an app from the same developer.
According to Morketing Duomeng’s analysis of ASM’s terms, Apple’s approach to bidding-based advertising resembles that of search engines in China: rankings determined by bids and keyword relevance, ads displayed alongside ordinary free search results with the same user experience (but identified as advertisements), and even no brand protection. With a sufficient bid and the right keywords, a search for “WeChat” could place your own app ahead of WeChat.
ASM therefore places greater demands on developers’ ASO skills. A suitably weighted keyword mix becomes more important—and more valuable—because every keyword costs money. Protecting your product against competing apps that use ASM to challenge it will also be crucial.
Duomeng also noted that Apple’s terms already allow advertising agencies to act as intermediaries. Developers can authorize agencies to handle their app promotion and manage adjustments to ad delivery, while still accessing the final traffic data through their own dashboards. Fully transparent ROI also presents a challenge for advertising agencies.
What does ASM mean for entrepreneurs?
ASM’s initial launch will offer a period of early opportunity. This will undoubtedly benefit entrepreneurs in sectors where “hundreds-of-rivals battles” are underway and companies are burning cash to attract users. However, as with bidding-based advertising such as Baidu’s paid rankings, WeChat’s Guangdiantong, or Taobao’s rankings, this advantage will soon fade. Advertisers will then face a trade-off between extremely expensive popular keywords and long-tail keywords with low search frequency. Discovering and testing less popular keywords will also require considerable effort.
Developers also need to pay particular attention to maintaining users’ curiosity and improving the conversion rate from an ad impression to a completed download, throughout the journey from a paid placement in search results to the download itself.
Although ASM has yet to launch in China, with the United States launching first, developers still need to watch for potential issues: What will customer acquisition costs actually be? Will consumers resist prominent advertising labels? Can ASM’s system prevent competitors from conducting malicious searches and downloads? Which is more efficient: ASM or manipulating app rankings? If an advertising agency is used, how can developers address fabricated downloads by that agency?
For questions like these, the market will eventually find a balance between costs and returns. But before and after that balance is reached, new grey-market businesses will inevitably emerge, creating fresh opportunities for teams currently engaged in manipulating app rankings.
http://www.hksilicon.com/articles/1188542