Are you following Apple Search Ads best practices to grow your userbase exponentially? To turn your advertising budget into real users and revenue, you must take the right approach. With an abundance of applications for users to choose from on the Apple App Store, many developers are actively leveraging Apple Search Ads to stand out from the crowd and improve their visibility.
Apple uses an auctioning system to rank search ads based on the highest bid and their overall relevancy to searchers. As you browse through the Apple App Store, it’s impossible to miss these ads. They appear at the top of the search results in a gray highlighted section. If you’re overwhelmed with competition in a particular niche, Apple Search Ads can fast-track growth.
Apple Search Ads Best Practices (5 Tips For 2022)
To invest in Apple Search Ads with confidence, you need to go in with a plan. Like any marketing channel, there are nuances to consider. Understanding how to cut through the noise and attract new users to your app is a science. When it comes to running Apple Search Ads, the smallest details can make a significant difference to campaign performance. Let’s break down a few tips.
Select keywords with considerable search volume
To target relevant keywords in the Apple App Store, you should think like a potential user and consider how they approach a search. Depending on the scale of your campaign, you may want to target several keyword clusters, including branded keywords and discovery keywords. Each of these keywords should carry considerable search volume to make the targeting worthwhile.
Here are the four main keyword categories you need to consider:
- Discovery keywords capture users searching for new terms from recent trends.
- Branded keywords target users who conduct searches with exact brand names.
- Competitor keywords tap into the search volume behind competitor brand names.
- Generic keywords reach users showing interest in your app’s category or functionality.
Source: Apple
Choose the right type of keywords for your campaign
Apple enables you to target exact and broad match keywords. Alongside this flexibility, Apple also has a keyword discovery functionality, known as Search Match, which you can use to ensure you are reaching the right set of target users. For those who are unfamiliar with the differences between exact and broad match keywords, let’s break these down below.
- Exact match keywords can drastically narrow the focus of your search campaigns. If users do not search for a specific set of keywords, your ads will simply not appear. This is perfect for campaign managers with a clear vision for where they want to show up.
- Broad match keywords can extend the reach of your ads to keyword variants. If users search for keywords deemed similar to your target keywords, the search ads will most likely appear. This is an effective way for campaign managers to cast a wide net.
At the beginning of a campaign, you may choose to focus on broad match keywords. By doing this, you can monitor campaign performance and narrow down the keywords as you go. This may help you to discover high-performing keywords along the way. Apple’s Search Match feature uses resources, such as metadata, to ensure your ads appear for relevant searches.
Pick the right campaign structure
The right campaign structure will set you up for success. There is no shortage of ways to optimize your campaign around key objectives. The best place to start is by looking at your keyword themes and how you can logically separate these into different campaigns. For instance, you could have a campaign solely targeting branded keywords.
Source: Apple
Utilize bid insights to make informed decisions
Adopting an effective bidding strategy will enable you to consistently rank for competitive keywords without breaking the bank. You can utilize Apple’s bid insights to evaluate your competitiveness in the search results. These will help you to make informed decisions on optimizing your budget and adjusting bids accordingly to elevate your campaign’s potential.
Source: Apple
Add negative keywords to optimize performance
If campaign managers know exactly which keywords they do not want to rank for, they can add these to a list of negative keywords. These lists are typically used for search campaigns using broad match keywords. When you open up the floodgates and start allowing your search ads to appear for many different keyword variants, you can set poorly aligned keywords as negative.
Apple Search Ads Cost (How To Optimize Your Budget)
Finely-tuned Apple Search Ads campaigns are remarkably effective at driving user acquisition at a sustainable cost. You should strive toward running campaigns on a continuous loop – picking up new users every single day and creating a virtuous cycle of growth. ASO (app store optimization) and paid advertising are central to the success of any Apple Search Ads campaign.
Unfortunately, many developers often fail to unlock a virtuous cycle of growth because they burn through their marketing budget with poorly optimized campaigns. Without following all the best practices, you will end up pouring money down the drain with Apple Search Ads. Luckily, there are specialist agencies that can help you to squeeze optimal value from your campaigns.
Partnering with a user acquisition agency is the single most impactful thing you can do to optimize Apple Search Ads. An agency will have an experienced in-house team to oversee all aspects of your campaigns and adopt a variety of Apple Search Ads best practices. With the right professionals in your corner, optimizing Apple Search Ads campaigns is easy.
Rather than worrying about getting all the key components of your Apple Search Ads campaign to align, you can leave the heavy lifting to us. As an ROI-driven user acquisition agency comprised of app store optimization specialists with a wealth of experience, ShyftUp is well-equipped to take the lead with your campaigns and unlock their tremendous potential.
Learn more about our ROI-driven approach to user acquisition for mobile applications.
Fill in gaps by talking to ShyftUp – a leading global User Acquisition Agency. They’ll help you decide on your mobile app data analytics from A to Z. As a forerunner in the industry, Shyftup focuses on two primary services:
- App Store Optimization (ASO) – unleashing the power of organic user growth by creating boosted visibility on the app stores.
- Paid User Acquisition – to help you grow your user base by converting your paid marketing budget into real users, thus revenue. ShyftUp specializes in Apple Search Ads and Google UAC channels.
