Key Metrics to Measure the Impact of textual ASO

The main goal of App Store Optimization is to increase organic installs. But unfortunately, it is challenging to measure the Impact of textual ASO in the same way as we evaluate installs from paid campaigns. That is why you need to understand which metrics to analyze in the first place after making changes in textual metadata.

Before we are going deeper to learn main metrics and KPI’s for textual app store optimization, we should remember that the final results of ASO are growth in organic installs. Also, you need to understand how to measure these installs after making after each iteration.

Which metrics to analyze?

External metrics

There are several types of external metrics. In general, we can divide them into two types: qualitative and quantitative metrics.

Quantitative external metrics include search queries and positions of the app in search listings by these keywords.

Qualitative external metrics include such parameters as “search volume” or “search popularity” of the keyword and “keyword ranking” of the app.

Let’s now analyze each parameter separately, why we need them for understanding the ASO effectiveness, and how to measure it.

Quantitative metrics

The most apparent external metric that first comes to mind is the keyword ranking of the app.

If you see the growth of keyword ranking and the increase of the number of search queries from the app’s metadata, which the App Store or Google Play indexed. Can you be sure that App Store Optimization was successful? Not certainly in that way. There are two nuances you need to consider:

• The semantic core of search queries, their popularity, and relevancy to the application is not apparent. Perhaps the app started to index by store’s algorithms and grew for irrelevant or low-volume keywords.
• There is a limit of visibility in search results beyond which there is no significant traffic. According to ASO experts, if the iPhone app is under the 9th position by the keyword in the search listing, then the keyword doesn’t bring organic traffic from search results. The main KPI of textual ASO is to achieve the top 5 keyword ranking for the app in search results.

Quality metrics

Most ASO beginners often look only at quantitative metrics that do not always show the full picture. Your main goal is to increase installs from search. Thus you need to understand how the visibility of your apps increases.

The visibility of the app in the search listings directly depends on the search volume of keywords reached the top search results. Accordingly, you need to analyze not only the number of keywords were indexed and achieved the top 5–10 search results but also the popularity of each search query.

This graph (Semantic Chart) displays the changes in the visibility of keywords in search results. You can see how many search queries are in the visible area for the user. You can see their popularity; in ASOdesk, we use the Keyword Traffic Score for evaluation of the search volume.
It’s useful to track keywords in the top 5 in search listing — they have the maximum visibility and keywords in the top 5–20 — they have the potential for further growth, and you can push forward them to the top later.

Internal metrics

Internal metrics include Impressions, Product Page Views, and App Units / Downloads from Search. It makes sense to analyze these metrics in the first place for understanding the effectiveness of ASO. These metrics you can see in the App Store Connect console. In ASOdesk, we have the ASO Dashboard tool, where you can track these metrics and choose the type of charts for data visualization.

Indirect Metrics

If your organic installs from search results increase, thus also the overall level of installs grows. As a result, your apps grow in the category or Overall. Good app store optimization can affect your Browse traffic due to the growth the visibility at the top of the category.

Indirect metrics are also divided into external and internal metrics.

External — app’s positions in the category or Overall.

Internal — Impressions, Product Page Views, and App Units / Downloads by Browse source.

Analysis of the effectiveness of app store optimization is not limited to the metrics we mentioned above. If you regularly make the optimization of app page textual and visual elements, get featured in the app stores and run paid campaigns. You also should analyze on regular basis: changes in conversion rate, quality of paid traffic, retention, engagement, and other parameters.

How to work with different traffic sources in the App Store, using ASO Dashboard, you can read in the article ASO Dashboard — effective analysis of traffic sources in the App Store.