What we learned about marketing an iOS App.
From Twitter Ads to ASO, how to stand out in a crowded App marketplace.
“Well, we are going to have to get creative.”
We were about to launch another iOS app in the App Store and everyone sitting around the table knew what we were getting into. Getting noticed in a saturated marketplace in an especially competitive category is challenging. Doing it with a limited budget makes it even harder.
Our goal was promoting Tavola, a cooking app for iOS with a focus on the home chef experience. It pairs simple Italian recipes with wine pairings and music playlists via Rdio. Its free, and you can download it here.
Our team was really happy with the product, but we knew that without the right mix of promotion, nobody would ever see it.
What worked (and what didn’t)
1. Reaching out to the influencers
In the past we have found that traditional media coverage - local news, TV spots - do not have a significant affect on downloads, so we doubled down on people who would actually use the app — foodies.
We invited local food bloggers and influencers to an event where they could experience the app first-hand.
The awesome chef behind the recipes, Daniel Costa, prepared food. We hosted two events, one at Daniel’s restaurant and the other at a private home to make sure everyone had a chance to attend.
The events were a lot of fun and we made a bunch of new friends. They also provided the biggest ramp in downloads. Take a look at the graph below (I will let you guess on which days we hosted the events).
We also gained a lot of valuable feedback on the app. The event generated a lot of social media buzz and led to some great posts like this one.
It also landed us in the top 10 of the Food & Drink category in several country’s App Stores, which in turn drove more organic growth.
2. Twitter Ads — Expensive but they can work
For curiosity, we tested out Twitter’s new App Install card and to see how it affected downloads. We ran a campaign on a small test budget of $200. Our target audience was based on:
- iOS devices running at least 7.0 or higher
- Interest Group: Foodies
- Interacted with Bon Appetite or First We Feast accounts
Here is the tweet we promoted.
The results were mixed. The ad delivered 30,542 impressions and drove 344 app downloads with an engagement rate of 1.13%, which translates into an average cost of about $0.58 per download. Tavola features in-app purchases for more recipe packs, so I will follow-up in a later post to see how many of these users ended up purchasing a pack.
3. Leveraging ASO
We had done our homework and followed the best practices for App Store Optimization (ASO). We wrote keyword-rich, descriptive and persuasive content, designed compelling screenshots, and spent a considerable amount of time tweaking our keywords.
Our target users are foodies who like to cook, so we focused on visuals that would appeal to the home chef. For the screenshots, most apps are following the take-a-nice-screenshot-put-it-on-the-iPhone-and-add-descriptive-text route, so we followed suit.
We knew that over 63% of app discovery comes via the App Store, so we wanted to make sure we got it right.
Tavola is the Italian word for table and there were several apps that already ranked for that term. We used a descriptive title for the app — Tavola -Italian recipes, wine pairings and music instead of just Tavola to stand out. I highly recommend this tactic — within a few days the app outranked all other apps for the word Tavola, as well as landing in the top three for terms like “italian recipes” and “italian food.”
4. Using Instagram to build a brand
We knew we could leverage app’s photography to begin building an audience on Instagram, so pre-launch we began posting from the account using popular hashtags to reach foodies.
In just a few weeks we were able to grow the account from the ground up to a modest 199 users, growing by a few people per day. We see this channel being increasingly effective as we roll out new product launches with the Tavola brand, especially on new platforms.
What’s Next
We will continue to update this post as we discover new ways to market the app. If you like to cook, be sure to check out the app yourself and let us know what you think.
Download Tavola here: http://usetavola.com
