App Store Seasonality

What is App Store Seasonality

App Store seasonality is the process of updating an app’s product page to coincide with seasonal events/public holidays; to create an ASO marketing roadmap that includes them is referred to as Seasonal Marketing. 

Some global big-hitter occasions include Christmas, Halloween, Easter, international sporting events, summer holidays, and ‘back to school’ and there are important National events in certain geographies also, such as the 4th of July celebrations in the US, Passover in Israel and Oktoberfest in Germany. These topical events have an impact on app store user behavior and offer unique opportunities to capitalize on the influx of visitors in the App Store who are on the lookout for apps that offer features relating to those events. By adopting a product page’s assets and by changing keywords according to trending interests and App Store searches, higher conversion rates are possible.

Why App Store Seasonality is Important

The preferences of users and what makes them tick can change depending on the day or month. Releasing app updates throughout the year with new creative assets/marketing messages/keywords to be in line with certain occasions is a positive step towards converting visitors into downloads.

Industry-specific seasonality is a great example. It’s coming up to New Year’s, the time of year which results in a large number of impressions of users searching the Health & Fitness category for an app to assist them in their fitness journey. For an app in that category, New Year’s is the perfect hook on which to hang a new app icon, update the description and focus on keywords associated with New Year’s. Christmas as another example is a great time for apps in the Food & Drink category. By changing metadata to reflect a Christmas theme and by updating keywords according to popular recipes for the time of year, without a doubt (if done correctly) an app developer would see a higher conversion rate.

In simpler ways, if the screenshots used on a listing are wintery and snowy, in summer it would be worth updating those to reflect the change in weather and be more season-appropriate. You wouldn’t expect to see a travel app pushing winter holidays in the run-up to summer, would you?

Leveraging unique moments in the calendar is a great marketing tool; if there are more eyes on specific App Store categories at certain times of the year, it means there’s more chance for an app listing to catch some extra impressions. 

App Store Seasonality and ASO

To create the perfect ASO update calendar or marketing roadmap, an app developer needs to take seasonality into account. Competitors will up their game for seasonal events and holidays, using seasonal keywords to climb the ranks to have a better chance of appearing in custom search lists like ‘Top Halloween Apps’ or ‘Popular at Easter.’ 

By A/B testing and evaluating the insights, experts like Storemaven can determine which creatives can be optimized in order to highlight seasonality. Keeping an app listing ‘on-trend’ and up to date ensures that apps are unique, more relevant, and in touch with the topics that are important to their audience. With the right creative assets / messaging, App Store seasonality is a great ASO strategy.