Building and deploying an app on Android is just one side of a larger story. The success of your business is not defined by the launch of its Android app on the play store. A successful deployment of the app is just the start. A start to the race which is endless and requires perseverance from the triumphant.
Along with launching and developing your app, engaging and growing your audience, and earning more revenue, optimizing the app, analyzing the results and conditioning the app accordingly is also important. There are a bunch of things that go into an app’s actual success after completing the milestones of your dedicated Android app development services.
Time to give a spring cleaning to your store
Once you have deployed the app on the store, do not forget to ensure that your store listing is up to date with your latest product information. Check of the Google Play’s guidelines too which states:
- Ensure that your app’s icon falls under the new specifications.
- Show the in-app or in-game experience for videos which focuses on the core features and content right in the initial 30 seconds. First impressions matter a lot. Google suggests landscape orientation over portrait orientation for videos.
- If you have deployed a game, provide at least three 16:9 screenshots and a video. This makes you eligible to be featured in larger collection formats, increasing your conversion rate.
- You can also build custom store listings and run A/B tests on your store listing in order to optimize your content on the Play Store.
- Make sure to turn off monetization for the video and set the privacy setting to public or unlisted.
- Lastly, you need to keep in check that your feature graphic conveys the app or game experience, also avoiding prominent branding or app icons. Your main area of focus should be towards the center of the graphic maintaining a 15% buffer from all four edges.
Optimize your app’s performance and quality consistently
It is highly suggested that you review your Android vitals dashboard which will help you articulate how your app is performing on core vitals metrics like crash rate, ANR rate, excessive wakeups, and stuck partial wake locks in the background.
The Google Play console is designed in a way where it can send you an email when it detects a sudden spike in a vital. Select Notification settings near the top right of the Overview page to get these important notifications.
You can also see how your app is doing along with others in the same category. All you need to do is create a custom peer group. It provides you with benchmark data which can help you decide whether you should invest more in fixing performance issues or app size. After assessing the metrics, follow these best practices which will help in improving your app quality and boost discoverability on the Play Store.
You can take a lower-risk, higher-reward approach
In order to take a low-risk, high-reward approach for your app launch, you can use Google Play store’s tools.
- Firstly, test early versions of your app internally along with trusted users or you can test them at a larger scale with an initial public beta release of your app.
- Next, try and Identify technical issues and address them before you release with pre-launch reports.
- Lastly, release your update to a small percentage of users in the launch phase with staged rollouts which will help you confirm optimal performance before rolling out to everyone at once.
Go for a pre-registration before the big launch
Assuming that you are going to release a big app or a game this year. Consider creating a pre-registration campaign before the final launch. This makes the Play Store listing of your app discoverable before the mega launch.
This allows users to sign up where they will be notified once your app is live. In this way, you can easily drive awareness and build anticipation for a bigger, more successful launch. One other benefit is that you can incentivize users with pre-registration rewards when they have signed up for your app or game.
Consider Android App Bundle for modern distribution
Switching to Android App Bundle for simplifying your releases is a smart choice. With this, you can shrink your download size, and ready your app or game for next-generation delivery features. Instead of using the monolithic APK, the app bundle is vital for modern app and game distribution.
On Google Play Store, more than 360K apps and games have made the switch, with an average size savings of 20% compared to a universal APK.
Always, always check your reviews and reply to your users
Keeping a check on your user reviews and ratings about your app in the Play Console can help you uncover themes and see what features have the greatest impact on your reviews, and more.
More important is responding to those reviews. Users always appreciate making a personal connection. A response from the app owner itself has a big effect on how they feel about your app. According to the data from Google itself, users update their rating by +0.7 stars on average when developers respond to their feedback.
Google provides suggested replies which can help you get started for the reviews in English based on the content of the feedback.
Never keep your SDKs outdated
There are innumerous SDK developers who work round the clock in keeping their products current with the latest policy changes and security fixes. Make sure to update the app’s SDKs regularly, majorly for for SDKs in data-heavy categories like analytics or advertising.
Also, double-check that your SDK uses HTTPS for default communication to backend servers.
Be open for communication
It is also equally important to make sure now and then that all the lines of communication are open like your primary account email address. Google sends all the important emails about your account and updates to Google Play. Keep checking this account on a regular basis.
Conclusion
These tips and best practices ensure that you meaningfully grow your business this year and for all the years to come. Most of these guidelines are suggested by Google itself which have stemmed out of experience and lessons.
Originally published at https://www.hiddenbrains.com on February 3, 2020.
