Marketing Your Apps for Maximum Exposure

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Marketing Your Android AppFirst Edition, 2011

Copyright © 2011 All Rights Reserved. Manufactured in the United Kingdom and Canada.

Distributed worldwide.

No parts of this mobile app content may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems without express written consent of the author and publisher except in the case of brief excerpts in critical reviews or articles.

The information provided within is not intended to be a substitute for business or marketing strategy or advice, and the author makes no guarantee, expressed or implied, that by following the advice within any success is guaranteed. Results will depend on the nature of the product or business model, the conditions of the marketplace, the experience of individual implementation, and situations and elements that are beyond anyone's control but your own. As with any business endeavor, you assume all risk related to investment and money, based on your own discretion and at your own potential risk.

The author and publisher make all recommendations without guarantee, and disclaim any liability arising in connection with this information. It is your responsibility to conduct your own due diligence regarding the safe and successful operation of your business.

About This App

This ebook app has been created to support clients, customers and owners of SquiddleBooks.

SquiddleBooks are book apps, complete with page flip functionality, that run on cell phones and tablets using the Android operating system.

SquiddleBooks can contain any information, of any length, on any topic and may or may not display advertisements. It's all up to you!

SquiddleBooks originate as unique content that has been converted into an Android app by a SquiddleFish developer. Find more information, including videos of a SquiddleBook in use, here:

http://www.squiddlebooks.comby

What We'll Cover

This book's aim is to introduce you to a variety of ways that your new Android App can be promoted – both online and offline.

You should already have a grasp of online and/or offline marketing, but even if you don't, Marketing Your Android App will get you started.

The content within has no intention of being a full-blown, complete-source, marketing handbook. There are multiple, well written courses available that teach very specific marketing techniques in a step-by-step fashion. If you need help finding the best one on any particular topic, don't hesitate to contact the writer personally.

I use the term “introduce you to a variety of ways” above as there is no way I can show you all the ways. Although I will be updating this app as often as possible the specific content of

your Android App will appeal to various target markets that I could never imagine to include. More succinctly; it will be your task to find non-app related venues and opportunities for promotion.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Personal Advice: Be There, Be AuthenticPersonal Advice: Full Time Marketers Should Exercise Caution

The Android MarketplaceYour App Listing Page

Discerning Key Words and PhrasesHow to Find High Traffic Key PhrasesNews-Worthy or Celebrity Keyword Strategy

Are You Selling Your App?

More Ways to Promote Your App in the Android Marketplace

Outside of the Android MarketplaceAmazon's Android App StoreYour Supporting WebsiteSocial Marketing

FacebookTwitter

Your Email ListAny Other Strategy You Already Employ

Your App Listing on Other Sites

Submitting to App Review Sites

About The Author: Laura Childs

Personal Advice: Be There, Be Authentic

My first rule of marketing is to always 'be' where your customer is 'at'. This wasn't as necessary with online marketing 10 years ago – we had different techniques and strategies up our sleeves – but today more than any other time in Internet history, you have to be an authentic member of the crowd you want to have as customers.

Here's an example, if you have written a SquiddleBook app on organic tomato growing, you would be wise to find all the gardening forums or websites, heirloom seed providers, the health conscious recipe sites, the back-to-the-land blogs, and make a personal attempt to become a part of their community. By doing so you will be helping others discover your great content, of course! You can find those sites through a few well targeted Google searches.

This is where being authentic will make you successful. If you're not walking the talk you

might as well just get out of any niche you're trying to bust into. Ignore that and your success will either be minimal, short-lived, or both.

Please understand that I'm not giving you this tough love content because I'm perfectly, authentically, every “thing” that I write about and promote. I am one of those people who most certainly has her paws in too many cookie jars – but the niches that I'm “living and breathing” are the ones I'm making money in, that people are following me in, and that I'm known for.

Niches and topics that I'm merely dabbling in – without enough experience to be an expert – is where my income flounders and wanes. If you can learn anything from me, learn to not be like me in that regard!

Personal Advice: Full Time Marketers Should Exercise Caution

This section is really for the marketing super stars who have been around the block for years, jump on all the new opportunities or are always looking for something new to teach and sell to newbies. My advice is to tread carefully with Android Apps.

Although the time to strike the Android market with oodles of SquiddleBooks:

• might be ripe, and• you could stand to make a lot of money, and• move a lot of traffic to affiliate

opportunities, and• gain a bigger list of subscribers than the

gurus, and• in markets where there is virtually no

competition...

And as much as we'd love to take your orders for one book creation after another, I urge you

not to spread yourself thin across multiple markets. This type of business plan – attacking multiple markets simultaneously – will eventually collapse.

To illustrate I'll use the example of Amazon's Kindle platform. A few years back Amazon allowed anyone and everyone to publish ebooks for the Kindle for free. As those ebooks sold, Amazon paid out royalties – to the tune of thousands monthly to many marketers. Marketers, not authors. The trouble was that these marketers were just throwing up one poorly written private label rights ebook after another and disaster eventually struck.

Customers complained, Amazon got mad, and the plug got pulled on the marketing geniuses. I'm not being judgmental...the concept was pretty solid for the first ten marketers that jumped in. But by the time Amazon pulled the plug and started pulling down the books and closing accounts, hundreds of newbie marketers went from a thriving online income

to next to nothing.

I'm sure you can see the similarities between Kindle books and SquiddleBooks book apps. One difference is that Google charges developers $25 (one time) – Amazon charged nothing. And having a developer create your SquiddleBooks cost money – where ebooks on Amazon cost nothing.

At any rate, if the Android market is flooded with private label rights book apps, the plug will be pulled quicker than Amazon's response. First, because Google is nobody's fool but also because app users are more apt to leave a bad review – even on a free app!

That's the end of my soap box. Keep your content real, be authentic, and offer great value to your App readers and users. If you do so, they will be loyal, leave you great reviews, visit your website, share your app with their friends, and sign up for your email list.

The Android Marketplace

Your App Listing Page

Here is the first point of contact a reader will have with you. Aside from your title, you'll have 4,000 characters to describe your app and entice the visitor to install your app on their phone or tablet.

One of the nice parts of having your own Android developer account is that you can log in and edit your description anytime. You can tweak the copy to make it more enticing or you can rewrite the content altogether to include particular words or phrases.

By particular I mean words that might be currently news-worthy such as a celebrity's name – but as that is a specific strategy, I'll cover it in a moment.

First let's clear up the standard concept of writing your description. The content you place

in your description can be as simple the first chapter of your book. If you're pressed for time or feeling particularly lazy, this is almost always a decent solution. With a first chapter people will gain an overview of your writing style within the app and the description will contain a good variety of related keywords for the Android App search engine to index.

If you have time however, I suggest you give the description a little more effort than a cut and paste of your first chapter. Write and proof your description carefully - ensuring choice keywords and phrases are ample – but in a manner that reads well to a human reviewer. No “keyword stuffing”.

Discerning Key Words and Phrases

There is no better time to talk to you about keywords and phrases and why they're important...

Although not everyone finds apps via the marketplace's search feature, many will. Should your app description contain the phrases a user types in, your app will show in the list of search results – even when it is brand new to the marketplace. In some cases and with some key phrases, this might be one way you can beat, or at least compete with similar apps. Furthermore – as long as the searcher is doing so from the top level category - you will also show up in a wider set of results.

Let me give you an example here:

Let's say Joan is trying to get in shape and hunts for a pedometer app to measure her steps taken and calories burned. Joan types “pedometer” into the search field of the

Android Market.

What are the results of Joan's search? A list of pedometer apps that measure stride, track steps, count the amount of calories burned, etc. But Joan also sees your book app titled “How to Use a Pedometer to Lose Weight” (her search term is in your title) and your other book app titled “Get in Shape in Three Months” (because your app description for this book contained the word pedometer).

I'm certain she's going to download your book app, too. Talk about meeting your market and expanding your reach!

If you've been around the marketing block or been in your niche for very long you'll already have a handle on which key words and phrases are the most important. But what if you haven't? Should you just guess at the words you want to be found for and stuff them into your description?

Absolutely not.

Over fifty percent of entrepreneurs, established business owners, and new marketers that I have talked to over the years seem to think they can and should pick the keywords they want to be found for.

Theoretically I suppose they're right – but wouldn't it be better instead to be found for keywords that potential customers are searching by?

If that didn't make immediate sense to you, here's another example:

Twelve years ago (yes I've been working online that long) I had a search engine client who was a gifted keynote speaker in the Knowledge Management industry – specifically in the mental health field. It was his goal to give speeches and presentations at health conferences around the world – on large corporate budgets.

After an hour of answering his questions about search engine optimization and discussing the various keywords and phrases he should/could target, he told me to drop all of the keywords I'd chosen and instead optimize for Boston Health Management Professional. He wanted to be #1 in Yahoo (I don't think we had Google back then) for “Boston Health Management Professional”.

“Really?”

Keeping in mind that 12 years ago only about 5% of the users that we have online now logged on daily and very few of those people were searching for local talent or information. The suggestion I made to my client was to target key phrases that were actively being typed into the search engines and that were congruent with his goals of travel and lectures (i.e. Health Management Speaker).

As it turned out ZERO searches per month were

being called for “Boston Health Management Professional” - zero, none, nada, zilch.

Could I get him to the #1 spot? Sure I could, but no one would ever be looking for his services there!

The secret sauce in all of this is the blurb from above “key phrases that were actively being typed into the search engines.” As such your next task is to discover which common terms are being used to find information related to your app – and target those terms!

How to Find High Traffic Key Phrases

So now that you have the concept of high-traffic key phrases it is time to discover where to find them.

https://adwords.google.com/select/KeywordToolExternal

The link above will take you to Google's free keyword tool. This is an entry level way of doing keyword research but it is sufficient to give you a list of “key phrases that are actively being typed into the search engines.”

Go to the link, type in one of the main topics of your new Android App and take a few minutes surfing through the results Google provides. The tool will usually return a list of 100 keywords, 50 to a page, so don't miss clicking the little page 2 icon at the bottom. If you get less than 50, your key phrase is too tightly defined – searching a different phrase may net better results.

Based on what you discover about your topic you can now write your description, ensuring that you've included some related high-traffic keywords.

News-Worthy or Celebrity Keyword Strategy

Even though your App may be about Ashtanga Yoga specifically – if your research finds that there is a huge global interest in Bikram Yoga, you'd be wise to target the term “Bikram Yoga” - at least in your description.

That is merely an example. Just some food for thought to explain the concept of being found for high-traffic, related terms.

You will have to think strategically for each scenario before you decide how to, or if, you should employ this strategy. You'll also want to consider how you'll respond to the large amount of visitors to your app who were searching for Bikram Yoga but found Ashtanga Yoga information instead.

Some ways to manage this are:

• Include a few sentences in your description that compare the two styles of yoga. “If you

enjoy Bikram Yoga, you'll love the challenge of Ashtanga.”

• If true, include your experience with Bikram Yoga in an author's bio within the description.

The celebrity or news-worthy strategy I mentioned at the top of this chapter? Employing this strategy could give you a big boost in downloads with only a few minutes invested. You merely need to strategize how current news stories, trends or celebrities, could be applied to your app. You also want to do it in a way that doesn't get you sued by the celebrity.

A quick example:

• Your Android app – Dramatic MakeUp Application

• The News – CoverGirl Foundation recall (there hasn't been one, this is simply an illustration)

• A Celebrity – Lina Smith became an

overnight sensation and duplicating her smokey eye look became a huge interest to teenage girls.

• Trends – Prom night is a month away.

I'm sure you could add a line or two to your App description to be found in the marketplace for Lina Smith, prom makeup, CoverGirl, or smokey eye makeup application, couldn't you? Sure you could and it would take you less than 5 minutes.

Are You Selling Your App?

If you are selling your app, consider the introduction to keywords and phrases from above but also employ some smart sales letter techniques in your description.

Writing an effective sales letter is an intense course on it's own and worthy of knowing if you're planning on marketing or selling more than one Android app. If you think that learning how to write effective copy is something you might be interested in, I would suggest investing $10 or so in Dan Kennedy's book – then, if you think you need to learn more you'll find a whole world full of over-priced courses on the topic through a Google search.

All that said, for a $1 - $5 app, you don't need to pitch too hard or learn too much on the psychology of selling. If you do nothing else but explain the content covered within your app and let the reader know how your app is going to help them with their problem, make their life

easier, or satisfy their curiosity on a topic - you'll have them interested enough to click that purchase button.

Keep in mind that the world is full of busy people who don't like to read long sales copy. For that reason you won't want to fill up your app description with 2,000 words (or the 4,000 limit). So here's a short lesson in sales copy for app descriptions:

• Use bullets that explain how the customer will benefit from your knowledge or content.

• Include snippets of testimonials or reviews as quotes within your copy. If you don't have any reviews or testimonials yet, ask friends or family members to proof your book and provide honest feedback. Then use their feedback as a quote.

• At the end of yours sales copy add a call to action. A standard call to action reads: “Install this app today to (insert your top benefit here)”

More Ways to Promote Your App in the Android Marketplace

There are a few ways to help your app show at the top of the listings by category as well as by search terms. Although you'd never want to game the system, asking friends and family to help you out by installing, reading, rating and commenting on your app will help to build user confidence in your app.

Although book apps aren't wildly common within Android at the moment, they do account for 24% of all apps on the iPhone and iPad – so assuming that what works to help iPhone apps gain rank and ground within the App Store would also work for Android's book apps.

It's important to state that I haven't done enough testing in this regard to claim any of it to be 'gospel truth'. With that introduction, here are some considerations.

Keep everything about your listing looking

polished and professional. Book graphics (cover, icon, screen shots, and video if applicable).

Solicit user reviews! If people compliment your work on your website, or in email, ask them to revisit your app page and leave a review. Within the pages of your app, ask for a review. Ask your friends and family to review your app.

Outside of the Android Marketplace

Amazon's Android App Store

The world's largest online store, Amazon, is now in the app business and for the first year of development you can partner with them, uploading as many of your own apps as you like, for free. On your first anniversary you'll need to pay them $99/year. This may be a limited offer until the Amazon app store is well established.

The .APK file, the supporting screen shots, and the descriptions for your app don't differ from the Android Marketplace so the submission, with Amazon's wizard walking you through the steps, will be a cinch.

At one of the first screens you'll be asked if you're selling your apps or offering them for free. Even if your plan is to give your apps away with an intention to earn advertising revenue within, I suggest you select the “selling” option.

Then, as you add each app to your account you will have a choice – free or priced. I do not know if the opposite is true.

Your Supporting Website

If you have an app then you either have a website dedicated to promoting that app, or you have a website that targets the same market, or you need to start a website using either of those strategies.

Apps, like websites, don't go viral, make you famous, or earn thousands of dollars overnight just because you've built one. Ask any successful app developer how they achieved success with their app and they'll tell you to “promote, promote, promote”.

Your strategy to promote your app through one or multiple websites will vary based on your target market and the app's content or functions. The desired outcome, however, is to put your app in front of as many eyeballs as

possible.

Talk about your app in every article or post you create, add your app icon to the sidebar of your blog or website, and link to your app description pages on the Android Marketplace, the Amazon App Store, or both.

Social Marketing

Whether your target market hangs out and interacts on Facebook, LinkedIn, YouTube, MySpace, Google+, or private forums, you need to be where they are, promoting your app.

It's important to note that every social network and forum has a code of etiquette to follow. Sometimes the 'code' is unspoken and sometimes the 'rules' are well documented.

If unspoken – you just 'know' when and how often to share personally vs. self-promoting.

An example of 'unspoken' rules is Facebook.

Facebook is akin to a party. Some groups or networks on Facebook talk about their kids, some incessantly about work, or the area they live in. They talk about the ties that bind them, the things they have in common. If one person at the party keeps talking about their book, their app, their website – it's not long before everyone else at the party has moved to the other side of the room. So when you're on Facebook – whether interacting with your friends or writing on another person's wall, don't be a shameless self-promoter. Interact, offer insights of value, show your intelligence or expertise on the subject without trying to make a sale and you'll find that you don't have to hunt down new friends – they'll be sending you friend requests.

On the other side of the spectrum are forums where rules are clearly documented – usually under a link at the bottom of every forum page. You'll find forums that state “no affiliate links”, no links of any sort until you've made 5 posts, and so on. Since your target market spends

time in this forum, finding and following the rules while becoming a valued member in the community could net you many sales, installs and subscribers.

Facebook

Finally, even if you don't use Facebook regularly to keep in touch with friends, family, fans or customers now that you have an app you'll want to give your app some promotion love through Facebook.

This is easy enough to do in Facebook – you simply create a page for your niche, for yourself (and announce your app on either of those pages), or for your app specifically.

If you've never created a page on Facebook before you'll find it to be super easy. On your “Home” page (not your wall, not your profile page), you should see a link in the left sidebar that says “Pages”. Directly underneath that title you will see any topic pages that you have liked

in the past. Click the word Pages and then click the button that says “Create A Page”. From there, Facebook's wizard will walk you through the remaining steps.

Don't worry about creating a bad page or the wrong type of page on Facebook. If you've created it, you can delete or edit it at any time.

Although there are lengthy courses and shorter blog posts (all available through a Google search) about winning marketing strategies with Facebook pages, here are some tips to get you started:

Use your keywords and phrases within the title, the description or the posts you make. You'd be surprised to learn just how many people search for information, content, new friends with similar interests, and more from within Facebook.

Post interesting and related photos in an album on your page.

Invite your friends and family to join and ask them to invite others. The more people you have liking your page and the more content and interaction you solicit the better.

Link to your Facebook page – that links to, or promotes your app – from your website's sidebar, in your other social networks or in your forum signatures.

Twitter

I have to admit that I don't get the most out of Twitter. As I'm no expert, I wouldn't want to give any advice, potentially steering you wrong or wasting your time.

However the basic social networking rules still apply. Use your keywords and phrases in your content, seek out like minds and Follow them, and post often.

Your Email List

Do you maintain a mailing list through an auto-responder account for your website or blog? If so, and if your app is related to the content your subscribers signed up for, announce your app to your list.

I recently read another marketer's research on his last promotion. His email list accounted for 40% of his total launch downloads. The marketer's idiom “the money is in the list” can be re-written for app launches as “the installs are in the list”.

If you don't have an auto-responder account now is the time to get one. By collecting names and email addresses from your Facebook fans and Twitter followers, from your website, and even from your app Marketplace page, you will have a list of interested parties who might be interested in your next app, an ebook you've written, a timely post you've written, or a product you'd like to promote.

This link will set you up with the best auto-responder service for a $1 trial fee – http://emailmanagement.aweber.com/. On the site you will also find videos, tips, tutorials, an extensive knowledge base and excellent support by email. The feature that sets this autoresponder apart from so many other is the extra work done behind the scenes with the larger email service providers to (practically) ensure your email doesn't end up in your list's junk folder.

TOP TIP!

To give your newly uploaded App listing a boost, follow these steps:

Once your App is 'Live' on the Marketplace, got to the listing on your Android phone (or get a friend to do it/or both!) and download the App to your device

Once you have done this, go back to the listing

using your Android device, and, as you have now downloaded the App, you are now entitled to give it a 'Star' rating and/or review (don't be obviously spammy & if you can't think of anything reasonable to say about your own app then just leave a star rating of your choice (NB – The star rating works on averaging all star ratings & therefore starting with a high star rating will nee more low ratings for the average rating to be significantly lowered)

Once you have rated your app, then go to the marketplace listing from your PC and Google +1 your app (top right corner) and Tweet your App (again, top right corner)

Once you have done this on the Android Marketplace now go to AppBrain, which is the 2nd most popular Android App listing site after the Android Marketplace. If you need to then sign up (free), then locate your App, sometimes there is a delay from your App showing on the Android Marketplace to the time it shows on AppBrain, once you have located your App on

AppBrain you can then Google +1, Tweet and Facebook 'Like' your App again

What this gives you is Tweets, Google +1's etc from two major sites – Android Marketplace and AppBrain

Finally, the ' piece de resistance' ;

Go to SocialAdr and join ~ this is a social network bookmarking site, but the difference is that the bookmarks that your App listing receives are actually from real people who are also members of SocialAdr, rather than Internet 'bots, and as such, your App listing URL gets bookmarked over a period of time and is very natural rather than all at once by automated 'bots and is very un-natural (and will also make Google suspicious of that particular URL's sudden popularity

A Note About SocialAdr:There are various levels of membership within the site, starting at Free Membership, and then

going on to Paid Membership levels

With the Free Membership, the way it works, is that you have to bookmark other members URLs and 'earn' bookmarks of your own. This is a good idea, especially as it is Free and you have a lot of time on your hands to 'earn' more bookmarks for your own listings

My choice is the 'lazy' way and I choose to pay 'X' amount per month for 'X' amount of bookmarks/backlinks without having to spend the time 'earning' bookmarks by submitting other peoples, which I think is time better spent on creating more Apps!

If I need extra credits for links but don't plan on needing that amount each month, then there is always the option to buy extra credits as a one-off

However, which plan you choose is entirely up to you of course. To see the current SocialAdr details and pricing Click Here

Any Other Strategy You Already Employ

Virtually any other marketing strategy that you've read about or are already doing – online or offline – is going to work to promote your app. Although the short list below might not be applicable to every app, it should get your mind thinking outside of the box.

• Write topic articles on other websites such as HubPages, Squidoo, InfoBarrel, and eZineArticles – and link to your app description, your Facebook page, your Twitter profile. (New to you? Search for Article Marketing or Marketing on Squidoo for helpful tips.)

• Make demonstration videos and post them on YouTube. Take videos of your app, of you talking about your app, or on a related topic. (New to you? Search for Video Marketing.)

• Presentations – same as above. If you've never done one before, try http://www.SlideShare.net/. It is both fun

and easy, plus the site gets a lot of targeted traffic.

• Write a Press Release about your app launch and submit it to free press release websites. (See http://www.prweb.com for free press release submissions.)

• Have bumper stickers, mugs, and t-shirts made. Then have a contest for your email subscribers, Facebook fans, etc. and give them away! Everyone loves a contest.

Your App Listing on Other Sites

One of the great things about having an Android app is that other websites will pick up the new releases and link to your App description page. It's important to know that this doesn't end with app review sites.

Just 15 days after the launch of my first app I had over 685 links to my app page. Approximately 60% of them were app review or app related websites but the other 40% were niche targeted. Every listing also linked back to my home page (not just the app description page in the Android market).

Marketers who are on the lookout for targeted back links should take note of this because this is just the beginning of the search engine positioning and driving targeted traffic power for website owners.

Submitting to App Review Sites

Be proactive in getting reviews from app review sites. Visit and contact any of the links below to submit your app for review. If an automatic submission form isn't on the site, use the contact form to ask for a review.

• http://www.androidtapp.com/ • http://www.androidappsreview.com/submit

-your-android-app/• http://www.mobileappsgallery.com/submit-

android-app/• http://appstouse.com/submit-app-for-

review• http://smokinapps.com/submit-apps/ • http://www.bestandroidappsreview.com/re

commend-an-app/• http://www.topbestfreeapps.com/submit-

your-iphone-and-android-app-review-for-free/

• http://www.androidvideoreview.net/submit -app/

• http://aviatorandroidapps.com/page/Devel opers-Submit-Your-Apps-For-Review.aspx (aviation niche)

• http://disquiet.com/2010/08/21/submissio n-guidelines/ (music niche)

About The Author: Laura ChildsAbout The Author: Laura Childs

Laura Childs is the author of over 20 electronic and print books (see many of them here on Amazon.com) and a growing list of Android Apps.Laura was a downtown city girl who, at 30 years of age, packed up her young daughter and headed to the country for a new way of life.Through years of raising all kinds of farm animals, home schooling her daughter, authoring books for print and digital, and living off the land; Laura also worked online to pay the family bills since 1997. No different than anyone else reading this – big modern commitments such as custody battles, orthodontics, and college tuition require finances that one-woman farm operations just won't provide.As a testament to Laura's marketing ability and consistent determination, her first website

(registered in 1998) is still thriving today after multiple changes to the online climate. Over the years she has worked for Marlon Sanders and with Dr. Joe Vitale (two marketing powerhouses that have been online since the late 1990s).Lately Laura's passion for marketing has morphed into mobile accessibility and creating apps, while continuing to assist small business owners to meet their financial goals.

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