Answer Engine Optimization is optimizing content so AI assistants like ChatGPT and Gemini surface and recommend your app or brand.
The app icon is the single most important conversion asset — the first thing users see in search, charts, and on the home screen.
App indexing exposes in-app content to search engines so it can appear in web results and deep-link directly into the app.
An app preview video is a short autoplaying clip on your product page that demonstrates the app in action and can lift conversion when done well.
The app store algorithm ranks apps in search and browse by combining relevance signals with authority and behavioral signals.
Conversion rate optimization (CRO) is the practice of increasing the share of store-listing visitors who install your app, mainly through creative testing.
Indexation is whether and how a keyword is registered as relevant to your app, determining which searches you can possibly appear in.
App Store Optimization (ASO) is the practice of improving an app’s visibility and conversion in app store search and browse, plus emerging AI surfaces.
The App Store subtitle is a 30-character line under your title that supports both keyword ranking and conversion messaging.
The app title is the most heavily weighted ASO field; including a high-value keyword in it can dramatically improve ranking for that term.
Featuring is when Apple’s editorial team showcases your app in a Today, Apps, or Games story — a major, if temporary, visibility boost.
Apple Search Ads is Apple’s paid platform for placing your app at the top of relevant App Store search results.
Apple Search Tags are structured keyword tags Apple uses to categorize apps and surface them for relevant searches and browse collections.
Branded keywords contain a company or app name; non-branded keywords describe a need. Each plays a distinct role in app discovery.
Category ranking is your app’s position within a store category’s top charts, driven largely by recent download and engagement velocity.
Click-through rate is the share of people who click your listing after seeing it — in app stores, closely related to tap-through rate.
ASO competitor analysis studies rival apps’ keywords, creatives, and ratings to find opportunities and benchmark your own listing.
Custom Product Pages let you create up to 35 alternate App Store pages, each with its own URL, screenshots, and messaging for specific audiences.
Deep linking sends users to a specific screen inside an app rather than its home page, improving conversion and re-engagement.
Generative Engine Optimization tunes your content and presence to influence how generative AI models describe and recommend you.
An impression is counted each time your app appears to a user in search or browse — the top of the ASO funnel before taps and installs.
A rating prompt is the native dialog that asks users to rate your app; timing it well is one of the cheapest ways to raise your score.
Install conversion rate is the percentage of product page visitors who install your app — the central CRO metric.
Keyword cannibalization is wasting metadata space by repeating the same term across fields, reducing the breadth of keywords you index.
Keyword density in ASO is how often a keyword appears across your indexable metadata fields — enough to signal relevance, without wasteful repetition.
Keyword difficulty estimates how hard it is to rank highly for a term, based on the strength and number of competing apps.
The App Store keyword field is a hidden 100-character list of comma-separated terms used only for indexing, never shown to users.
A keyword ranking is your app’s position in the app store search results for a specific search term — the core ASO performance metric.
LLM citations are the sources an AI assistant references or links to when answering, and being among them drives AI-era discovery.
LLM visibility is how often and how favorably AI assistants mention your app across the prompts your potential users ask.
Localization is adapting your app’s metadata and creatives for different languages and regions to rank and convert in each market.
On Google Play, the long description is indexed for keywords, making it the primary place to influence search ranking through copy.
Long-tail keywords are longer, more specific multi-word search phrases that are easier to rank for and often convert better.
Metadata is the set of text and asset fields in your store listing that the algorithm reads and users see — the raw material of ASO.
Organic uplift is the additional organic installs generated as a side effect of paid campaigns improving your rankings and visibility.
Organic installs come from unpaid discovery; paid installs come from advertising. The mix shapes your unit economics and ASO strategy.
Product Page Optimization is Apple’s native A/B testing feature that lets you test up to three alternate versions of your icon, screenshots, and preview.
Prompt share of voice is the percentage of relevant AI prompts in which your app is mentioned versus competitors.
Ratings and reviews influence both ranking and conversion; the average star rating is one of the strongest conversion levers on any listing.
Retention rate is the share of users who keep using your app after installing; stores increasingly use it as a quality and ranking signal.
RAG is the technique where an AI retrieves external documents at query time to ground its answer — a key route to being cited.
Review velocity is the rate at which an app accumulates new ratings and reviews over time — a freshness and momentum signal.
App store screenshots are the visual pitch for your app; the first two or three drive the majority of the conversion decision.
Search relevance is how closely the store judges your app to match a query, the gate that decides which terms you can rank for.
Search volume (or popularity score) estimates how often users search a given keyword — the demand side of keyword research.
Seasonality is the predictable rise and fall in search demand and installs tied to times of year, holidays, and recurring events.
Share of voice measures how much of the visibility for a keyword set your app captures relative to all competitors.
The Google Play short description is an 80-character line that is both keyword-indexed and the first copy most users read.
Store Listing Experiments are Google Play’s native A/B testing tool for icons, screenshots, descriptions, and other listing assets.
Tap-through rate is the share of impressions that result in a tap to your product page — a key signal of icon and title appeal.
Uninstall rate is the share of installs that are later removed; a high rate signals weak value and can drag down rankings.