Which ASO Tools are Right for Your Game?
When I started doing app store optimization (ASO) for my games, I was so overwhelmed by the numerous ASO tools available in the market…
App Annie, Mobile Action, Sensor Tower, App Radar, Priori Data, ASOdesk, Searchman, TheTool, Keyword Tool, AppKeywords.net, Apptentive, Appbot, AppFollow, Apptopia, APPlyzer, SplitMetrics, StoreMaven, Raise Metrics, TestNest, SearchAdsHQ, SearchAds by Mobile Action, adAhead, you name it.
And as if things were not already complicated enough …
These ASO tools provide very different features, pricing, options, …
When deciding which ones to use, I was like…
How to Choose your ASO Tools
If you are looking for your best ASO tools, check out my findings below.
I will first start with a categorization of ASO tools, and follow up with a big list of app store optimization tools.
You can then choose your ASO tools based on the category and the details of individual tools.
Free Bonus:
- Click here to get a free comparison spreadsheet of all top ASO tools. It can be printed nicely on one page, and you can easily sort the ASO tools by type, price, availability of free version, etc.It also includes 2 more ASO tools that are not covered in this post.
Types of ASO Tools
ASO tools come in many flavors and packages, and they can be grouped into the following categories:
1) App Keyword Optimization Tools
ASO tools of this type help you optimize your app keywords to increase your app search traffic.
The app keyword related features include app keyword suggestions, keyword optimization, keyword tracking, etc.
ASO tools like Mobile Action, Sensor Tower, Meatti, App Radar, Priori Data, ASOdesk, Searchman, TheTool, Keyword Tool, and AppKeywords.net are some good examples.
2) Review & Sentiment Analysis Tools
ASO tools of this type perform optimization of your user reviews and ratings.
Tools like Appbot, Mobile Action and TheTool analyze your user ratings and review contents, and tell you what your users like and don’t like.
With this kind of sentiment analysis, you can then refine your product development roadmap to earn better ratings.
For example, if you find out a lot of users are complaining about a specific issue, you can prioritize your effort to fix that problem, and tell the complaining users about the solution.
Many users will appreciate your positive reaction to their comments, and give you better ratings.
Related to this, AppFollow provides features that help you reply all comments in App Store and Play Store efficiently.
On the other hand, ASO tools like Apptentive help you increase the chance of getting 5-star reviews. It optimizes your app’s rating prompt process by deciding who, when, and how to present your rating prompts.
3) A/B Testing Tools
A/B testing enables you to test your mobile app just like a science project. It helps you test two or more app product pages and determine which one gives you a better download conversion rate.
Tools like Splitmetrics, Store Maven, TestNest, and RaiseMetrics are some good A/B testing tools for your app product page.
4) Search Ads Optimization Tools
These ASO tools help you optimize your advertising campaign on Apple Search Ads. They provide automation features and competitor data that help you run ad campaigns more effectively.
Some tools also integrate with app attribution partners (Adjust, AppsFlyer, Kochava, TUNE, etc.) and allows you to optimize campaigns not only for installs, but also for in-app events.
ASO tools like SearchAdsHQ, SearchAds by Mobile Action, and adAhead are some good examples.
5) App Store Intelligence Tools
ASO tools of this type provide estimates of competitor performance and app market trends.
For instance, they offer estimates on data on competitor apps. These estimates include app downloads, revenue, advertising spend trends, market penetrations, etc.
The information can be useful to app product managers and marketing managers for doing competitive analysis and marketing planning.
App Annie, Mobile Action, Sensor Tower, Priori Data, Apptopia, and APPlyzer are ASO tools that offer app store intelligence.
Top ASO Tools
Listed below are the top ASO tools in 2018. The list is organized according to the types of ASO tools discussed above.
To make the list more authentic, I personally reached out to everyone of them and collect their views of how their tools can help their users.
And I’m fortunate enough to receive some great answers!
Lastly, I’ve prepared an one-page comparison spreadsheet with all the ASO tools.
It is a printable version, and you can easily sort the ASO tools by type, price, availability of free version, etc.
1) App Keyword Optimization Tools
2) Review & Sentiment Analysis Tools
3) A/B Testing Tools
4) Search Ads Optimization Tools
5) App Store Intelligence Tools
A Side-by-Side Comparison of ASO Tools
Mobile Data Intelligence & Actionable Insights
Mobile Action
Mobile Action is an intuitive App Store Optimization tool and a data company providing actionable insights for their users. It provides its users with the most accurate data possible but that’s what every ASO tool claims to do. In fact the difference of Mobile Action is its dedicated customer success team that provides instant support across the entire globe 24/7. Mobile Action got into business as a ASO agency so we know a great deal of stuff regarding App Store Optimization and we build our tools from the perspective of an ASO specialist.
Aykut Karaalioglu, CEO
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $69/Month
Data That Drives App Growth
Sensor Tower
Sensor Tower provides mobile developers with powerful market intelligence and App Store Optimization solutions that enable them to easily surface competitive insights and achieve maximum organic growth on the App Store and Google Play.
Randy Nelson, Head of Mobile Insights
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $79/Month
App Store Optimization made easy
App Radar
App Radar is an search engine optimization tool that helps app developers optimizing their apps being more visible within the app stores. With a direct integration into iTunes Connect & Google Play Console, App Radar makes the process of App Store Optimization easy like never before.
Thomas Kriebernegg, CEO
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $150/Month
Win Your Mobile Market
Priori Data
Priori Data App Intelligence enables you to research, benchmark, and track your competition all in one place.
Create individual or team viewable watchlists and comparisons of apps in your competitive set, and track their rank, download, revenue, DAU, MAU, ARPDAU and retention performance on a daily basis.
Set up smart alerts to get notified of any major shifts, and receive daily and weekly reports so that you never lose track of the big picture.
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? No
- Premium plan starts at: $99/Month
Boost your organic downloads with Data-Driven Marketing Technologies
ASOdesk
Our dream is to make our customers more and more successful.
App Store Optimization is a never-ending optimization process that can bring millions of free installs. Our clients have many opportunities to make their business more effective. Just in a couple of clicks our product is available for you and ready to help you to find new real users.
Sergey Sharov, CEO
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $41.6/Month
App Data Solutions to accelerate Ecosystem success
Searchman
SearchMan is the leading App Analytics Data & Technology company with over 100 000 companies actively using our solutions to help them succeed in the App economy. SearchMan’s parent company, AppGrooves was founded in San Francisco Bay Area by former executives of Rakuten, AdMob, Yahoo and many other startups. Our investors include 500 Startups, Digital Garage, and several internet luminaries whose experience includes Disney, Google, Yahoo, Gree, Ricoh, Hatena, and Rakuten.
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $25/Month
Performance-Based Mobile App Marketing & ASO tool
TheTool
TheTool helps developers and marketers to track and optimize their App Store Optimization strategy in 91 countries or globally, carry out keyword research, benchmark ASO KPIs with competitors, understand the impact of marketing actions on installs, conversion rate and revenue; and, ultimately, grow the organic installs of their apps and games. Basically we help people make more money with apps.
Daniel Peris, CEO
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: €29 /Year
Find Great Keywords Using Autocomplete
Keyword Tool
KeywordTool.io helps marketers and app creators discover what app store users are looking for by generating keyword suggestions using the app store’s autocomplete.
A simple search can yield hundreds of hidden keywords for you to optimize your app towards.
Khai Yong Ng, Head of Growth
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $48 /Year
Sneak into Google Play's auto-suggest feature
AppKeywords.net
When I launched AppKeywords.net back in 2015 it was really hard to get proper data on keywords. Sure you had a lot tools giving you some kind of estimates but you could not be really sure if the data is accurate. Especially when you were researching non-english keywords.
Sebastian Knopp, Growth and Product Strategy
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: Free
Build a brand your customers love
Apptentive
Using proactive mobile communication tools, Apptentiveempowers companies to better understand more of their customers—at scale—in order to drive app downloads, create seamless customer experiences, and validate product roadmaps. The product gives brands the opportunity to listen to, engage with, and retain their customers through intelligently timed surveys, messages, and prompts. They power millions of customer interactions every month for companies including Buffalo Wild Wings, eBay, Philips, Saks Fifth Avenue, and Zillow.
Robi Ganguly, CEO
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: Custom Plan
App review & ratings analysis for mobile teams
Appbot
Appbot helps developers understand how customers feel about their apps, by monitoring and analyzing their app reviews and ratings across all major platforms. Appbot applies proprietary sentiment analysis and clustering techniques to help developers understand current issues, and identify quick wins.
Claire Mcgregor, Co-founder
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $39 /Month
Reviews & Updates Monitor for App Store & Google Play
AppFollow
AppFollow is created to support everyone (this year we will expand this support even further) involved in the process of development and growth of mobile apps and games. We support everyone whether it is a developer, CEO, customer support or product manager, ASO expert or publisher.
Anatoly Sharifulin, CEO & Co-founder
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: Custom Plan
Achieve success through apps
App Annie
The industry’s first app data platform integrates your app data with our comprehensive market data, cutting-edge data science, deep data foundation and engaging data experience. Through our platform, you can get immediate access to all our latest technology innovations and data sets, share the right data with the right people at the right time, pinpoint prime opportunities — and most crucially — create winning strategies.
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $15,000+/Year (source: TechCrunch)
Grow Your App Business
Apptopia
Apptopia provides competitive intelligence for the mobile app economy. Through intuitive tools, we’re able to display actionable data. This means user acquisition managers, product teams, SDK sales teams, growth marketers and more can make smarter decisions faster. Data we provide includes downloads, revenue, usage, retention, rank, SDK data, audience intelligence, advertising intelligence and more.
Adam Blacker, Communications Lead and Brand Ambassador
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $55 /Month
App Market Analysis & App Store Optimization
APPlyzer
Applyzer is a leading app industry analysis service providing market insights since 2009. Our service offers reliable data to a wide range of customers in the app business – From actionable data for publishers to relevant information for tech investors.
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: €10 /Month
Optimize Your App Conversion Rates on the App Store and Google Play with A/B Testing
SplitMetrics
With SplitMetrics, such app publishers as Rovio, Halfbrick, Wargaming, ZeptoLab, Pocket Gems optimize app store conversions by A/B testing app page elements: from icons and screenshots to subtitles, app previews, etc.
To help publishers get the most out of their app marketing efforts, SplitMetrics shares industry benchmarks and a great volume of educational materials, such as an AppGrowthLab course.
Alexandra Lamachenka, Head of Marketing
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $4,999 /Year
Increase app store conversion rates & pay less for every install
StoreMaven
StoreMaven helps more than 60% of top-grossing app publishers optimize their app store product pages to increase install rates and reduce the cost of user acquisition. Companies like Google, Uber, Facebook and Zynga rely on StoreMaven‘s testing and analytics platform to define their ASO and global mobile marketing strategies.
Gad Maor, CEO
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? No
- Premium plan starts at: Custom Plan
Raise your App Store & Google Play install rates with A/B testing
RaiseMetrics
Insight Is Everything. RaiseMetrics provides a visual understanding of how your audience interacts with your app page, and what you can do to maximize conversions.
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $99 /Month
Best Self-serve App Store and Google Play AB Testing Platform
TestNest
Best self-serve app store and google play ab testing platform.
Unoptimized App Store pages may increase CPIs by up to 40%. A/B test your app listing pages and get more quality users for less. Learn from user behavior analysis make optimized data-driven decisions.
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: $149 /Month
Optimize Apple App Store Ads for Revenue, not just downloads
SearchAdsHQ
SearchAdsHQ helps app publishers run ROI-driven Apple Search Ads campaigns.
To make it possible, the platform connects Apple Search Ads with app attribution partners (Adjust, AppsFlyer, Kochava, TUNE, etc.) and allows to optimize campaigns not only for installs, but for in-app events: in-app purchases, subscriptions, conversions.
Alexandra Lamachenka, Head of Marketing
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: Custom Plan
Mobile Action provides awesome tools to make the most of your Search Ads and keep up with the competition.
SearchAds by Mobile Action
Searchads.com was created specifically for Apple Search Ads and as Apple Search Ads is a rather new service it tries to cover the shortcomings of Apple Search Ads by providing competitor data, more reactive notifications and automation features that allows users to get the most out of the time and resources they have spent in Apple Search Ads.
Aykut Karaalioglu, CEO
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? No
- Premium plan starts at: Custom Plan
Optimize Apple App Store Ads for Revenue, not just downloads
adAhead
adAhead is an Apple Search Ads Optimization Platform that is fully self-managed by mobile app marketers. It provides GEO reports, COHORT analysis, keyword reports and charts, powerful rule manager tool, keyword rank monitoring, custom ad scheduler, bulk edit, duplication option for campaigns/ad groups, and multi account dashboard. adAhead also provides fully featured live demo for new visitors.
Yury Listapad, CEO
ASO Tool – Quick Facts:
- Free version / trial available? Yes
- Premium plan starts at: 2.5% of ad spend
A Side-by-Side Comparison of ASO Tools
The list of ASO tools here is really long.
To make it easier to do comparison, I've prepared an one-page comparison spreadsheet with all the ASO tools for you.
It is a printable version, and you can easily sort the ASO tools by type, price, availability of free version, etc.
Click here to get a free comparison spreadsheet of all top ASO tools.
The spreadsheet also includes 2 bonus tools and additional details that I didn’t have room to include in this post.
