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Apple Considering Google-Like 'Paid Search' On App Store (bloomberg.com)
Apple is considering big changes to the App Store, according to a Bloomberg report. The publication claims that the iPhone maker has a team working on "paid searches" -- something similar to Google's model. Under this, the company will charge its developers for showing their apps among top search results. Apple critic John Gruber writes: This sounds like a terrible idea. The one and only thing Apple should do with App Store search is make it more accurate. They don't need to squeeze any more money from it. More accurate, reliable App Store search would help users and help good developers. It's downright embarrassing that App Store search is still so bad. Google web search is better for searching Apple's App Store than the App Store's built-in search. That's the problem Apple needs to address.
While we're doing Google comparisons ... how about letting developers respond to a confused, erroneous or otherwise misinformed review.
Apple is ridiculously rich because of the high margins on their products. The reason they can have high margins is primarily because they have high customer satisfaction -- and also a great reputation, which is a result of the customer satisfaction. Cluttering their app store with stupid shit like this might make them a few pennies, but it will reduce customer satisfaction.
Apple considering changing name and logo to Peach.
Is it time to join the YaCy crowd yet?
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Its also possibly a step back to the old brick and mortar days where small devs had to compete with large corporations for shelf space, in other words rarely get shelf space. It might undo the somewhat equalized footing of a good set of keywords in a search showing both the large and small developers. Where the difference may be brand recognition and not so much visibility to potential customers (as with brick and mortar shelf space).
The search in the app store already sucks so hard that I literally Google what I want first, and then go back and try to "trick" the app store into actually showing it to me.
I hate ads with a passion, but in this case, I doubt paid listings could seriously make it any worse.
iphones make the money, rest just eat it up.
once iphones sales stop growing (which is starting to happen), and there is real competition in a saturated market for so called smartphones,(with apple no longer able to fool buyers in to paying extra for its over hyped, but in reality rather average, phones) apple would be in trouble.
its unused cash-pile will not cushion it for long either.
then we will see true money grubbing colors of apple . this story is just the start.
What's happening to QuickTime has been going on with Apple's iPods, iTunes, Macs and MacBookPros and OS X ... no one at Apple has the knowledge to write code and so Apple kills off the products.
But as the exodus of real coders starts hitting the iPhone and iPad lines, they too will suffer.
Cook's mantra "Hire The Queer" irrespective of skills, in this case complete lack thereof, ... has a downside.
"...The publication claims that the iPhone maker has a team working on "paid searches" -- something similar to Google's model."
So that's why I only get garbage on the results of my searches on Google Play? At best one or two relevant results and the following not having nothing to do with what I was looking for? Dammit!
Religion: The greatest weapon of mass destruction of all time
Back in mid-December 2015, DxO Labs released an app called "DxO Optics Pro for Photos". That's right, it's a photo-enhancement app that works with your Photos library, or something like that.
This was Version 1.0. It was soon top left on the "Best New Apps" section of the App Store's "Featured" screen, even though "We have not received enough ratings to display an average for the current version of this application." Which led me to wonder how this app could be considered "best".
How did this work, if not paid placement? Someone at the Fruit Company was looking at what just escaped from review and said "hey, that's really cool, let's feature it"? Number of installations per recent unit time?
Right now, discoverability is terrible in the app store. Unless I know what I want already, I don't go there - because the suggestions I get will be for Star Wars, Angry Birds, and Star Wars Angry Birds.
As a comparison, look at Steam. I buy all sorts of weird crap on Steam because they have so many ways to explore their content. One day I'm buying a AAA title for $50, the next I'm the 100th person to buy some random indie title for $2, the next I'm getting some older thing that just went on 70% - and I'm having a good experience with all those. The Queues are brilliant, their sales system is great, and their social features actually work (even though I only have a few friends on Steam, I quite often get sucked into buying something that they've played or reviewed or whatever).
Google and Apple (who both enjoy essentially monopoly status on their platforms) should both be stealing ideas as hard as they can from Valve here (who earned its popularity with users and developers by providing value to both over the long term).
Trying to monetize placement is completely backwards - it's creating win-lose situations between developers, and win-lose for Apple and consumers. Doing better work to help show people the stuff they might want is win-win-win, where the pie gets bigger, developers sell more, and consumers are more satisfied with what the stuff they get because it matches their preferences better.
Let's not stir that bag of worms...
Once in a while I make the mistake of browsing the app categories, just to see what's available.
I end up getting inundated with applications that all start with **11111AA, so that it appears at the top of the list, and you have to scroll pages and pages of apps before you hit something that isn't remotely junk. I don't even bother browsing anymore cause it's just a waste of time. I don't need to see 500 AAAAAAAAUseYourPhoneAsToiletPaper apps.
Suppose you just developed a new app. Today you have to buy ads on search engines and other places where you can only guess user interests. It's far better to advertise to users already search app store for appropriate keywords and who have matching interests. It will probably cost less money and you spam fewer Android users and others who are not interested in this category of apps.
Instead of that, how about you split the view into three instead of two parts? Paid, IAP and actually free?
there was a time when the "free" section of the AppStore was a great place to discover small gems, demo versions and more. Now 90% of it is FarmVille clones.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org