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Posts tagged with "app store"

Apple Revamps App Store ‘Games’ Category with More Curated Lists→

Sarah Perez, reporting on Apple’s latest tweak to the App Store curated picks, this time for the Games category:

Apple quietly made a number of changes to the way it features and organizes mobile applications in the iTunes App Store in May that are of particular interest to mobile game developers. Previously, developers relied on algorithmically generated sections highlighting new and trending titles as a way of having their games found, but now many of these lists are gone.

Now missing are lists like “New,” “What’s Hot,” and “All iPhone (Free & Paid),” for example. In their place, including for the first time ever in the Games’ subcategory pages, are editorially curated lists instead.

Games are the App Store’s most popular category, with 18 sub-sections for different game genres. I’ve argued in favor of more human curation on the App Store in the past, and Apple seems to agree that having human editors is the best (and only?) way to highlight good content with taste and thoughtfulness.

Some developers will always find ways to work around a system where apps are highlighted through algorithms; you can’t buy your way into a curated list unless you make a good app and Apple thinks it’s worth recommending to customers. Apple still has algorithm-based sections on the App Store (Top Charts, ‘Popular Games’ on the front page), but handpicking the best software is the right thing to do in a store with about 1.5 million apps. I’m glad that we’re seeing more of this.

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No Ecosystem Is an Island: Google, Microsoft, Facebook & Adobe’s iOS Apps

Apple doesn’t make a single Android or Windows Phone app, and makes barely anything for Windows. But Apple’s reluctance to develop on other platforms hasn’t stopped Google and Microsoft from bringing their own apps across to iOS. That shouldn’t be any surprise at all, given the different business strategies the three take. But what might be surprising is the extent to which Google and Microsoft have committed to bringing apps to iPhone and iPad users.

You are no doubt aware of the big apps from Microsoft (Word, Outlook and Minecraft) and Google (Gmail, Maps, Calendar), but the reality is that these two companies alone have over 150 apps available on the iOS App Store today. For good measure, I’ve also taken a look at the iOS development efforts from Adobe and Facebook, which are also significant.

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Apple Rolls Out App Analytics→

Almost a year after the original announcement at WWDC 2014, Apple has opened access to App Analytics in iTunes Connect today.

Sarah Perez, writing for TechCrunch:

Ahead of its annual WWDC developer conference in June, Apple has opened up beta access to a new mobile app analytics service aimed at iOS developers. Simply called “Apple’s App Analytics,” an announcement inviting developers to request early access to the service appeared today on the iTunes Connect developer portal. Those with an iTunes Connect account can also reach the sign-up page using the direct link analytics.itunes.apple.com.

App Analytics are available for devices running iOS 8 and above, and the usage data part is completely opt-in. Every time you set up a new iOS device (or upgrade to iOS 8), you’re asked if you want to share information with app developers to improve their apps through analytics. Other App Store metrics (views, installs, etc.) are returned for all users.

Based on the tweets I saw in my timeline today, first impressions seem positive. Apple can now give developers a level of insight that’s unprecedented for any other app analytic platform. Apple’s App Analytics can plug directly into the App Store and tell developers how customers find their apps, where traffic is coming from, and how many views an app gets on the Store.

After years of no data about customer behavior on the App Store, it seems like this will be a massive change for how apps are marketed, optimized for international App Stores, and presented to users.

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Apple to Reject Watch Apps ‘Whose Primary Function Is Telling Time’→

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Apple updated their App Store Review Guidelines to state that Watch apps built primarily to tell time will be rejected.

In the past few weeks, I’ve heard about a few timezone apps primarily designed to show world clocks that were rejected for unknown reasons, with developers annoyed about the lack of official guidelines. Today’s change is better than approving and then rejecting an app, I guess, but maybe Apple could have shared this piece of information sooner. I don’t know if those timezone apps ended up being approved or not, and there could be other developers with a different experience from the ones I talked to.

From Apple’s standpoint, however, I can see why it makes sense to avoid confusion with apps that replicate a watch face UI – at least initially. It’s not too dissimilar from Apple’s stance on third-party apps that replicated native functionalities with the original iPhone App Store.

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‘Hours, the Apple Watch, and Turning an App Into a Business’→

Jeremy Olson on making Hours free and shifting their focus on turning a “simple app” into a business:

How do you break into business and the enterprise? We like Slack’s bottom-up approach. Start by making the best solution for individuals, who in turn advocate adoption for their team, who in turn evangelize to other teams…and up the chain it goes. If startups can make this strategy work in the Enterprise, as Slack has, then they can focus on creating a great experience for the end-user instead of a bloated feature list to pass a corporate approval checklist.

Hours is an excellent time tracker. I’m curious to see if this strategy will work out for them, and if other developers are tweaking their plans to follow a similar route.

See also: Dan Counsell’s advice from last year.

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Apple Watch App Store Going Live Today

Apple has begun opening the doors to the Apple Watch App Store, featuring iPhone apps that have been updated with Watch compatibility. According to BuzzFeed, more than 3000 Watch apps have been approved by Apple, and all of them will be available in the App Store section of the Apple Watch app for iPhone today.

In a screenshot shared by Buzzfeed, it appears that the App Store for Apple Watch will feature curated sections for categories such as Healthy Living, Games, and more. However, at the moment the Apple Watch app is only displaying a list of recommended apps by Apple, which include Twitter, Things, Wunderlist, Uber, Evernote, and Instagram. Apple is also promoting two games – Rules and Trivia Crack, both updated with Apple Watch support. A full refresh of the App Store for Apple Watch with more sections and lists is expected to go live later today.

In the meantime, Apple has also updated the App Store for iPhone with new badges to indicate whether an app offers Apple Watch compatibility. In search results and app descriptions, you’ll now see a badge with the app’s Apple Watch icon, as well as screenshots of the Apple Watch version underneath regular iPhone screenshots.

The new badge is also available on the App Store for iPad, with a label that says “Offers Apple Watch App for iPhone”. Currently, screenshots of Apple Watch apps are not available on the iPad App Store.

Blink: Effortless Affiliate Link Generation on iOS

Launching today, Blink is a new Universal iOS app from Squibner that quickly generates affiliate links for content from the App Store, Mac App Store, iTunes Store and iBooks Store. If you’re a member of the iTunes affiliate program you’ll know that you don’t want to be manually editing iTunes links with your own token and campaign tag – Blink automates that process on iOS, making it quick and effortless.

Before I continue, a quick introduction to the world of affiliate linking for those that are unaware. Essentially, anyone can register for the iTunes affiliate program and they will receive their own affiliate token (a series of letters and numbers). If they generate an iTunes URL that includes this affiliate token and share that link with others that click on it, they will receive a (small) percentage of any iTunes sales that flow from any clicks. For many small and independent sites, such affiliate programs are a valuable source of income (and yes, MacStories uses affiliate links). Apple’s website has more details if you’d like to learn more about the technical details of affiliate linking and perhaps even sign up.

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After Six Months of Rejections, Launcher Returns to the App Store

When Greg Gardner, an independent developer based in San Francisco, released Launcher for iOS last year, he didn’t think his handy utility would make headlines around tech blogs and push other developers to approach widgets for iOS 8 differently. And yet, after months of not being available on the App Store despite being originally approved in September 2014, Launcher is about to be covered (and used as an example) by the press again. Launcher has been re-approved by Apple, and it’s coming back to the App Store today with the same feature set from six months ago.

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The App Store, Pinterest, and App Curation

Last night, Apple and Pinterest announced a new collaboration that will see Apple curating app picks on the service, which has gained new special app pins with Install buttons. I can’t help but wanting to know more whenever the App Store and curation are involved; plus, I’ve been keeping an eye on Pinterest, and I find this new partnership fascinating.

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