Every month the ASO Stack community publishes a roundup of App Store and Google Play news and updates that occurred in the previous four weeks.
Here are some of the latest updates from November 2019:
- November 4: Google Play Points
Google Play has rolled out a new reward system. Users can accrue points to use towards various purchases: in-app, paid apps as well as other paid content. The points are rewarded for any purchase they make in the Google Play store as well as downloading and installing select apps and games.
- November 14: Google Autoplay Toggle
For about three months, Google Play has been discussing the addition of an autoplay feature within the store. We’ve seen the significant impact that a similar change had in the App Store and suspect the same increase in the importance of video to happen on Google Play as well. Today only about 8-10% of users ever watch the video but autoplay could increase that number to close to 100%.
Google Play is wary of rolling out this feature due to users’ concern over uncontrollable data usage. Subsequently, Google has been A/B testing a toggle that will allow users to turn the feature on and off. Although it’s unclear what the results of the A/B test will be, we should be preparing for the change to be ready in case it does go live. Relatively low exposure rates to video up until now meant that developers have previously neglected this element. But the sudden increase in exposure will hurt conversion rates in storefronts that retain an unoptimized video.
- New Ad Type in Google Play
Illia Kukharev, one of the ASO Stack community members, spotted a new type of ad in the Google Play Search Results page. Whilst apparently still in the testing stage, this new ad could be Google Play’s answer to Apple Search Ads.
It seems any new feature introduced into one store naturally flows into the other store as the feature’s value is proved. We’ve seen it with ads, personalization, the subscription offerings of Google Play Pass and Apple Arcade, as well as now with autoplay videos. As the two platforms battle it out to provide a better experience for users, we expect this trend to continue.
Read the full roundup here
