Have you ever heard of keyword stuffing? If you work with digital marketing, you should pay attention to them, so you do not end up harming your application's marketing strategies.
Keyword stuffing is a practice in which a keyword is repeated many times in a text. Contrary to what many might believe, this puts the quality of the content into question. Therefore, it is considered a Black Hat practice, which is ASO misconduct.
What is keyword stuffing?
Keyword stuffing means loading app titles and descriptions with irrelevant, misleading, or excessive keywords with the hopes of being ranked for them.
Since we started helping developers with App Store Optimization, knowledge of the importance of ASO has spread among the app development community. We want developers to get great results from their apps in the App Store and acquire the highest quality users which can only come from App Store Search.
Keyword density
Keyword density refers to the number of times you use targeted words in your app description. It is measured by percentage.
As a general rule, you should repeat a targeted keyword about 4-5 times. This is equivalent to about 2-3% keyword density. The percentage may be higher or lower than that though. It greatly depends on the number of words you use in the app description.
If your keyword density is too low, Google may not recognize the targeted words as actual keywords. If your keyword density is too high, Google may think it is keyword stuffing. When this happens, you will not only lose app ranking points but also you may get penalized.
You need to strike the right balance in using keywords to obtain the best results.
Moreover, other rules you need to remember is not to use more than 10 targeted keywords. Don’t force a keyword as well in a sentence or paragraph. You need to add keywords as naturally as possible. Remember, you write for humans first, then for the algorithm.
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How to calculate app description keyword density?
Determining keyword density is quite easy. All you need to do is take the number of times the target keyword appears on your app description and divide it by the total number of words on the page.
If you’re not that good at math or you don’t have all the time in the world to manually count words and keywords, then I’m sure you’ll be more than happy to use an ASO tool to automate things.
Why is keyword stuffing bad?
Unfortunately, just like traditional SEO for the web there are “white hat” (good) and “black hat” (bad) methods of optimizing your app for App Store search. White hat methods will get you great results over time while black hat methods may get your app kicked out of the store.
Stuffing your app’s title and description with keywords might get you banned
App Store Optimization (ASO) is a set of techniques and industry best practices that allow your apps to be easily discovered and downloaded on the app store. The three crucial components of any ASO include the app’s title, description, and use of the right keywords.
App Store Optimization is very important. Over 63% of iOS apps (and 58% of Android) are discovered through searches in the app stores. Hence, improper use of ASO is practically costing you one of the largest discovery channels out there!
However, one of the most common mistakes made while employing ASO includes misuse of keywords, stuffing, and not understanding how best to leverage the title and description to the greatest effect.
What will get your app suspended?
Keyword stuffing will get your app suspended. Stuffing, as defined by both Apple and Google, means the use of repetitive and/or irrelevant keywords. It creates an unpleasant user experience and can result in an app suspension.
Similar to SEO, Google, and Apple are targeting a better and more engaging user experience. Hence, any effort to hoodwink the biggest search engine on the planet, or the biggest app store will obviously not be taken kindly.
How to form a remarkable app title and description?
On the Apple App Store, the algorithm identifies, ranks, and organises apps using primary keywords in the app title and subtitle; whereas the Google Play Store counts keywords in both the title and description. Regardless of which platform you launch your app on, keywords should be used sparingly and strategically in these fields without looking spammy.
Here are some dos and don’ts for writing a good app title to boost your app’s discoverability:
- Do use your best-performing keyword in the title.
- Don’t stuff; keep it natural and fluent.
- Do deliver the punchline within the first few words, because your app title may get cut short in search results.
- Don’t add your company name, app stores have a defined area for that.
- Do avoid changing it too often, especially once the app has gained traction.
To write a good app description, follow these best practices:
- Focus on delivering your app’s benefits instead of getting as many keywords in as possible – especially on the Apple App Store, where description text doesn’t affect searchability.
- Make sure the copy is well written and easily readable.
- Add a call to action to remind the user what the next step is.
Finally, here are a few more things to keep in mind when it comes to the keyword field:
- Filter through your keywords and use only the most popular and relevant ones.
- Don’t put spaces between words, i.e. fitness, lifestyle, wellness instead of fitness, lifestyle, wellness.
- Use numerals instead of words, i.e. 3 rather than three.
- Make the most of all the characters you have.
- Don’t use ‘free’ as a keyword, the app store already knows your app is free to download.
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