Reading your first results: day one to month one
What Applyra can tell you on day one, what needs a week, and what only means something after a month. Read the trend, not the very first number.
Video transcript
Your first results arrive on three clocks. Here's what to read, and when. Day one: ASO Health. It reads your listing, not your rankings, so it's ready the moment you add your app. It grades three things: whether your fields carry words people search, whether your keywords are winnable at your size, and whether the page converts. And it names the one holding you back. That's the number to act on first, today. The first week: positions. Each one is read when you add the keyword, and movement shows from the next day. Expect two things. A new app ranks on very little. And one place up or down is noise: both stores shuffle every day. The first month: the trend. The visibility score is built to be compared with itself. One reading tells you where you stand. The same score two weeks apart tells you if the work is landing. At the end of the month, ask three questions, in this order. Did ASO Health improve? Did visibility follow? And did the gap with your competitor close?
Three numbers, three clocks. The ASO Health listing audit is complete the moment you add an app, because it reads your metadata and not your rankings. Positions arrive with your first keyword and turn into readable movement over the first week. The visibility trend is what the first month is for. Reading the right number at the right time is most of what separates a useful ASO routine from a discouraging one, and the tour of the dashboard shows where each of the three lives.
Day one: the listing audit
ASO Health is available immediately, because it reads your metadata rather than your rankings. It grades three things: whether the fields the store indexes carry words people search, whether the keywords you target are winnable for an app your size, and whether the page converts once someone lands on it.
This is the number to act on first. It names the axis holding you back, and fixing that axis is work you can do today without waiting for any measurement.
The first week: positions and movement
Your first position on a keyword is read from the store the moment you add it, and the Keywords Tracker starts showing movement from the next day. Three things to expect:
- A new app ranks on very little. It takes time for a store to index a listing and to place it, and a position outside the top 100 reads as not ranked because that is what it is worth.
- Day to day noise is normal. Both stores shuffle results constantly. One position of movement is not a signal, and the algorithm change detector exists to tell you when a whole market moved rather than just you.
- A position you search by hand may differ. Applyra measures one store, one country and one language, once a day. The usual causes of a difference are worth reading before you conclude anything from a manual search.
The first month: the trend
The visibility score is built to be compared with itself. One reading tells you where you stand today. The same score two weeks apart tells you whether the work is landing.
This is also the horizon on which a metadata change can be judged. The move itself is fast: once the store serves your new listing, a keyword you added to the title usually moves at the next daily reading, not weeks later. What takes weeks is telling that move apart from ordinary daily noise, which is the whole job of a trend.
What to do at the end of the first month
Three questions, in this order:
- Did ASO Health improve? Your listing is scored again each time the live version changes, or when you update your iOS keywords field, so a rewrite shows up once the store serves it, not when you submit it. If it has not moved, the listing work is still pending, and the Metadata Simulator lets you test a rewrite before shipping it.
- Did visibility move in the same direction? It usually follows the listing with a delay.
- Did the gap with your competitor close? That is the only comparison that controls for a market moving as a whole.
The monthly ASO routine turns those three questions into a thirty minute checklist you can repeat.
Frequently asked questions
How long before Applyra data is useful?
The listing audit is useful the moment you add the app because it reads your metadata, not your rankings. Your first position on a keyword is read from the store as soon as you add it, and most of the effect of a metadata change lands within a day. What takes about a week is telling that effect apart from ordinary daily movement.
Why is my visibility score low at the start?
The score counts positions inside the top 100 across a fixed set of keywords from your niche, the same set every day. A new app ranks on very few of them, so it starts low by design and rises as your listing earns positions on them.
What should I look at first in Applyra?
The ASO Health score. It grades the listing itself rather than the rankings, so it is complete the moment you add the app, it names the axis holding you back, and acting on it needs no measurement to have happened yet.
How do I know whether a metadata change worked?
Read the next daily positions on the keywords you targeted for the move itself, then the visibility trend over the following weeks to tell it apart from ordinary daily noise. If everything moved at once, check the algorithm change detector before crediting the change.
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