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Ads Now Appearing in App Store Search Results for U.S. Users

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As expected, Apple has begun showing developer ads in the iOS App Store today for U.S. users, reports The Verge. Now, searching for popular terms like "taxi", "calendar", or "to do list" returns a banner ad for promoted apps above the search results.

appstoresearchads-800x390.jpg

Apple announced plans for the ads back in June and developers have participated in a beta testing program since that time. The App Store Search Ads system finally went live on September 28, inviting developers to purchase ad spots through the program. Those ads are now viewable by the public as of this morning.

With Search Ads, developers are able to bid to have their app listed as the top result when certain keywords are used, in order to improve app discoverability. Ads are available through an auction system, with one ad displayed to customers per search result page.

Ads are clearly marked as such and the content they show is the same as that on the App Store app description pages, since they use App Store metadata and imagery.

According to Apple's Phil Schiller, Apple "thought about how to carefully" do search ads in a way that "customers will be happy with." Apple also believes the ad auction system is fair to developers, including indie developers.

As of last week, developers who signed up to offer Search Ads have been given a free $100 credit to get started with the program.

Article Link: Ads Now Appearing in App Store Search Results for U.S. Users
 
Article Link
https://www.macrumors.com/2016/10/06/ads-appearing-app-store-search-results/
Ads will help Indie developers? Sure they will. But only if you consider King, EA, Sega, etc. to be indie developers.

Greed greed greed. Instead of making search algorithms better, why bother? Just put ads in, that will do the trick. And improve apple wallet. Nice one Tim, nice one...
 
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Reactions: tonyr6, CrickettGrrrl, Val-kyrie and 6 others
On one side I think; "Its a good way to advertise a good app. If its decent, its worthy to spend money showing it"

Unfortunately it is not how it works; Money-grab apps are going to plague the rankings.

Dear Phill, just leave the damn store like it was. Clean. Its not relevant if its not organic. And I don't mean the green stuff you guys smoke in CA!

If a developer wants to advertise, let it do like it always were. Outside of the app store. Some games are advertised even on TV! Many are inside other apps, same apps...
 
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Reactions: smacrumon and JohnnyCanadian
This is very wrong and depressing. I don't want Google the App the Store giving me adverts first.

Mabye, in the end, Google like advertising on search results and end user data harvesting is where Apple is going to go anyways - cause its profitable (and people get promoted and bonuses for that). Look at all the people complaining about having to pay for iCloud storage instead of free like data harvesting providers Google / Microsoft etc..
 
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wait, is it the small line of text above the results?
I've seen this for a while. I didn't realize that was an "ad" per se, just other similar/related search words.

I was worried they'd will search results WITH advertised/promoted apps
 
Sasparilla said:
This is very wrong and depressing. I don't want Google the App the Store giving me adverts first.

Mabye, in the end, Google like advertising on search results and end user data harvesting is where Apple is going to go anyways - cause its profitable (and people get promoted and bonuses for that). Look at all the people complaining about having to pay for iCloud storage instead of free like data harvesting providers Google / Microsoft etc..
Click to expand...
Why is it depressing? Apple has always harvested data. Copious amounts of data. They even told us what types of data they harvest. Apple's issue was they failed at monetizing the data because the vastly over estimated the price advertisers were willing to pay (iAds). They lowered and lowered and lowered the price but by that time no one was interested.

This latest effort is embarrassing. If they're going to do it, they need to do it better. If I search for Pokemon Go, the first ad I see shouldn't be a fake version of Pokemon Go. https://9to5mac.com/2016/10/06/ios-app-store-search-ads/

I think where people get confused is when Apple says "we don't sell your personal data". No they don't. Neither does anyone else. But the implication is others do and based on some of the quotes on MR, the implication is believed by a lot of people. We should never confuse we don't sell with we don't collect.
 
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Reactions: samcraig, simonmet, H2SO4 and 2 others
It's not like Apple is allowing all sort of ads to be plastered over the App Store. This is a banner at the top displaying an app that would probably appear there anyway, since the most heavily promoted apps are usually the most popular, and the most popular apps usually end up appearing near the top.

Edit: pegamoos beat me to it.
 
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I think I threw up in my mouth a little.

Promoted apps:
x TRY NEW MOUTH-THROW APP! How far can you throw the cartoon mouth-creatures?!
x Little Mouth 6.0 - the social network widget that works for you!
x BttrMth 2 - Short for Better Mouth, BttrMth 2 is the latest version of the popular mouth replacement-service...
 
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I don't like when people over use this statement: "Steve wouldn't have agreed with this" but to be honest .... I think he is twisting in the grave now...

I do get that people who bought Apple shares need to milk money out... but it's clearly impacting due to the pressure they put on Apple's management who needs to consider money all the time.

Of course I may be wrong - it's just me feeling.

Phone sales go down, same are the forecasts - then Apple tries now to find other means to get more cash for the investors.

I hope on the long time Apple will not transform into a boring company. Right now I just feel like this money pressure is getting more and more visible on the way they launch products, advertise and market.
Expecting innovation from them - from where I stand - is not as demanding like others do.

I expect revolutionary products (HW, SW whatever) every 2-3 years.
This yearly update cycle is clearly a huge push and pressure on them especially internally.

Anyway - I am sure I will not see cooking ads or whatever - but I am in no mood of featured app from the one who pays the most. This is to me a simple way of saying - we need more money - we became google.
Cough it up if you want to sell more...
 
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Dissonance said:
This feels wrong.

I pay the Apple tax so that I DON'T have to see ads everywhere.
Click to expand...
The problem here is that now they are now double dipping with developers. Pay apple to get your app on the store ($99/year), give apple 30% of your revenue, and pay apple to bump your listing up and to make sure your competitors don't steal your top search result position.
 
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jclardy said:
The problem here is that now they are now double dipping with developers. Pay apple to get your app on the store ($99/year), give apple 30% of your revenue, and pay apple to bump your listing up and to make sure your competitors don't steal your top search result position.
Click to expand...
And it doesn't even work that way. 9to5 posted an article about it. Search Pokemon Go and above it you'll get a fake Go app. :eek: That's gotta change.
 
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Reactions: smacrumon
I have been using Weblock to block ads iOS-wide for many years, but it seems these ads have made the App Store no longer work well if Weblock is enabled. I can't search for apps (forever loading) and downloading updates has been buggy and slow. This has been happening for a while though, so not sure I can only blame the new ads. Still, I wish there was an opt out.
 
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