Examples of how we can leverage APIs and scrapers in ASO: Automate keywords research, fetch suggested search queries from Google, track required installs to rank in Top Charts etc

1. A S O C o n f e r e n c e , B e r l i n , M a y 2 2 n d
Leverage APIs & Scrapers in ASO
R o m a i n G o l f i e r

2. About me
www.romaingolfier.com

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1. What are APIs & Scrapers?
2. 4 ways to leverage them in ASO
3. Combine APIs with Tagging Automation
Agenda

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APIs? Scrapers?

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 Group of methods, classes often used to get data and automate tasks
 Create applications based on 3rd party services or data.
E.g.: weather app using weather.com’s API
 Requires - most of the time - programming skills and a development
environment
Application Programming Interface

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 Scraper = bot crawling web pages
 Extracting data
 40-50% of internet traffic = Scraper bots
 Requires - most of the time - programming skills
 Different ways to scrape:
 Develop your own scraper
 Software & Web browsers extensions (Data Miner, Scrape Similar)
Scrapers

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Why using APIs & Scrapers
 Automate manual data collection
 Speed up analysis & reporting
1 - BE FAST
 Create added value by combining different APIs
 Create unique tools and reports adapted to your business (competitive advantage)
3 - INNOVATE
 Collect & manipulate huge volumes of data
 Extend your analysis
2 - GO LARGE

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What kind of data for ASO?
 Search results
 Search Volume / Difficulty
SEARCH APIs
 Title & Subtitle
 Descriptions
 Store Assets (Icon, Screenshots)
 Downloads & Revenue
 Ratings & Reviews
 Organic vs Paid
 Top Charts
 Featuring
 Similar Apps
APP DETAILS APIs
APP PERFORMANCE APIs
LISTINGS APIs
ASO Tools APIs + Features: http://bit.ly/2VlzYfi

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STORES WEBSITES
 ex: play.google.com
 Free
 Risk of IP ban
/ captcha
 Limited data
Where to find them?
CHECK ASO TOOLS
 Usually complete
 Maintained
 Documented
 Number of calls
GO TO GITHUB
 Free resources
 Open Source
 Technologies
(Python, NodeJS, PHP…)
 Maintenance
 Risk of IP ban
for scrapers
BUILD YOUR OWN
 Customized to
your needs
 Time consuming
 Challenging
 Maintenance
APIs Scrapers & APIs APIs Scrapers

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How it looks
var store = require('app-store-scraper’);
store.search({ term: ‘games’, num: 1, page: 1, country : 'us’}).then(console.log).catch(console.log);

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Results
 Output in JSON
 Result can be:
 PARSED through a script
 Pushed to a DATABASE
 Sent to a GOOGLE SHEET
 PROCESSED in the way you want

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4 ways to use APIs & Scrapers
1. Spy keywords from hundreds of competitors
2. Get thousands of keywords from Google Play suggestions
3. Track Similar Apps
4. Get amount of downloads per rank in Top Charts (need paid API)

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Identify all keywords used by
Racing Games on Google Play

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&
FACUNDOOLANO
http://bit.ly/2ZrRiOZ
Provides google play
and app store
scrapers
&
LUCKYAPE
http://bit.ly/2vhAYSW
Simple yet efficient
Keyword Density
script
Search API/Scraper Top Charts API/Scraper
App Details
Keywords Density Script
Visualization
Logic
Text / Description

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Number of times this
keyword has been found
How many times it
appears on average in
each description
How many times it
appears on average in
this particular game
description
200+ descriptions parsed in 1 click

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Get most recurring colors in Cooking
Games icons

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&
FACUNDOOLANO
http://bit.ly/2ZrRiOZ
Provides google play
and app store
scrapers
&
BRIANMCDO
http://bit.ly/2vhAYSW
ImagePalette is used to
extract a color palette
from a given image
Search API
App Details API
Extract colors from icons
Visualization
Logic
Text / Description

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Example of report

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Build an ASO tool based on suggestions
without writing a line of code

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While searching on Google Play

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Activate Developer Console (F12)
Copy this URL

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You just found an API
https://market.android.com/suggest/SuggRequest?json=1&c=3&query=games&hl=en&gl=US

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Google play section Value for 'c'
Books 1
Music 2
Apps & Games 3
Movies 4
Home Page 13
Let’s have a look at the parameters
Category
Language CountryKeyword
json=1&c=3&query=games&hl=en&gl=US

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[
{
's':'games',
't':'q'
},
{
's':'games that don’t need wifi',
't':'q'
},
{
's':'games for girls',
't':'q'
},
{
's':'games without wifi',
't':'q'
},
{
's':'games for kids',
't':'q'
}
]
Data output

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Connect to the API from Google Sheet
1. Create a new Google Spreadsheet
2. Tools -> Script Editor
3. 'Create script for Spreadsheet'
4. Copy paste the code from
https://github.com/bradjasper/ImportJSON
5. Use this function in a cell
=ImportJson ({URL})
http://bit.ly/2ICiZzC

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More possibilities through scripting
Get more results by relaunching the API for each letter of the alphabet added to
the seed keyword:
$data = [];
$seed = ‘games’;
$alphabet = [‘a’,’b’,’c’,…,’z’];
foreach($alphabet as $letter)
{
$data[] = GetGoogleSuggestions($seed.’ ‘.$letter);
}

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Results
+5000 queries
about gaming collected in only
10 minutes

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 Make a nice GUI and make the tool available
to more stakeholders
 Combine with ASO Tools APIs to add Volumes
and Difficulty scores
 Find similar APIs on other platforms:
 Google web
 Amazon
Other applications

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Collect Similar Apps
To identify apps potentially driving organic traffic to your app
&
FACUNDOOLANO
http://bit.ly/2ZrRiOZ
Provides google play
and app store
scrapers
with

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Top Charts API
Logic
=
Similar Apps API Record result + Parent ID
Search for your apps !
Top 500 of each store
category Similar Apps DatabaseTop Charts Database

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Results
 Identified 70 apps displaying our
game Operate Now in Similar Apps
 Next steps:
 Build a nice GUI
 Use Crons to automate this
logic every day
 Use another API to get
downloads

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Top Charts
How many downloads you need to rank in Top 100

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Logic
1. Get Top Charts
• Top Charts API
• Get every day Top 100 in Games + Categories
• Record all games
2. Get Downloads
• For each game:
• Get App Downloads for that day (AppAnnie API)
• Record Date, Rank & Download
3. Pull data
• Average of downloads per rank
• Tips
• Separate weekdays and weekends (~20% difference)
• Monitor on a weekly basis
Top Daily Installs
10 7,841
20 7,261
30 4,652
40 4,738
50 4,581
Required avg installs per day for Simulation, US, iOS

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2
4
6
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10 Top 20 Top 30 Top 40 Top 50 Top 60 Top 70 Top 80 Top 90 Top 100
Thousands
Min of downloads Max of downloads Average of downloads
Identify requirements per top
Use cases
Monitor evolution of requirements
Daily installs per rank, iOS, in Simulation, April 19 Daily installs per rank per month, iOS, in Simulation, 2019
0
2
4
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1-12-2018 1-1-2019 1-2-2019 1-3-2019 1-4-2019 1-5-2019
Thousands
100+
20-29
30-39
40-49
50-99
Top 10

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Combine APIs with
Tagging Automation

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Data classification is crucial
 Outcome of your application depends on how you segment your market
 In Gaming:
o Hundreds of game genres & sub-genres (Mahjong, Hidden Objects)
o Only 17 store categories which are very broad (The Sims & Fifa are in the same category)
o Game per theme: Hospital games, cooking games
 Tagging Automation System
o Automatically assign tags to apps based on keywords found in meta data
o Launch automatic reports for specific a tag:
o Keywords research, market analysis
o Business-value beyond ASO (support product ideation and conception)

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How to build a tagging system
1. Define the objectives of the classification:
 E.g.: Centralize competitors analysis per game genre, theme and art style
2. Define the classification structure
3. Define the classification criteria
Keyword Tag Type
Mahjong Mahjong Mechanic
Mahjong Puzzle Game Genre
Pixel art Pixel Art style
Idle Idle Mechanic
… … …

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Use Cases
Identify game mechanics that our players also play
Cross-App/Affinity API + Tagging
Monitor market trends (Downloads of Hyper Casual Games)
App performance API + Tagging

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Conclusion
• APIs and Scrapers give endless possibilities
• From automation to innovation
• Competitive advantage
• Increase business-value of ASO within an organization

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Thank you