Apple will start letting developers nominate their games and apps for App Store featuring later this year.
Announced during WWDC, the company said devs can nominate upcoming content and enhancements for feature placements.
Nominations can be made through App Store Connect, and must include details such as publishing date and the relevant countries and regions.
Submissions will then be reviewed by the App Store editorial team for potential featuring on its store.
Apple did not give a precise date for when App Store featuring nominations would open up. The next version of its iPhone operating system, iOS 18, is set to enter public beta in July and will be available in autumn.
Game developers and publishers have previously told PocketGamer.biz that featuring has little to no impact on downloads, though others say that for some titles it can still help generate downloads.
Promotional notifications
Updates to App Store Connect also provide new ways to promote “special moments”, such as a new version launch, in their apps.
“Whether they’re launching a brand-new app or shipping an exciting new app update, developers can now effortlessly generate marketing assets from App Store Connect to share directly onto their social channels,” read a statement from Apple.
“If an app has been featured as App of the Day, developers will receive a push notification from App Store Connect inviting them to create a special marketing asset to commemorate the moment.”
App store updates
Other App Store announcements during the show included custom product page deep links that let developers direct users from the store or a Search Ads campaign to a specific, relevant place within their app.
Meanwhile, developers can now use “win-back offers” to try and get users to repurchase a subscription.
On MacOS, developers can also provide discounted or free subscriptions for a period of time with offer codes to acquire, retain and bring back former subscribers.
Apple also made updates to StoreKit to provide developers with new options to organise and present in-app purchase.
App Analytics, meanwhile, now provides more insights into business and app performance, with reports including “hundreds” of new metrics.
Discoverability challenges
PocketGamer.biz recently delved into the state of mobile game discoverability across the App Store and Google Play, comparing them against each other and PC marketplace Steam.
We also discussed the issue on the PocketGamer.biz Podcast The Week in Mobile Games here.
