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VRV App Store Spotlight

August 20th, 2019

VRV App Store Spotlight
David Quinn

by David Quinn

VP of Strategy & Partnerships at Gummicube, Inc.

VRV is a video streaming app offering licensed content from a range of networks, creators and distributors. Users can watch classic cartoons, live action shows from overseas, web originals and more. Before they can watch anything, though, they need to find the app. For this week’s App Store Spotlight, we take a look at VRV and see if its App Store Optimization gets users to tune in.

iOS

On the Apple App Store, VRV ranks #93 in the Entertainment category. It ranks #1 in searches for “anime video,” “cartoon geek” and “nicksplat.” It also ranks #4 for “free anime,” although its rankings begin to fall for terms like “cartoon animation” (#18), “animation” (#54) and “cartoon apps” (#98). Most of its rankings come from competitors or similar apps, such as “crunchyroll” at #14 and “Funimation Now” at #11, including several misspellings of those apps. Its rankings for genres outside of anime are on the lower end, as it ranks #144 for “free cartoons” and does not rank for any “TV” or “television” terms.

Creatives: VRV uses five screenshots, each one accompanied by callout text that emphasizes certain features. The callout text is on the top of each image, with a vibrant background to enhance it and highlight important elements. However, with only half of the ten screenshots allowed, it leaves out several aspects it could delve into.

For instance, three of the five screenshots show different animated series available on the app, but only one shows the original live-action programming. This is reflected in the app’s rankings, which is primarily for animated shows. Additional screenshots could call out things like VRV’s original series or shows imported from Japan.

The screenshots could benefit from being ordered in terms of value. The first screenshot has a callout text stating “Offline viewing,” before mentioning in smaller text that it’s for premium members only. The app could potentially engage with more users if it began by talking about streaming shows, since offline viewing is a premium-only feature and may not be its greatest source of income.

Since VRV is a streaming app, it could potentially benefit from an app preview video. This could include brief clips from its various shows that it owns a license for, similar to what HBO NOW does. Including video clips of licensed content is a common trend for streaming apps.

Since all the videos are available within the app, this would be in line with Apple’s video guidelines that require app previews use in-app footage only. Showing users the variety of shows available could help encourage them to convert.

Title & Subtitle: VRV’s full title is “VRV – Different All Together.” While this does use 28 of the 30 characters the App Store provides, the terms it uses are not valuable keywords. It helps it rank for terms like “all different” (#4) and “different video” (#16), but these are low-volume terms with little relevance to the app. It could instead use the title space to include keywords that emphasize its values, such as “video streaming” or “TV, Cartoons & Anime.”

VRV does not include a subtitle, which means it misses out on two opportunities. First, the subtitle could provide extra user-facing information to tell them more about the app. It could highlight some of the shows and channels it has available or present the app’s value.

Second, the subtitle is used for keyword indexation. By leaving it blank, VRV is missing out on 30 characters’ worth of additional keywords it could target.

Description: VRV’s description is short and direct. It begins by stating its purpose as a “fan-first streaming service,” before listing the channels it provides shows from. However, it does not rank for searches for all of those. For instance, while it lists “Cartoon Hangover” and “Rooster Teeth,” both of which have high search volume, it does not appear in searches for them.

The description could stand to be expanded upon to provide more information, such as the variety of shows it provides, its original programming or the community chats. It doesn’t have a full feature list, just a bullet list for the networks available.

Elaborating on what VRV has to offer could help encourage users to install, while integrating keywords throughout it could demonstrate its relation to their queries and improve relevancy for Search Ads.

Google Play

On the Google Play Store, VRV ranks #1 for its name and “Cartoon Hangover.” It ranks #3 for “anime,” and is in the top ten for a number of anime keywords, like “anime episodes” at #4. The anime-focused keywords continue until it reaches “cartoon shows” at #30 and “watch free” at #33. It does rank for several related streaming apps, such as “Crunchyroll” at #5, “Hulu” at #79 “Netflix” at #118.

Creatives: VRV uses very similar creatives on both Google Play and iOS. The first four are identical, using the same callout text and screenshots, while the fifth uses a different screenshot for the same callout text.

Once more, the app could benefit from the use of extra screenshots. There’s a wide variety of programming available on the app, but its current creative set does not highlight that. It could also benefit from prioritizing the screenshots based on their value for users, so the most important images come first.

VRV does not use a video on Google Play either. This could be another opportunity to highlight the app’s shows and functionality, which could help improve conversions. A good video can increase conversions by up to 25 percent, and demonstrating the range of viewing options can help a video streaming app convert. VRV could test this by running a Google Play experiment to determine if the video can improve its conversions.

Description & Metadata: VRV uses the same title and description on both stores. As with iOS, the “Different All Together” title helps it rank for “Different” at #15 and “together” at #6, but these are not terms directly related to the app’s functionality.

The description still uses a short introduction and a list of the networks it has to offer. While the bullet list helps it rank for some of those networks, such as #10 for “Rooster Teeth” and #4 for “Mondo,” it needs to emphasize some further to rank for them. For instance, it does not rank for “Boomerang” or “CuriosityStream.”

By expanding the description, VRV could target more keywords by placing them in the front of each line or sentence. Additionally, a longer description could provide more information for users, giving them more reasons to convert and try the app out.

Since Google Play’s algorithm determines keywords based on their placement in the description, a well-written description is essential for indexation. VRV could target more terms while potentially converting more users by telling them about everything the app has to offer.

Overall

VRV has room to grow in the App Store and Play Store. It can do so by updating its title (and subtitle on the App Store) to include relevant keywords, adding additional screenshots that emphasize its core features, adding a video showcasing the shows it offers, and reworking its description to provide more information about the app. These are key aspects of App Store Optimization, which can help apps attract and convert users by appearing in more searches.

Want more information regarding App Store Optimization? Contact Gummicube and we’ll help get your strategy started.

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