Apple’s head of worldwide marketing Phil Schiller has announced a slew of changes to how the iOS App Store functions. Developers and consumers alike will most definitely welcome the changes, with Schiller suggesting that his reign will introduce major improvements to how the search functionality works, as well as offering new payment options through universal subscriptions to developers.
The general consensus is that the App Store has long been suffering from a visibility issue, leaving developers frustrated that they can’t efficiently get their apps in front of consumers. It now seems that Apple is about to rectify that problem.
Speaking to a number of publications, Phil Schiller gave a deeper insight into some of the changes that are about to take place. One of the most important from a developer’s perspective is that Apple will give access to app subscriptions that will provide those third-party developers with a new potential revenue stream.
Rather than simply being able to charge a one-off price for an app download or try and make additional revenue through in-app purchases, app publishers will soon be able to sell apps with a recurring monthly or yearly subscription model for a continuous income stream.
As part of the announced changes, Apple will also be adding ads into App Store search results. These will be displayed inline in the App Store app when ever a user goes through the process of making a search for a particular term. This implementation will be non-intrusive, will only display one per search results page, and will give developers the option of promoting their apps for better visibility, which will hopefully translate to increased downloads and revenues. This option will be available to developers on an auction basis.
According to Schiller, there’s been a great deal of internal thought and discussion put into trying to find the best way to offer these promoted apps, with the general consensus being that the auction model will be “fair to developers, and fair for indie developers, too”. It’s fair to say that the App Store has generally seen improvement over the last six months, which is partly due to the fact that Phil Schiller took over the reigns from Eddy Cue amid a growing list of complaints from developers. These latest announcements are simply the next step in ensuring that the App Store is a powerful as it can be, and that it offers the best possible discoverability for third-party apps.
All planned changes will begin rolling out over the next couple of months.
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