An app icon is inarguably one of the most important and challenging elements of your ASO strategy. The icon is the first thing a player sees in the Top Charts, search results, and when Google or Apple features your app. The app is featured on Google Play or App Store. The icon is the main element on the app page, and it is also the graphical element the player uses on their phones to tap and launch your game.
Your game's icon is its calling card. It must resonate in the hearts of your players. When your target players with the icon, you can be sure it will trigger other potential players' minds. Unlock this cornerstone, and they will want to install and try your game.
We cannot stress it enough that the icon has a significant impact on ASO and other aspects of the project. It's the first impression a player gets. It's your game's face in a crowd of millions of other games. It is the reason players you are looking for will install the game.
We divide the icon's conversion rate (what proportion of users who see it will go to the app page and install it) into two main parts:
Product Page Views / Impressions is the ratio of the number of the icon's (app's) views in the search results per page view. In other words, this is the proportion of players who go to the app page after seeing its icon in the search results, in the Top Charts, during an advertising campaign, and in other placements.
App Units / Product Page Views is the ratio of app page views per install. In other words, it is the proportion of players who have installed the app while viewing its page on Google Play or App Store.
Let's say we have an application called X. It has been shown 10,000 times for the query 'traveling' to its target users (we do not consider the positions in the search results of the app yet). Let's assume that the first type of icon conversion (Product Page Views / Impressions) is 20%, and the second type (App Units / Product Page Views) is 10%.
With 10,000 Impressions, 20% of the players will click the icon. They will move to the app page (Product Page Views). As a result, 2,000 players will visit the app page. Let's take another step. According to the second type's proposed conversion rate, 10% of the players who have already gone to the app page will install it. As a result, we get 200 installs.
This example shows that by improving the icon conversion, we can get more installs with the same number of app views in the search results. So, when the CR of the icon increases by 10% in both types of conversion, we get: 10,000 Impressions х 30% CR1 x 20% CR2 = 600. Thus, a 10% improvement in icon conversion can lead to an increase in installs three times over! Of course, this is just an example, and the conversion of an icon cannot be counted separately from the conversion of the entire page as a whole.
This example illustrates the icon's importance in the "saw → came to the app page → installed" process.
In the next article, we'll talk about how to increase this conversion and where to start.
Written by: Dmytro Biruk