ARE YOU LOSING MONEY? If you develop themes for launchers or apps like GO Launcher, GO SMS, Next Launcher, Apex, ADW, or other apps then you've probably noticed you're installs have reduced dramatically. That's because a recent anomaly in the Play Store search feature has caused an issue where your themes aren't being returned in the results correctly. Many themes won't display in the result even if you search for them by their exact name.
I'm going to take a moment to give you a couple of examples so you can see what I'm talking about and then I'm going to go over what the negative impacts are and then let you think about how we should approach this problem together.
First let's think about how the end user is searching for the themes they want to download. If I like Star Trek and I wanted to some Star Trek inspired themes how would I search for them? I'd probably type in the search bar the name of the app I want the theme for and then Star Trek. like this, "GO SMS Pro Star Trek" or if I know the name of the theme I'd type that. I think everyone will agree this is the typical way people search.
Now let's go to the Play Store and do some searching. I like basketball so I'm going to search for a "GO SMS Pro basketball theme". I'm using this as an example because I've been following this search result for six weeks and I know what the outcome should be. You can search for whatever you like.
Trying the search terms "GO SMS Pro Basketball Theme", I have gotten three relevant results on every search over the last six weeks but now there is only ONE RESULT. Now the interesting thing is, if I abbreviate my search "GO SM PR Basketball Theme" I'll get all THREE RESULTS.
GO SMS Pro Basketball theme
GO SMS Basketball Theme 2014
GO SMS basketball bubble Theme
THIS IS CRAZY! If I type the exact name of the app I'm looking for it may not show up in the results at all. Let's try it with the "GO SMS Basketball Theme 2014" in the search bar. Over the last six weeks, searching for this app by its name has not been a problem, but now, searching by exact name returns ZERO RESULTS.
Searching for a theme by it's name may yield a result or may not. Try some for yourself. I've tried many themes from the list "Top paid in personalization" and none of them come up as a relevant result. All of them should
I should mention that some searches still yield results for the subject. Searching for "GO SMS Pro Weed theme" still gets results although not as many but a search like "GO SMS Pro Diamond theme" yields no relevant results at all when there should be at least a dozen.
HOW IS THE END USER GOING TO FIND WHAT THEY WANT? That's a very pertinent question. If you want a Star Trek inspired theme for GO SMS how are you going to feel when you search "GO SMS Pro Star Trek" and get ZERO RELEVANT RESULTS?. Try that one...there should be at least ten results for it. In fact there are at least three Star Trek inspired themes on the "Top Paid in Personalization" list. and a couple on the "Top New Paid Android Apps" list. I point that out because if these themes are on top lists then they should certainly show as relevant result when searched and certainly when searched by app name.
I reported this issue to developer support. I advised them that I had observed this anomaly with the Play Store search feature during the last week. My primary concern was that end users would experience the frustration of failed searches for themes of interest and that Google and developers would potentially lose millions in revenue. Of course they misunderstood the report and sent me a typical canned response. I responded to that canned response with an even more detailed report, citing examples and pointing out other specific observations but they sent another canned response.
The question is, what do we do? How can we approach this problem? The end user needs to be able to locate relevant choices when they search but this anomaly prevents that. It even prevents the end user from searching for an app if he/she knows the exact name of the app. Searching by developer name doesn't work either.
I feel the frustration of having attempted to report this to developer support and now I'm eager to see your responses.
I just received a reply to my most recent report. The response was simply another canned response about app visibility. The reps at google support obviously don't know what I'm talking about.
Related
Why the apps having the worst users' reviews are shown as "Recommended Apps" ???
Hello,
How are the "Recommended Apps" selected by the Marketplace?
I am tired to see all the apps having actually the worst users' reviews be selected by Micorosoft and promoted on the Marketplace.
For instance, this week I see as recommended the games "Castlevana Puzzles" (rated only 1 star over 5) and "Deer Hunter" (rated only 1.5 star over 5) !!! Most reviews of these games state that they are not very good.
So therefore, by WHOM are they recommended ? I wonder. Not by the users for sure.
In my opinion the most important opinion is the customers' one.
MS, please stop 'recommending' apps that the users said they don't like.
How to find on the Marketplace only the apps that the USERS RECOMMEND (not MS), that is to say the ones with 3, 4 or 5 stars?
Thank you
I believe it is based on the number of downloads, which is a completely different metric from the ratings.
Jim Coleman said:
I believe it is based on the number of downloads, which is a completely different metric from the ratings.
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I don't think so. My app appeared on the featured list once for a while and it only has <100 downloads to this date!
It looks to be fairly random to me.
Blade0rz said:
I don't think so. My app appeared on the featured list once for a while and it only has <100 downloads to this date!
It looks to be fairly random to me.
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That'd be nice. Maybe if devs know that even crappy apps will be randomly "featured" they'll have a little pride and reduce apps that aren't so shoddy.
It's also nice because apps that might otherwise not be seen will get some time in the spotlight. Could be a big deal for someone - I know it would be for me.
Back in the WMP9 days I made a few skins that people liked for their simplicity (they were designed to be "always on top"). After MS featured them on a skins site and they got a high rating they amounted to about half of my site traffic.
A little free attention from MS can make a huge difference for a smalltime dev.
Bleak Morn said:
That'd be nice. Maybe if devs know that even crappy apps will be randomly "featured" they'll have a little pride and reduce apps that aren't so shoddy.
It's also nice because apps that might otherwise not be seen will get some time in the spotlight. Could be a big deal for someone - I know it would be for me.
Back in the WMP9 days I made a few skins that people liked for their simplicity (they were designed to be "always on top"). After MS featured them on a skins site and they got a high rating they amounted to about half of my site traffic.
A little free attention from MS can make a huge difference for a smalltime dev.
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I totally understand your point of view.
Nonetheless, I would probably like/prefere to have an "Apps recommended by users". I mean the apps with the best feedback from the ones that really tested the apps. Indeed, number of download means nothing.
Strange that the Marketplace does not include this. It seems natural to me.
It would be good because:
- it will encourage developers to make good apps and get a high ranking,
- it will allow users to discover and install apps that have a positive feedback. It does not mean that a lot of people aready installed it. Maybe only one or two people only installed the app, found it very good. Thanks to its high ranking, the app will be discovered by other people.
Also, I do not think that apps such as Deer Hunter or Castlevania need to be promoted like they currently are on the Marketplace: firstly, they are mediocre Xlive games. Secondly, better to promote independant small developers that Xlive games developed by Microsoft. Microsoft do not really need to promote their own game, especially when they are not so good.
arturobandini said:
I totally understand your point of view.
Nonetheless, I would probably like/prefere to have an "Apps recommended by users". I mean the apps with the best feedback from the ones that really tested the apps. Indeed, number of download means nothing.
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Click to collapse
Keep in mind, ratings can be gamed as well. One vote for 5-stars could result in a 5-star rating for a 1-star app.
A while back I had an issue with the Zune software - wanted to get a list of all of my songs based on whether or not they were ZunePass (DRM) songs, or MP3's I'd bought with my 10 monthly song credits. The idea was to use the credits on the songs I've listened to most but hadn't yet unlocked.
I was having getting the software to do what I want, so I asked how to do it in the Zune forums. When that didn't get the answer I wanted, I communicated with some Zune MVP's via Twitter. They connected me with one of the Zune application development leads at MS (also on Twitter) and I directed him to the article in the Zune forums where he helped me troubleshoot and fix the issue.
One of the things I like about MS is that when I poke around, they usually put me in touch with someone who can directly solve my problem (like the app dev lead).
In this case, he provided me with a simple work-around for the problem I was having, but if you need a new app feature it's nice to be able to tell the guy in charge directly.
Oh, and if you end up taking this approach I'd love it if you'd post the link to your Zune forums thread here so I can follow along since it's an issue I might encounter soon.
Check out the following apps on the market (only check out description page, don't install top10 ones):
Boblox (developer top10)
Real Physics (developer top10)
Physics Box (developer Scott Pilgrim)
I think Pilgrim is the original, the other two repackaged from that and atleast airpush added.
I've notified Google weeks ago, by answering many questions first to find contact form and finally filling out a tiny form describing the situation. No answer yet and the apps are still on the market.
I know they're getting tons of reports, but surprising that no reply yet, and no action taken. The top10 dev even has the game with two different names and descriptions suspicious to say the least.
Not sure what's really going on with those apps, just my conclusion of the situation. They might contain other malware too, but probably their goal is just to make money with airpush. (Airpush is almost malware in my book
Sent from my U8800 using xda premium
It will not be one of the versions that probably go down in history this 3.10.9, which takes the place of the previous 3.9.17, but, no matter how small, the innovations introduced are numerous and we're not sure appreciated them all.
We start from the section recommended for you. Whether it's app or books (advice on music yet they are not), or even if you are on the homepage of the store, blocking the slice with the Google personalized recommendations you'll notice that at the top there is a new voice, "improve these councils, "which allows us to add people you know to find out their tastes and also receive recommendations based on them (or so says the description of the function). Good theory, too bad that the vast majority of contacts proposed were complete strangers from the other side of the world, with which (we checked) we did not even vague contacts on Google+. We look forward to a future refinement.
Then continue with the translations. Some apps now have a button "translate" at their description, which basically will only call into question Google Translate on the fly to change the text in a language more understandable to us. In this case the theory is good, pity we did not understand when and when not to appear: comparing different applications, different languages, some of them had the button translate it and other were completely lacking. Also in this case we are confident in a future refinement.
If these two functions must be short andarsele a little 'to seek, we turn now to a thing you will see rather often. You will all familiar with the installation of new apps: you choose one, went on his page, click on install, accept the permissions and you will be thrown back to the description of the app while the progress bar will indicate the percentage of completion. Not any more. After accepting the permissions, and then return to the description of the app, you have inserted a new page, which you can see an example on the right. The aim is to highlight related app and installed by others, but the match as you know is not always the best, by clicking on "back to shopping" you will still be redirected to the description of the app to start. We did not find a way to disable this feature, which basically requires a tap in to install any new app. Annoying.
And finally we come to the last news, the only one on which we could hardly rely on something: it is now possible to remove items from the wish list by tapping on the icon in that list, without having to open a description of each app. It is the same method used to delete applications from the complete list of all the ones we have ever installed and certainly saves us a few more steps. Nicely done.
After then the description of the new features, I leave you the link to download the Play Store:http://d-h.st/ZZB
Thank you for the hint!
Thanks for letting us now
Sent from my GT-I9000
whats the difference with this one
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1996995
Already been postedf
Sent from my GT-I9300 using xda premium
Kameirus said:
whats the difference with this one
http://forum.xda-developers.com/showthread.php?t=1996995
Click to expand...
Click to collapse
what seems the usual review?
but please ...
Closed
We already have a thread with same topic
It will not be one of the versions that probably go down in history this 3.10.9, which takes the place of the previous 3.9.17, but, no matter how small, the innovations introduced are numerous and we're not sure appreciated them all.
We start from the section recommended for you. Whether it's app or books (advice on music yet they are not), or even if you are on the homepage of the store, blocking the slice with the Google personalized recommendations you'll notice that at the top there is a new voice, "improve these councils, "which allows us to add people you know to find out their tastes and also receive recommendations based on them (or so says the description of the function). Good theory, too bad that the vast majority of contacts proposed were complete strangers from the other side of the world, with which (we checked) we did not even vague contacts on Google+. We look forward to a future refinement.
Then continue with the translations. Some apps now have a button "translate" at their description, which basically will only call into question Google Translate on the fly to change the text in a language more understandable to us. In this case the theory is good, pity we did not understand when and when not to appear: comparing different applications, different languages, some of them had the button translate it and other were completely lacking. Also in this case we are confident in a future refinement.
If these two functions must be short andarsele a little 'to seek, we turn now to a thing you will see rather often. You will all familiar with the installation of new apps: you choose one, went on his page, click on install, accept the permissions and you will be thrown back to the description of the app while the progress bar will indicate the percentage of completion. Not any more. After accepting the permissions, and then return to the description of the app, you have inserted a new page, which you can see an example on the right. The aim is to highlight related app and installed by others, but the match as you know is not always the best, by clicking on "back to shopping" you will still be redirected to the description of the app to start. We did not find a way to disable this feature, which basically requires a tap in to install any new app. Annoying.
And finally we come to the last news, the only one on which we could hardly rely on something: it is now possible to remove items from the wish list by tapping on the icon in that list, without having to open a description of each app. It is the same method used to delete applications from the complete list of all the ones we have ever installed and certainly saves us a few more steps. Nicely done.
After then the description of the new features, I leave you the link to download the Play Store:http://d-h.st/ZZB
Thanks, i was just reading about it in the main android themes and apps forum :laugh:
Today I reinstalled the CM rom on my phone and while I was upgrading my apps, a notification appeared on my phone making me upgrade Google Play Services.
I understand that it is a necessary app and all of that, but did you realized about the high punctuation it has in the Play Store? If you read the opinions, on the most useful section, they talk all about the same: "I can't upgrade this app because it is so big and now I can't use my phone" and all those people give between 1 and 3 stars, but the app has 3.7.
So I changed the section to "Newest first" and started reading opinions. There were a lot of then with comments like "P" or "nice" and 5 stars. If you also look the profile of those people who comment on that app, you can find profiles with any information, just a 5 stars punctuation on that app. And nothing more.
A screenshot of one of this profiles can be found here: nicovell3.es/playServices.png
I suppose these profiles are generated by Google workers to elevate the punctuation of that app, and I understand that they want it to have a good image to make people trust in downloading that app but... I'm not sure that's the correct way.
What I want to ask is: if Google controls in that way the Play Store and we continue trusting that company, what will prevent it from making us believe what they want?
I post this here because I think this must concern all the app developers which produce apps to post them in the Play Store...