Own the search on the App Store.

Apple Search Ads is the highest-intent surface an iOS app can buy. Someone typing your category into the App Store is one tap from installing, which is why the channel converts so well and why it is so easy to overpay for installs you would have won anyway.

We split the account so that question can actually be answered: brand defence, category discovery and competitor conquesting run as separate campaigns with separate budgets and separate reads. Brand terms are cheap and defensive, discovery is where growth comes from, and competitor terms are the ones that need the hardest payback test.

Apple Search Ads is one input to a store listing, not a substitute for one. Paid traffic converts against the same screenshots and metadata as organic, so we run it alongside app store optimization rather than in isolation. Podz reached 52,873 installs in a month at $0.70 each, and category leadership inside three months.

The channel sits inside our paid advertising line and reports into the same cohort model as every other install source, so a cheap install that never pays back does not get to look like a win.