Menu
A Better Description for App Store Optimization
Written by Kaysie Green
It was Thanksgiving morning. I had spent all night making enough pies and desserts in enough flavors to guarantee my entire extended family’s happiness. The panic had set in for yet another family event that would fully occupy my next two days. Then I got the call.
My client’s game had been removed from the app store for inappropriate language.
You may have gotten this notification or something similar before, and I hope it’s never happened over a holiday. But this was the exact case for my client. One of the 19 languages they had submitted to the Google Play store had been flagged as containing a profane term. I immediately jumped onto the nearest computer and reached out to the senior linguist, answered calls, text and emails from my panicked client. Within an hour, we found that in this case, thankfully, it was a false positive. This experience really made me think: what are the challenges that game developers face with mobile game releases, and how can Glyph’s Games Localization and Consulting team help?
Your App has been Optimized but has it been Internationalized?
Character Limitation
Glyph understands all the work that goes into an App or Google Play Store release. The videos and images have to be a certain size, length, and file type. Your game name and description, which your marketing teams spend months developing, are limited to a 30 character name, 80 character “short” description and a 4000 character “long” description. And on top of that, you are expected to translate them. Did you know that once translated, languages such as French, Spanish and Italian are on average 20% longer than English… and languages like German are closer to 35%?! This means whatever copy you’ve painstakingly crafted in English is going to be much longer once localized. And the clever name you’ve spent time picking out for your game? It may not work when translated.
Character Limitation
Glyph understands all the work that goes into an App or Google Play Store release. The videos and images have to be a certain size, length and file type. Your game name and description, which your marketing teams spend months developing, are limited to a 30 character name, 80 character “short” description and a 4000 character “long” description. And on top of that, you are expected to translate them. Did you know that once translated, languages such as French, Spanish and Italian are on average 20% longer than English… and languages like German are closer to 35%?! This means whatever copy you’ve painstakingly crafted in English is going to be much longer once localized. And the clever name you’ve spent time picking out for your game? It may not work when translated.
App Store Optimization and Keyword Research
When you write an app description using keyword-rich search terms, be prepared to do additional keyword research for other markets. For example, in an App Store Optimization evaluation for a Solitaire game the top clicked term for English-speaking markets is “solitaire”. In Spanish, the top searched phrase was actually “De Tres Picos” (Tripeaks), and it had a higher density by a significant amount. Make sure to select a localization provider that understands games and knows the market, as well budget accordingly for multilingual App Store Optimization. It makes all-the-difference with your game’s app store success to take the extra effort for international keyword research to achieve the top score for every game!
ASO and Keyword Research
When you write an app description using keyword-rich search terms, be prepared to do additional keyword research for other markets. For example, in an ASO evaluation for a Solitaire game the top clicked term for English speaking markets is “solitaire”. In Spanish, the top searched phrase was actually “De Tres Picos” (Tripeaks), and it had a higher density by a significant amount. Make sure to select a localization provider that understands games and knows the market, as well budget accordingly for multilingual ASO. It makes all-the-difference with your game’s app store success to take the extra effort for international keyword research to achieve the top score for every game!
Localization vs. Translation
It pays to know the difference between localization and translation. These are TOTALLY DIFFERENT services. Translations are direct, and often literal – meaning that if you want to say “Play game” in Spanish, literally translated it would be “JUEGA JUEGO”. We can do that for you, but so can Google translate, and a translation as literal as that isn’t at all likely to be well received in the market. Instead, we localize. Our expert localization team will research and compare the latest trends, and marketing strategies used by other games, to ensure your message is reaching as many people as possible. This replaces the need for a localized copywriter writing in the local language.
Localization vs. Translation
It pays to know the difference between localization and translation. These are TOTALLY DIFFERENT services. Translations are direct, and often literal – meaning that if you want to say “Play game” in Spanish, literally translated it would be “JUEGA JUEGO”. We can do that for you, but so can Google translate, and a translation as literal as that isn’t at all likely to be well received in the market. Instead, we localize. Our expert localization team will research and compare the latest trends, and marketing strategies used by other games, to ensure your message is reaching as many people as possible. This replaces the need for a localized copywriter writing in the local language.
Reaching the Right Markets
When you look at specific games that have widely different sales figures in different markets… it poses the question “what markets do I localize this game into?” More generally, it’s important to think about the type of game you’re marketing. For example, according to Sensor Tower, casino mobile games are widely popular in North America, but not so much in Europe or Asia. If you’re planning to localize your casino game into Spanish, you might want to consider Spanish US rather than European or Castilian Spanish.
Reaching the Right Markets
When you look at specific games that have widely different sales figures in different markets… it poses the question “what markets do I localize this game into?” More generally, it’s important to think about the type of game you’re marketing. For example, according to Sensor Tower, casino mobile games are widely popular in North America, but not so much in Europe or Asia. If you’re planning to localize your casino game into Spanish, you might want to consider Spanish US rather than European or Castilian Spanish.
Why Glyph
Preparing your mobile game for release in other markets merits consideration of a number of factors: externally-imposed character limits, keyword research, taking care not to translate literally, and focusing your effort on the right non-American market to target. These are all things we at Glyph Language Services have a proven track record of getting right. If you’d like to know more please reach out to sales@glyphservices.com.
