My first App Store sale, and the ASO lessons behind it
tl;dr
Four apps, zero sales, then $4.48 from someone in Spain. Before you chase more downloads, clean your numbers (testers and gift codes out), put your best search phrase in the title, use the keyword field for the leftovers, and change one thing per version. A capped one-week Apple Ads test cost me ¥751 and showed which app had pull.
You ship an app.
Then another one.
You check App Store Connect every morning like it owes you money.
Downloads trickle in. Sales stay at zero.
And a small voice starts asking if anyone will ever pay for anything you make.
I had four apps live on the App Store and zero sales.
Zero ratings in the US, too. Across all of them.
Now, for the good news.
In October 2026 a stranger in Spain paid me $4.48.
Tiny number. Huge feeling.
And getting there (and looking hard at the numbers after it) taught me more about App Store Optimization than any thread I'd read.
This guide is all of it. Real numbers, including the flops.
1. The sale
1.1 What actually happened
It was a one-time unlock inside YenPocket. Not a subscription. Not a big plan.
$4.48, from someone in Spain.
Here's the funny part.
I was running Apple Ads at the time. In the US, the UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.
Not Spain.
So the ads didn't make that sale. Somebody found the app on their own and decided it was worth paying for.
I can't tell you exactly which change made it happen. Anyone who says they can, from one sale, is guessing.
Bottom line.
Your first customer probably won't come from where you're aiming.
Your job is to make the app easy to find and worth paying for. Then get out of the way.
1.2 Tell people about it
I nearly didn't post it. $4.48 felt too small to talk about.
I posted it anyway, numbers and all: revenue $4.48, 1 customer, Spain.
It turned into my best-performing post on X.
People don't care about big numbers from strangers. They care about the first one, because they're still waiting on theirs.
Bottom line.
Small numbers are content. Share the first one.
2. Know your real numbers
Before you touch your listing, check that your numbers are real.
Mine weren't.
2.1 Testers are not users
When I went through my customer lists properly, 14 "customers" across my apps were just testers.
One app showed 11 trials. Looked great.
Every single one was a gift code I'd handed out. Real trials: zero.
My dashboard was telling me a nicer story than the truth.
Bottom line.
Strip out testers, sandbox purchases and gift codes before you read a single chart.
Otherwise you're optimising for a fantasy.
2.2 The honest version
Once the fake ones were gone, the app that made the sale had 45 real users in 28 days.
One of them paid.
That's not a "get more traffic" problem yet. People are finding it. Most of them just don't see a reason to pay.
That's a much more useful thing to know than "sales are slow".
Bottom line.
Real users first, then the ratio of users to buyers. That tells you where to work next.
3. ASO: your listing is the shop window
App Store Optimization sounds fancy.
It mostly comes down to four boxes: title, subtitle, keyword field and promo text.
Here's what I learned about each.
3.1 The title does the heavy lifting
I took a snapshot of where my apps ranked for the words I cared about.
The phrase in YenPocket's title: #9.
The phrase in 100 Bites's title: #14.
Four other words I really wanted for 100 Bites: #97, #97, #128 and #154.
Nobody scrolls to #97.
Bottom line.
Put the exact phrase people search for in your title. That's where the easy wins were for me.
And don't swap your strongest word out of the title to make room for something clever.
3.2 The keyword field: small box, easy to waste
The keyword field is hidden. Nobody sees it but Apple.
Which means it's easy to fill with junk and forget about it.
The rules I use now:
- Single words, separated by commas. No spaces.
- Don't repeat a word that's already in your title or subtitle. It's wasted room.
- Keep the words that actually describe what the app does in that moment, not the category you wish you were in.
- Write it, then cut it again.
Mine took three drafts before I was happy with it.
Bottom line.
The keyword field is for the words that didn't fit in your title and subtitle. Nothing else.
3.3 Change one thing at a time
I posted about my ASO plans on X. Someone who knows this stuff far better than me replied with one tip:
Ship the keyword field first. Change the title and subtitle in the next version.
Obvious once you hear it.
If you change everything at once and rankings move, you have no idea why.
So before changing anything, I snapshotted 47 keywords across the US and Australia, and sorted every one by where it lives: title, subtitle, keyword field, or only on a blog page.
In about four weeks I'll compare. Wins and flops, per bucket. I'll post the results on X.
Bottom line.
Take a snapshot before you change anything. Then change one box at a time.
No snapshot, no lesson.
3.4 Promo text is the free lever
Your title, subtitle and keyword field only change when you ship a new version.
Promo text doesn't need one.
I rewrote it on four apps in one afternoon. No new build, no waiting.
Use it for whatever is timely: a new feature, a season, a rule change your users care about.
Bottom line.
If you've never touched your promo text, you're leaving the easiest edit on the table.
4. Apple Ads: a cheap test, not a rescue
4.1 Before: technically "on"
I had campaigns running for two apps.
In one week they got 15 impressions. 0 taps. ¥0 spent.
Every keyword had the same flat bid (¥50 on one app, ¥79 on the other). 3 or 4 exact keywords per ad group. Search Match off.
That's not advertising. That's a campaign that exists.
Bottom line.
A campaign that spends nothing teaches you nothing.
4.2 The test
So I ran a one-week test.
I raised the bids on two markets per app:
- YenPocket, US: ¥79 to ¥250
- YenPocket, Australia: ¥79 to ¥180
- 100 Bites, US: ¥50 to ¥265
- 100 Bites, UK: ¥50 to ¥215
And set a hard total cap before starting, so it couldn't run away from me.
The results after the week:
- YenPocket, US: 129 impressions, 3 taps, 1 install, ¥543
- YenPocket, Australia: 26 impressions, 1 tap, 1 install, ¥208
- 100 Bites and everything else: close to nothing
Total: ¥751 for 2 installs.
YenPocket is the one that made the sale. 100 Bites barely got shown, even after I raised its US bid more than five times.
So I kept YenPocket's campaigns running and paused the rest.
Bottom line.
Ads won't fix a listing nobody wants. They're a cheap way to find out which app has pull.
Set a cap first. Run it for a week. Keep what works, pause what doesn't.
5. What I'd do again
If I was starting from zero sales tomorrow:
- Clean the numbers. Testers, sandbox and gift codes out.
- Snapshot your keyword ranks before touching anything.
- Put your best search phrase in the title.
- Rewrite the keyword field: single words, commas, no repeats.
- Refresh promo text today. It doesn't need a new version.
- Change one box per version, then compare.
- Run a capped one-week Apple Ads test with bids high enough to actually show up.
- Post your numbers, even the tiny ones.
Final thoughts
One sale is not a business.
But it's proof that something you made is worth paying for to someone you've never met.
Everything after that is just doing it again, a bit better each time.
If saving money in Japan is more your thing than ASO, I also run YenHacks.
Good luck.
Have a question?
DM me on X: @kaynesheenan. I read everything.