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iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

developer.apple.com

121–130 of 222 posts

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#121
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't give an app a 1 star review just because they ask for a review. Apple and Android have made ratings incredibly important, and the vast majority of happy users never take the time to review. You get some happy users rating, and a disproportionate number of unhappy users. Asking people (at an appropriate time) is the only way to level the field. We've had a few 5.0 releases of our iOS app, but usually a fe…

>Secondly, the 3rd items you list is actually a dark pattern. If you are going to ask users to review, let them be honest. Directing 5 stars to app store and 4 or fewer to an internal system is gaming the system. Sorry, but that particular pattern is 100% appropriate, IMO. * If someone has a problem with my app, I absolutely don't want to send them to the reviews where they'll post a "tech support review". Yes Apple…

> That's just common sense, not gaming the system.

I bet about 95% of people would disagree with you. This is a very dark pattern, few people are engaging in it, and if you told me non-anonymously that your app does it I would put you and your app on my blacklist of "not to be trusted, ever".

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#122
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an unfortunate cause of excessive app rating prompts — what's shown in search results/top charts/other areas is the average of the latest version, not the overall aggregate. If you're at a company that does scheduled releases (e.g. once every three weeks), you'll need to continually ask people to review the app to keep that rating high. Otherwise you only get ratings from new users and users that are disconte…

I'm tied to the Norwegian app store by bank card. Norway has a small population resulting in the majority of apps having the "we don't have enough reviews for this app" and no review data at all. Instead of showing reviews from another country, or overall from all countries, Apple choose no data at all. Really useful.

I am in the same situation, it's frustrating that Apple segregates the store by country this way.

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does that work? How can Apple prevent douchebags from calling the new API from a modal "Do you love my app? No / Not yet" dialog?

Simple: By rejecting apps which do that.

They are already allowing apps to do stuff which is against the rules. I am on a personal crusade on Twitter against apps that spam me with notifications to "come back".

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#124
post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's an unfortunate cause of excessive app rating prompts — what's shown in search results/top charts/other areas is the average of the latest version, not the overall aggregate. If you're at a company that does scheduled releases (e.g. once every three weeks), you'll need to continually ask people to review the app to keep that rating high. Otherwise you only get ratings from new users and users that are disconte…

I'm tied to the Norwegian app store by bank card. Norway has a small population resulting in the majority of apps having the "we don't have enough reviews for this app" and no review data at all. Instead of showing reviews from another country, or overall from all countries, Apple choose no data at all. Really useful.

Same for Estonia, I don't think I've ever seen a review on Estonian iTunes app store. Not a single one.

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#125
I really hope that it would be finally possible to use touch id to identify myself when leaving reviews. I do not understand why reviewing seems to be the most sensitive thing I can do on an iPhone, as it is the only feature that always requires the whole password.

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#126
post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> No one said nag. People seem to be be assuming the worst possible behaviour. Asking once with a "Don't ask again" and "Later" option is pretty standard. It is pretty standard, and it turns out that I have more than a hundred apps installed that all do it. I too routinely give one-star ratings to try and de-incentivise this kind of thing. I'm sorry that you don't seem to have an alternate way of going about getting…

No one dismissed your complaint. I presented the developer point of view. If you honestly think that a single popup makes an app deserve of a 1 star rating regardless of anything else, I disagree. It's like being a single issue voter. It's also more damaging than you know to the app developers who's work you are using (in most cases for free) and I'd encourage you to reconsider. Apple could fix this issue. A few vigi…

My landlord just raised my rent. I could use some money. Can I have your phone number so that I can text you and ask you to call my landlord, tell her what a good person I am, and lower my rent?

My God, never in a million years would you agree to it.

Why?

Because you don’t care about my problems. But I’m supposed to care about yours. Why?

Because you’re you. Look at your responses. “I don’t care about your problems, but you should care about mine.”

Typical. Humans are born naricissists, and they stay that way for life mostly.

Once upon a time, there was a saying. It was “the customer is always right.”

My how things have changed.

Now, it’s “the customer is always wrong.” Look at you. You care nothing about what the customers want. You don’t listen and adapt.

If enough customers are giving you 1 star because they don’t like nags, and enough are doing it to effect you, those customers are telling you something. You’re a fool if you don’t listen.

If not enough are doing it to effect you, then you don’t have a problem.

If every dev that nags gets a one star, then it’s a wash for you. Why are you leaving all of these facts out? Nobody is suggesting ONLY 1-staring you. They’re suggesting 1-staring everyone. You don’t lose anything in such a scenario. Except, those who don’t nag will rise higher in the ratings, and you’ll be here screaming about how you “have to nag because that’s how the system is weighted.” Whether or not you use it as a competitive advantage or not is up to you, although let’s face it, you blame us regardless of what you do.

Listen, you have problems. I have problems. We all have problems. My problems aren’t your problems, and yours aren’t mine. Grow up, handle your business, and do it without asking other grown adults to do things for you for free. We’re not your parents. We don’t do things because you’re our special little boy. You don’t do them for us either.

You’re an adult now, and that’s the way it works.

Or, do what you want, and accept the consequences, which you’ve already been appraised of. Sure, you can throw up a middle finger if you’d like, keep bombing the customers, then periodically cry “It’s sooooo unfaaaaair”. Maybe you’ll get sympathy.

For my part, I’ve never given one-star for ratings nags, but I will now. In fact, I’m going to give 10 one-stars as soon as I leave this page.

I’ve put money into every app that’s been on my device for more than a month, and I’ve been ripped off along the way … devs changing paid to freemium and throwing ads all over apps I’ve paid for, devs dropping support and releasing “new” versions the next day, dev taking the cash and keeping the ads in the product … you’re all barely better than swindlers these days, and some of you aren’t better at all.

Let’s face it. You could not care less. You’re busy worrying about you. I’m supposed to put all of my experience aside, and think about you. Your wants. Your needs. Oh why won’t the customers think of you, the selfish bastids!

Manipulating the ratings is nonesense too, and the way you justify your behavior to yourself is such a narcissitic endeavor that it’s humorous. At leats be honest with yourself. Yeah, like you admit, you manipulate things to your advantage, but we’re supposed to do the same. Manipulate things to your advantage. You You YOU. If it benefits you, you find a way to justify it, if it benefits someone else, eh, screw em and their wants.

And now, I read that we’ve been stealing your apps, and using them for free, and gosh darnit, we’re so selfish that we don’t stop what we’re doing and rate your app 5 stars to make your lives better like your parents used to do for you whenever they were asked.

Yeah, now I actually dislike the nag devs, because I got just a little bit of insight into what they’re thinking, and oh, wouldn’t you know it … it’s “me me me me me”.

“But that’s what the customers do! Think about themselves!”, you’ll surely respond, without realizing that, YEAH, they’re supposed to. The customers are suppose to be the selfish people of the transaction. I can just imagine you being a waiter, standing around complaining “bring me some food, refill my drink, all the customers do is think of themselves!” You’re supposed to serve the customers, genius, not the other way around. The customer is there to serve themselves, and you’re there to serve them.

If you don’t like it, then boy are you on the wrong side of the transaction.

And hey, I’d still like that number if you don’t mind. You can never have to many people to ping when you have a problem, and if you wouldn’t mind me pinging you for some help every now and then, I’d certainly appreciate it.

Come on, it’ll only take a few minutes of your time every other month. Me needing help is the way the world is designed. Don’t blame me, blame the system.

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#127
post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Please don't give an app a 1 star review just because they ask for a review. Apple and Android have made ratings incredibly important, and the vast majority of happy users never take the time to review. You get some happy users rating, and a disproportionate number of unhappy users. Asking people (at an appropriate time) is the only way to level the field. We've had a few 5.0 releases of our iOS app, but usually a fe…

I've found that many "prompted" reviews are generally of low quality and lack detail, and essentially flood the listing with useless information. (Who cares if there are 500 reviews each saying "Good app!", that tells you basically nothing.) In 7 years I've never prompted for a review in any of my apps. Users that write reviews do so genuinely, and if they are happy, they often leave extremely detailed feedback expla…

It's not the review that's important, it's the * rating that shows in search results etc.

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#128

What I was really hoping for is a solution to the problem of every app begging me for a review after upgrading. I get a "please review" popup pretty much every day. When I got back from Christmas vacation and synced a bunch of apps, my iPhone was painful to use for about three days and every app begged for my help. I actually review apps I use and like, I just wish I didn't have to do it every update to help keep the…

I review every app that annoys me with a review popup, and voice my opinion about my most recent memory of the app (the annoying popup, 1 star). Seems like enough people have started doing it that app developers no longger do this that much, at least on Android. There was even an article how to properly beg for reviews. Boils down to: * Do it after you have delighted the user, not during startup. * Do it respectfully…

> If they say no, ask if they want to provide feedback, if they say yes, you ask them if they're willing to leave a review.

I really, really hate this practice - it just feels scummy as hell to me.

Re: iOS and MacOS Developers Can Now Respond to Reviews

#130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some people here would probably call that a "dark pattern" (I of course don't). Because, you know, it's soliciting for positive reviews from a preselected set of users.

Not a dark pattern at all. There are no interface tricks

Yeah - however, the whole "do you like our app? yes/no" thing, where yes takes you to the store for review and no takes you to a feedback form (that probably doesn't even post)? Definitely a dark pattern.
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