Guides / ASO
Do I need an ASO consultant, or can I do it myself as a solo founder?
If your problem is basic keyword hygiene and metadata, do it yourself — tools like AppTweak or AppFollow cover most of that, and the learning curve isn't steep. If your problem is a genuine keyword gap against category leaders, or you need ASO decisions connected to unit economics and paid channels, that's where outside help starts to earn its cost.
Most solo founders can handle: title and subtitle optimisation, screenshot testing, basic keyword research, and reading their own conversion data. None of that requires a consultant. It requires time and a couple of cheap tools.
Where it gets genuinely harder is when the top keywords in your category are already owned by leaders with eight-figure ASO budgets. One lifestyle app we worked with hit exactly this ceiling — organic rankings on the core wellness keywords had plateaued against competitors with budgets no solo founder can match. That's not a tactics problem you fix with a better screenshot. It's a structural ceiling, and the decision that follows — whether to keep pushing ASO or open a paid channel instead — is a judgment call, not a checklist item.
What outside help actually adds, beyond picking keywords:
- Connecting ASO diagnosis to unit economics. A single global CPI target hides unprofitable pockets — the same 43-locale example applies here: a market-by-market ceiling against local ARPU tells you a lot more than a blended average ever will.
- Knowing when to stop. Recognising a structural ceiling versus a fixable gap, and knowing when the right move is channel expansion — Apple Search Ads or Google UAC — rather than another round of ASO tweaks.
- Cross-app pattern recognition. Working across many apps and categories surfaces patterns a founder working on one app for years simply doesn't accumulate.
This only makes financial sense once there's a real budget question behind it — apps already profitable, or backed with real marketing capital. If you're pre-revenue, the better use of money is almost always the tools plus your own time, not a consultant.
If you've hit a real ceiling rather than a tactics gap, get in touch and we can figure out which one it is.