Need more positive reviews for your smartphone app? Well, you can always interrupt your users by inserting one of those annoying review requests when they’re inside the app itself, but analytics startup Tapstream is offering a different approach — the Review Bar, a “Rate this app!” prompt that sits at the top of your website.
“We want to encourage developers to use the Web,” says Tapstream co-founder Slaven Radic, arguing that too many mobile developers don’t bother to do anything worthwhile with their web presence.
So with the Review Bar, developers can convince users to write a review at the right moment — not when they’re pissed off at the app (which can drive someone to write a review without prompting), and not when they’re trying to use the app itself.
The bar asks for a rating between 1 and 5 stars. If users enter a 4- or 5-star rating, they’re prompted to follow a link to the App Store and post a review. If they enter a rating of 3 stars or less, they’re prompted for feedback instead. (If you think this is dishonest, well, fair enough, but no one is stopping the user from posting an App Store review. The Review Bar just isn’t encouraging them to do so. And hopefully developers will actually respond to the fact.)
One possible drawback: Once someone downloads the app, they never feel the need to visit your site, so they never see the bar. Another one: There are a bunch toolbars available now competing for website space, for example the recently acquired Hello Bar.
Radic admits that developers probably don’t want to pile one toolbar on top of another, but he says you could always try out the Review Bar as a limited campaign for a month. The bar itself is free, though he’s hoping that developers who really want to track its effectiveness sign up for Tapstream’s paid analytics product.