App Store Optimization Company or Your Own Team? How to Decide

You are looking for an app store optimization company because your app needs more people to find it in search. Before you sign a retainer, answer one question first. Do you already have a marketing team that can do the work?

Many companies do. A studio with one marketer can run App Store Optimization (ASO) itself. So can a scale-up with a growth team, or a large company with a full marketing department. They need the right tool and a clear weekly routine. This guide explains what an ASO company does and when your own team can do the same work. It also covers when an agency is still the better choice.

What an app store optimization company does

An app store optimization company runs ASO for you as a service. You pay a fee, usually every month, and their team does the work on your listing. The usual scope looks like this:

• Keyword research: they find the searches your users make and pick the terms worth targeting.
• Metadata: they write the title, subtitle and keyword field on the App Store, and the title, short description and full description on Google Play.
• Creatives: they plan or design screenshots, the icon and the preview video.
• Tracking: they watch your rankings and your competitors every day.
• Reporting: they send a summary of what moved and what they will change next.

That is real work, and a good agency does it well. But every item on the list is a task your own team can also do, with the right data in front of it.

Why an app store optimization agency is not always the answer

An agency adds a step between your team and your listing. Your marketers already know the product, the users and the roadmap. The agency must learn all of that first, and it learns it from your briefings.

Three costs come with that step:

1. The fee is ongoing. When the obvious fixes are done in the first months, you still pay for the routine work that follows.
2. The knowledge stays outside. The keyword research, the tests and the lessons live in the agency's files and the agency's heads.
3. Changes are slower. A release note, a seasonal campaign or a competitor move must go through a request before your listing changes.

None of this makes an agency a bad choice. It means the choice depends on whether you have people who can own the listing.

When your own marketing team can run ASO

Your team can run ASO in-house when these three things are true:

• Someone can own the listing for a few hours each week.
• That person can change the store metadata, or can ask the developer who ships the release to change it.
• The team has data it can trust: keyword volume and difficulty, daily rankings and competitor changes.

The first two are about people. The third one is about tools, and it is the reason most teams think they need an agency. Keyword volume, daily rankings and competitor changes tell the team what to change each week.

What your team needs to run ASO in-house

An in-house ASO routine needs the same inputs an agency uses. These are the parts, with the ASOScan feature for each one:

• Keyword research with volume and difficulty for every market you sell in: keyword intelligence.
• Daily rank tracking, 200 positions deep, on the App Store and Google Play: the same feature tracks every keyword every day.
• Competitor tracking that shows when a rival changes its title, subtitle or screenshots: competitor analysis.
• Reviews, with sentiment and replies drafted in the reviewer's own language: review analytics.
• Reports your team can send to a manager or to leadership: reports.

ASOScan puts all of this in one workspace, and every plan includes unlimited team seats. Plans start at $15 a month, and Business is $149 a month for larger portfolios. You can see every plan on the pricing page. If you want a baseline first, the free ASO score checks any listing in about a minute, with no account.

For the method behind the routine, read our ASO guide and the App Store keyword research guide.

Large companies and the biggest apps

In-house ASO is not only for small apps. The biggest apps are often the best fit, because their companies already have the people. A large marketing department has product marketers, growth managers and localization teams. What it often lacks is one shared view of keywords, rankings and competitors across every app and every market.

For those teams, ASOScan is the tool the whole department works in. Everyone sees the same data, and no seat limit decides who gets access. The work stays inside the company, where the product knowledge already is.

When an ASO agency is still the right choice

Hire an app store optimization agency when one of these is true:

• Nobody on your team has time to own the listing, even for a few hours a week.
• You need a lot of creative production, such as screenshot sets and preview videos in many languages, and you have no designers.
• You want an outside expert to set the strategy once, and your team will run it after that.

The last option is a good middle path. A consultant sets up the keyword strategy and the first listing changes. Your team then runs the routine every week with a tool, and the fee stops when the project ends.

Questions to ask an app store optimization company before you sign

If you decide to hire, ask these questions in the first call:

• Which fields does each store index? On the App Store, the description is not one of them. On Google Play, it is.
• How will you measure the result, and how will you separate search installs from paid installs?
• What will you change in the first 30 days, and what happens after the first fixes are done?
• Will we get the keyword research and the rank history if we end the contract?

Two answers are red flags. The first is a promise of guaranteed rankings, because no one can guarantee a position. The second is a plan with one audit and no ongoing measurement.

To compare an agency quote with the cost of doing it yourself, see best ASO tools in 2026. Before you agree to a reporting format, read how to measure ASO.

Frequently asked questions

Can ASOScan replace an ASO agency?

For many teams, yes. ASOScan gives your own team the same inputs an agency works from: keyword research, daily rank tracking, competitor tracking, review analysis and reports. Your team then decides what to change and ships it with the next release.

How much does an app store optimization company cost?

Agencies rarely publish their prices, because the quote depends on the number of apps, markets and creative work. ASOScan plans cost $15, $59, $149 or $299 a month, and Enterprise has custom pricing. Every plan starts with a 7-day free trial with no credit card.

Can a large company run ASO without an agency?

Yes. Large companies often have the strongest in-house teams, with product marketing, growth and localization already in place. They need a shared tool that covers every app and every market, and ASOScan gives every team member access with unlimited seats.

Does ASO improve organic rankings?

Good ASO improves organic rankings, and ASOScan helps you rank better. No tool and no agency can guarantee a specific position, so be careful with any offer that promises one.