Republish same app again? Any experiences?

I would like to boost my app downloads, as they are same for months and I really don’t know what else to do to improve them.
I read somewhere - I think right from David on this forum, but also somewhere else - that sometimes it helps to republish same app again. I mean do following:

  • change package name of your app (this is of course a MUST - otherway you won’t be able to release it as new app)
  • slightly change app name and description
  • publish as new app
  • do massive marketing, like pay per install for 2-3 weeks as in first month it’s easier to get higher in ranking than with your “old” app

I hear some success stories about this, however I have few questions - if somebody experienced this, I would really like to know for example:

  • if you will have 2 very similar apps, won’t you get ban or warning from google?
  • or to be safe you un-publish old app first. However, this seems very risky to me - you never know if you will have success with republished new app and you can lost everything

Any ideas or real-life experiences would be very very helpful, I’m sure not just for me :slight_smile:

I was thinking on doing this… I don’t think it’s violating anything if you republish them if you delete te previous… but if you keep both I can’t tell…

me too. And anyone with real experiences? :slight_smile:

However, I was thinking a little and it looks like it would be a huge problem for all new apps now due to new play store webpage…Now (unlike earlier) after search there are only 48 results showing and no “next page” button. But your app won’t be surely after publishing in first 48 results, so nobody will download it. And when nobody will download it, it won’t get higher in ranking => it looks theoretically and also practitcally impossible to get your app ranked higher. Or google thought on this, and has some suprises in ranking alghorithm :slight_smile: