Apple Search Ads is now a $7+ billion market. Developers spent over $7 billion on Apple Search Ads in 2024, making it one of the fastest-growing mobile advertising platforms. Yet most developers can’t answer a simple question: “Which keywords are actually making me money?”
If you’re spending $1,000+ per month on Apple Search Ads, this probably sounds familiar:
- Your overall ROAS looks acceptable, but you don’t know which keywords are actually profitable
- You’re scaling campaigns without clear signals on what to double down on
- You’ve tried to connect installs to revenue and hit technical complexity
- You’re relying on spreadsheets or exports to piece things together
When App Tracking Transparency rolled out, conversion tracking broke for a lot of ad platforms. Developers running Facebook or Google Ads suddenly couldn’t tell which ads were actually driving conversions, and many accepted that as the new normal.
Apple Search Ads is often assumed to work the same way—but it doesn’t. Even without ATT permission, Apple Search Ads still provides conversion data at the campaign and keyword level. The issue isn’t whether conversions can be tracked. It’s that most developers never get a clear view of which keywords are actually converting. This creates the “keyword profitability blind spot.” Some keywords might have 5 conversions while others have 2 conversions, but they all look identical in the Apple Search Ads dashboard.
What you’re actually missing
In the Apple Search Ads dashboard, this is what you see:
At a glance, everything looks reasonable. Installs are coming in. CPA isn’t alarming.
What you don’t see is what happens after the install. Standard Apple Search Ads analytics stops at the install—it doesn’t show you revenue per keyword.
You can’t tell:
- Which keywords turned into paying users
- Which keywords generated meaningful revenue
- Which keywords quietly lost money
As a result, very different keywords end up looking the same.
What changes at the campaign level first
Before keyword-level data even matters, the first unlock is campaign-level revenue. This is where Apple Search Ads conversion tracking becomes essential.
In Apple Search Ads, you can see:
- Spend per campaign
- Installs per campaign
But you can’t tell how much revenue those installs actually generate.
That creates a common problem:
- You see revenue in App Store Connect or RevenueCat
- You see spend in Apple Search Ads
- But you don’t know how much of that revenue came from ads vs organic installs
Without a way to track Apple Search Ads conversions to actual purchases, you’re flying blind. You might be profitable overall, but you can’t tell which campaigns are driving that profitability.
Once revenue is attached to campaigns through conversion tracking, that ambiguity disappears.
You can immediately see:
- Which campaigns are driving paid revenue
- Which ones are just generating installs with little return
- Where your ad budget is actually working
This is what an Apple Search Ads conversion tracker reveals—the connection between ad spend and actual revenue at the campaign level.
At that point, the question changes from:
“Is Apple Search Ads working at all?”
to:
“Which campaigns are worth scaling, and which ones are quietly losing money?”
This is the difference between optimizing activity and optimizing outcomes.
From campaign-level to keyword-level
Once revenue is visible at the campaign level, the next question becomes obvious:
Why does this campaign look mediocre?
At the campaign level, everything is blended:
- Profitable keywords
- Break-even keywords
- Money-losing keywords
They all roll up into a single ROAS number.
That’s where keyword-level Apple Search Ads analytics changes the game. When you break the same campaign down by keyword, the picture becomes clear.
What’s involved in setting this up
AppSkale isn’t a “flip a switch” feature inside Apple Search Ads — it works by connecting data you already have. Think of it as Apple Search Ads analytics extended to show revenue, not just installs.
At a high level, the setup looks like most modern analytics or attribution tools (think RevenueCat, Mixpanel, or Facebook Ads attribution).
There are three things to connect:
1. Apple Search Ads data
This lets AppSkale pull campaign- and keyword-level spend and attribution data.
2. Install attribution inside your app
So installs from Apple Search Ads can be linked back to campaigns and keywords.
3. Revenue events (subscriptions or in-app purchases)
So AppSkale can calculate real revenue and ROAS instead of guessing.
None of this requires rebuilding your app or changing how you monetize — it’s about connecting existing systems.
What setup typically looks like
In practice, most teams do the following:
- Generate Apple Search Ads API credentials
- Add the app inside AppSkale
- Connect your revenue source (for example, RevenueCat or in-app purchase events)
- Install a lightweight SDK or attribution hook (similar to other analytics tools)
If you’ve ever set up RevenueCat, Mixpanel, or ad attribution before, this will feel familiar.
For most apps, setup takes ~30 minutes.
Who This Is For
AppSkale is built for developers serious about iOS app growth—whether you’re launching today or already running campaigns.
Here’s what we’ve learned from launching multiple apps: the App Store doesn’t work like Google. You can’t SEO your way to rankings. You can’t create content and wait for organic growth. Title, subtitle, and screenshots play a role, but based on what developers consistently observe, Apple’s algorithm appears to prioritize conversion signals: download velocity, tap-to-install rates, and how many users actually purchase.
The most reliable way to send these signals? Apple Search Ads.
If you’re just launching your app, here’s the typical playbook: Get initial traction through channels like AppAdvice lifetime free offers, then immediately start running Apple Search Ads on 20-30 keywords. Your goal in the first few weeks isn’t necessarily profitability—it’s discovery. Which keywords drive installs? Which drive actual purchases? What’s the CAC per keyword?
This is where most developers hit a wall. Apple shows you campaign totals, but you can’t see keyword-level revenue. You’re testing keywords blind. You don’t know if “voice recorder app” costs you $15 per customer while “audio recorder ios” costs $3. You can’t calculate which keywords are worth scaling or build a realistic budget around keywords that actually work.
If you’re already spending on Apple Search Ads, the problem is different but just as critical. You’re spending $5,000 or $10,000 per month, you see campaign totals, but you can’t see which specific keywords are working. Some keywords might have 4x ROAS while others bleed money at 0.3x ROAS, but they all look the same in Apple’s dashboard. You might scale a campaign that’s being carried by two profitable keywords while ten others lose money.
AppSkale solves this for both scenarios. From day one of your first campaign, you can see which keywords drive revenue, calculate CAC per keyword, and build your growth strategy on actual data instead of guesswork. You find the keywords that can go the distance, pause the ones that don’t work, and know exactly how much investment you need to scale the winners.
This makes sense if you’re:
- Launching a new iOS app and need to discover profitable keywords
- Currently spending $1K-50K/month on Apple Search Ads
- Using RevenueCat for subscriptions or in-app purchases
- Building a sustainable growth strategy based on keyword economics
Next steps
This guide covered what’s missing from Apple Search Ads reporting and what becomes possible with keyword-level revenue tracking.
If you want to see which keywords drive revenue from day one, setup takes about 30 minutes. You’ll connect Apple Search Ads (read-only), add your app, install the SDK, and link RevenueCat.