# Seasonal ASO Human Guide

## What This Is For
You help the user identify and act on seasonal keyword opportunities and listing optimizations tied to calendar events, holidays, and trending moments. It gives the agent a clearer input/output frame for seasonal ASO: what context to ask for, what decisions to make, and what usable artifact to return.

Use this as a human-readable version of the Seasonal ASO agent skill. It is meant for marketers, operators, founders, and other non-coders who want the workflow without reading agent-specific implementation instructions.

## When To Use This
- Use this when you need a repeatable process for seasonal ASO.
- Use this when the task needs judgment, examples, constraints, or a clear output format rather than a one-off prompt.
- Use this when you want to hand an AI assistant enough context to produce a usable marketing artifact.

## When Not To Use This
- Do not use this when you only need a quick factual answer.
- Do not use this when the work depends on private data you cannot share with the assistant.
- Do not use this as a replacement for legal, compliance, financial, or medical review.

## What You Need Before Starting
- The goal or business outcome you want.
- The audience, customer segment, or market context.
- Any source material the assistant should respect, such as notes, briefs, examples, URLs, or brand guidance.
- Constraints such as tone, length, channel, deadline, region, or approval requirements.
- A clear definition of what a good final answer should look like.

## Step-By-Step Workflow
1. State the job clearly: "Use the Seasonal ASO guide to help me with..."
2. Add context: audience, goal, offer, channel, source material, and constraints.
3. Ask the assistant to identify missing inputs before producing the final output.
4. Have the assistant follow the skill-specific guidance below.
5. Review the result against the final checklist and ask for revisions where needed.

## Skill-Specific Guidance
- Check for `app-marketing-context.md`
- Ask: **Which event or season are you targeting?**
- Ask: **What does your app do?** (to assess keyword relevance)
- Determine if the event is a good fit — not every seasonal moment applies
- Volume spike (compare to baseline 30 days prior)
- Difficulty < 60 preferred (seasonal keywords are crowded)
- Relevance to your app's core function
- Swap out low-performing keywords for seasonal terms
- Add 2–4 seasonal keywords while preserving your best evergreen terms
- Remove seasonal terms that are irrelevant to your core use case
- Consider a seasonal hook if it fits: "Your Holiday Planner" or "New Year Goal Tracker"
- Only change if the original subtitle is not keyword-critical

## Decision Points And Nuance
The original skill emphasizes: Key Principle, Seasonal Calendar (iOS — US), Workflow, Step 1 — Identify Relevant Event, Step 2 — Research Seasonal Keywords, Step 3 — Plan Metadata Changes, Step 4 — Timing Checklist, Output Format, Seasonal Opportunity Brief, Seasonal vs Evergreen Trade-offs.

Use these questions to steer the work:
- What is the intended audience or buyer?
- What source material must be preserved?
- What should the assistant optimize for: clarity, persuasion, accuracy, speed, creativity, or conversion?
- What examples represent the desired quality bar?
- What should the assistant avoid?

## Common Mistakes
- Promotional text (170 chars — no review required):
- **Rule:** Only swap evergreen keywords that are already underperforming. Never sacrifice a high-ranking keyword for seasonal speculation.

## Copy-And-Paste Prompt
```text
Use the Seasonal ASO human guide.

My goal:
[Describe the business outcome]

Audience:
[Describe who this is for]

Context and source material:
[Paste notes, examples, links, or existing copy]

Constraints:
[Tone, length, channel, timeline, must-include items, must-avoid items]

Before producing the final output, ask me for any missing information that would materially improve the result.
```

## Final Checklist
- [ ] The output matches the original goal.
- [ ] The audience and context are reflected in the answer.
- [ ] Important constraints and source material were preserved.
- [ ] The assistant made the relevant decisions explicit.
- [ ] The final artifact is ready to use, review, or hand to the next person.

## Source
This guide was generated from the eronred/aso-skills skill entry for `seasonal-aso`.

## Source Skill Notes
These notes preserve the nuance from the original skill. Use them as supporting reference when the workflow above feels too generic.

# Seasonal ASO

You help the user identify and act on seasonal keyword opportunities and listing optimizations tied to calendar events, holidays, and trending moments.

## Key Principle

**Seasonal rankings are competitive and time-sensitive.** Metadata takes 1–3 days to index. Plan changes 2 weeks before the event; revert 3–5 days after peak.

## Seasonal Calendar (iOS — US)

| Event | Peak Window | Keywords to target |
|-------|-------------|-------------------|
| New Year | Dec 26 – Jan 7 | "new year", "resolution", "goals", "habit", "fresh start" |
| Valentine's Day | Feb 1–14 | "valentine", "love", "couples", "romantic", "gift" |
| Spring / Easter | Mar–Apr | "spring", "easter", "refresh", "clean", "declutter" |
| Mother's Day | May 1–12 | "mom", "mother", "family", "gift for mom" |
| Summer | Jun–Aug | "summer", "vacation", "travel", "outdoor", "beach" |
| Back to School | Jul 15 – Sep 10 | "school", "study", "student", "homework", "planner" |
| Halloween | Oct 1–31 | "halloween", "scary", "spooky", "costume", "trick" |
| Black Friday | Nov 20–30 | "deal", "sale", "discount", "shopping", "gift" |
| Christmas | Dec 1–26 | "christmas", "gift", "holiday", "santa", "family" |
| End of Year | Dec 27–31 | "year review", "recap", "goals 2026", "new year" |

## Workflow

### Step 1 — Identify Relevant Event

1. Check for `app-marketing-context.md`
2. Ask: **Which event or season are you targeting?**
3. Ask: **What does your app do?** (to assess keyword relevance)
4. Determine if the event is a good fit — not every seasonal moment applies

### Step 2 — Research Seasonal Keywords

Use Appeeky to find volume on seasonal terms:

```bash
GET /v1/keywords/metrics?keywords=christmas+planner,holiday+tracker
GET /v1/keywords/suggestions?term=christmas&country=us
GET /v1/keywords/trending?country=us&days=7
```

**Filter by:**
- Volume spike (compare to baseline 30 days prior)
- Difficulty < 60 preferred (seasonal keywords are crowded)
- Relevance to your app's core function

### Step 3 — Plan Metadata Changes

**Keyword field (100 chars, iOS):**
- Swap out low-performing keywords for seasonal terms
- Add 2–4 seasonal keywords while preserving your best evergreen terms
- Remove seasonal terms that are irrelevant to your core use case

**Subtitle (30 chars):**
- Consider a seasonal hook if it fits: "Your Holiday Planner" or "New Year Goal Tracker"
- Only change if the original subtitle is not keyword-critical

**Promotional text (170 chars — no review required):**
- Always update for seasonal events — instant, no review
- Use for: seasonal call-to-action, limited-time feature highlights, event tie-ins

**Screenshots:**
- Add a seasonal frame or theme to the first 2 screenshots
- Use `screenshot-optimization` skill for creative guidance

### Step 4 — Timing Checklist

```
Timeline (count back from event date):
- [ ] T-14 days: Research keywords, brief creative
- [ ] T-10 days: Write new metadata + promotional text
- [ ] T-7 days: Submit screenshot updates (no review needed)
- [ ] T-5 days: Submit keyword/subtitle update (review time buffer)
- [ ] T-0: Event peak — monitor rankings daily
- [ ] T+3 days: Revert metadata to evergreen version
- [ ] T+5 days: Revert promotional text
```

## Output Format