When prompted 'Would you like to rate this app?', if you choose 'Yes', show a ratings widget and comment box right there in the dialog without booting you to the App Store.
Edit for the downvoters: this is me speculating on how the ratings work in practice. Whether the system is fair or serves your own interests are both seperate issues.
The app has been up for at least 5 minutes
&&
It was first run at least 7 days ago
&&
It (executed primary function) no more than 12 hours ago
&&
It (executed primary function) at least 3 times
&&
There was some user activity in last 60 seconds
"every time the user launches your app, Appirater will see if they’ve used the app for 30 days and launched it at least 15 times. If they have, they’ll be asked to rate the app, and then be taken to your app’s review page in the App Store. If you release a new version of your app, Appirater will again wait until the new version has been used 15 times for 30 days and then prompt the user again for another review. Optionally, you can adjust the days to wait and the launch number by changing DAYS_UNTIL_PROMPT and LAUNCHES_UNTIL_PROMPT in Appirater.h."
Tweaking those two settings lets you target any selection of engaged users (eg. 15 launches in 30 days will reach primarily very engaged users).
I too really dislike being asked to rate an app. Especially since there's never a good time for this. Most of the time I've see this on my phone is when I launch an app for the 5th or 6th time. I launched the app to use it, not to review it.
We all hate the bad reviews. But don't start doing this. It's just bad user experience.
We've also had issues with what seem to be targetted 1 star ratings with no reviews. Every new version that comes out we instantly get a bunch of these, and I have suspicions about who they come from. Almost all written reviews are 4 or 5 stars.
While I'm not sure what the "euphoric moment" will be in my app, it's very wise to time your reminders to be placed in strategic areas associated with positive emotion: the end of a task, a major completion.
Not sure why you need a 3rd party library to do this though, it's pretty straight forward.
But as a user, I strongly dislike being spammed. Here, what seems nice is that it waits until 30 days use before asking and only asks once per version, which is good for multiple reasons. (I'd likely personally keep it to once ever though)
Right now the official twitter app is being downrated into oblivion here in germany (1,5 stars) due to the introduction of that trend bar. From one of the best twitter clients to One and a half star. Really? You don't have to like that bar and most people certainly don't but does it affect your twitter experience in such a bad way that those one star ratings are justified. I doubt it.
That said, app reviews seem to be used as kind of punishment by users instead of providing helpful feedback.
Therefor i can see that asking users who frequently use your app to rate it makes a lot of sense from a developers perspective. Additionally those developers should have the option to provide highlighted answers to reviews or weigh in on unjustified user statements.
The trick is getting the timing right. Wait long enough that they've used it a few times and have actually had a chance to form an opinion. Otherwise it's just annoying.
I now have over 50 reviews for the current version with a 4-5 star average.
http://itunes.apple.com/ee/app/icross-wod-free/id397702723?m...
Feedback is greatly appreciated.
Getting the timing right is a bit tricky - I've opted to prompt the user after ten uses at a point where interaction with the app won't be obstructed by the alert.
As a side note, I think that the alerts should be shown only once. I was using another app that would prompt every other time to rate and the default dismiss button was "Remind me later"...very annoying.
They justified that by "well, yea those are sort of fake review but everyone does it so it is ok"
