Learn from Steve
On YouTube, for free, and genuinely worth watching. On your account, a team. The brand recruits; the process delivers. Ask on the call who owns your title and subtitle.
Translation: Brand is not staffingASO agency review · September 2026
App Masters review: the founder is on YouTube. Avoid assuming he is on your account.
App Masters is the agency behind Steve P. Young, host of one of the biggest app marketing YouTube channels, author, speaker, and a genuinely likeable presence in the industry since 2011. The agency says it has worked with more than 3,000 apps. The person you watched for two hours is the reason you are considering them. He is also the person least likely to be doing your ASO.
Thinking about hiring App Masters? Avoid. Let me explain the personal-brand problem.
Gabriel Machuret · September 2026I like Steve P. Young. I want to say that first, because this page is critical of the agency built around him and I do not want that to read as a criticism of the man. He has spent more than a decade teaching app marketing in public, for free, on a YouTube channel that has helped a lot of developers who could never afford an agency. That is a real contribution. It is also, from a business point of view, the best top-of-funnel an agency could have, and that is where the problem starts.
A personal-brand agency has a structural gap between the pitch and the delivery. The pitch is Steve: his videos, his podcast, his stage appearances, his warmth. The delivery is the team, because one person cannot be on a channel, on a stage, in an academy and on three thousand accounts. So the founder’s time goes to the content that brings in clients, and the clients go to whoever is available. You will meet Steve on the sales call, perhaps. You will work with an account manager and a specialist whose names you did not know when you signed.
Now, the team may be perfectly good. But you are paying a premium for the brand that recruited you, and the brand is not in the room. Three thousand apps over fourteen years is more than four a week. That is a volume shop, and volume shops standardise: an audit template, a keyword process, a screenshot format, a monthly report. The YouTube channel teaches nuance and judgment. The agency, by necessity, ships process.
There is a second gap. App Masters also sells an academy, courses that teach you to do ASO yourself. That is admirable, and it is also revealing: the founder himself believes the work can be learned by a motivated team in a few weeks. If that is true, then a twelve-month retainer for the same work is a strange purchase. Either the academy is right and you should learn it, or the retainer is right and it cannot be learned. The agency sells both.
Compare that with hiring one consultant who is the same person on the sales call and on every deliverable, and who takes a fixed number of clients precisely so that is possible. The teardown, the rewrite, one creative test at a time, the handover, with dates. And, like the academy, the whole engagement is designed to teach your team to run it afterward, except that it is done on your actual listing rather than in a course. The fee is fixed, it ends, and there is no team behind me to be handed to.
In fairness: if you have a small budget, want a friendly American shop with a founder who genuinely understands the stores, and are comfortable that the delivery will be a team running a process, App Masters is a reasonable option, and the free content alone has earned goodwill. If you were sold by Steve and expect Steve, ask on the call who will actually own your metadata. Then send me their proposal and I will show you what the same work costs from the person who does it.
02 — Where a personal-brand agency’s retainer actually goes
Typical agency economics · illustrative, not their books03 — What the channel says vs what the account gets
Hover a row to unredact3,000+ apps
More than four a week for fourteen years. Only a template survives that pace, and a template is what arrives. Depth in your category is not on the menu at that volume.
Translation: Volume means templateFaster, better, cheaper
A slogan borrowed from engineering, where you pick two. In ASO, faster and cheaper usually means the template; better means someone thinking about your category for a while.
Translation: Pick two04 — App Masters vs one consultant
Same goal: more installs from searchApp MastersGabriel, direct
The pitchSteve P. Young’s content and reputationThe person you will actually work with
The deliveryA team running a processGabriel, on every deliverable
ContractMonthly retainerFixed scope, fixed fee
12-month cost≈ $48,000 at a typical $4k/mo$9,500, one engagement
TeachingSold separately, as an academyBuilt into the engagement, on your listing
ReportingTemplated monthly reportA changelog: what shipped, what it did
When it endsCancel, and the process moves onYour team runs ASO without me
05 — Red flags in a personal-brand proposal
If you see three, send it to me- The founder on the call, no named lead on the delivery plan
- Client counts in the thousands with no case study in your category
- A retainer for work the same company sells a course to teach
- Screenshots in the portfolio that share a layout across unrelated apps
- ‘Growth hacks’ or ‘secrets’ in the proposal
- A minimum term longer than the stores take to respond
06 — Fair play — what App Masters genuinely does well
Credit where it is due- Steve P. Young has taught more people ASO for free than almost anyone in the industry
- A founder who has genuinely stayed close to the stores since 2011
- For a small budget, a friendly, established American option
07 — Should you avoid App Masters?
Honest answer: depends who you areAvoid if
You expect the founder on your accountYour listing needs category depth rather than a processYou would rather learn the work than rent it monthlyYou want the engagement to end when the work is doneHire them if
You have a small budget and want a known, friendly US shopYou are comfortable with a team running an established processYou value the founder’s reputation as a signal, and have confirmed who is actually assigned07 — Before you sign
Send me
App Masters’
proposal.
I will tell you what the process would do to your listing versus what your category needs, and quote the deep version as a fixed fee from the person who does it. If a process shop is genuinely enough, I will say so.
08 — Objections
“Steve clearly knows ASO. Isn’t that enough?” +
He does. Ask on the call how many hours per month he will personally spend on your listing. The answer tells you what you are buying.
“Isn’t their academy proof they are generous?” +
It is, and it is also proof the founder believes the work can be learned. If your team can learn it, a twelve-month retainer is the wrong purchase. I teach it on your actual listing as part of the engagement.
“Aren’t you also a personal brand?” +
Yes, and the difference is that I do not hand you to a team. The person on the call is the person on the deliverable, which is why I take a fixed number of clients.
“Is this review biased?” +
Yes. I compete for ASO work. That is why the argument is about the gap between brand and delivery, not about anyone’s competence, and why I have said clearly what the founder has given the industry.
App Masters quoted you? Ask who is actually on your account.Send their proposal