---
title: "Does the app name or the tagline decide marketplace search rank?"
description: "On the Atlassian Marketplace, our listings ranked in the top 20 for a query when the app name contained it, and below 170 when only the tagline did. Renaming moved three listings up within hours, and lengthening a name that already matched cost one listing fourteen places. Rank followed the name."
date: 2026-10-11
lang: en
canonical: https://goingstellar.ro/research/marketplace-search-rank-follows-the-app-name/
author: Going Stellar
publisher: GOING STELLAR S.R.L.
topic: Measurement / Marketplace search
license: CC BY 4.0
alternate_ro: https://goingstellar.ro/ro/cercetare/pozitia-in-cautare-urmeaza-numele-aplicatiei/
---

# Does the app name or the tagline decide marketplace search rank?

*On the Atlassian Marketplace, our listings ranked in the top 20 for a query when the app name contained it, and below 170 when only the tagline did. Renaming moved three listings up within hours, and lengthening a name that already matched cost one listing fourteen places. Rank followed the name.*

> Measurement · Marketplace search · 2026-10-11 · https://goingstellar.ro/research/marketplace-search-rank-follows-the-app-name/

## Key points

- On the Atlassian Marketplace, our listings ranked 3rd to 15th when the app name contained the search phrase and 179th to 185th when only the tagline did.
- A listing with 1 install ranked 3rd on its exact-match query, ahead of a competitor with 2,799 installs, so matching the name outweighed install volume on that query.
- Adding the target phrase to names that lacked it moved planning poker from 185th to 70th and issue templates from 179th to 85th on the same day.
- Lengthening a name that already matched the query exactly made it worse: epic roll-up fell from 3rd to 17th.
- Lengthen an app name only when it does not contain the target phrase; if it already does, keep it short.

## The name decides, the tagline barely counts

On the Atlassian Marketplace, public search rank followed the app's name, not its tagline. Where the name contained the search phrase, our listings ranked between 3rd and 15th. Where the phrase appeared only in the tagline, the same kind of listing ranked 179th or 185th. Lengthening a name that already matched the phrase made its rank worse.

A **tagline** is the short line under an app's name on a marketplace listing. Most listing guides treat the tagline as the place for keywords. Our measurement says that on this marketplace the tagline is indexed far more weakly than the name, so a keyword placed only there does almost nothing for discovery.

## Why we measured it

On 11 October 2026 we checked our four public Atlassian listings at the source. Each had exactly 1 install, which was our own test instance, and 0 reviews. The listings themselves worked: the public page offered a free tier and an install button. So whatever was going wrong was happening before anyone reached the page, in **discovery**, meaning whether the listing appears when a buyer searches for the job it does.

Install counts with no reviews and no outside installs at all are the signature of a listing nobody finds. Before changing anything, we wanted to know where the four listings actually sat in search.

## Method

We queried the marketplace's public search with the same filters a buyer would apply on the site (the Jira product, cloud hosting), recorded the position of each of our listings, and recorded the total number of results for the query. Install counts came from the public record of each listing. Every number below can be reproduced by anyone with the same query.

For each listing we chose the phrase a buyer would type for its job, then noted whether that phrase appeared in the app name, the tagline, or both.

## The baseline: four queries, two patterns

**planning poker**: our listing ranked 185th out of 876 results. The phrase was in the tagline, not in the name, which was SprintEstimate.

**issue templates**: 179th out of 2,794 results. Again the phrase was in the tagline; the name was Templatize.

**recurring issues**: 15th out of 2,821 results. The name was Recurring Issues.

**epic roll-up**: 3rd out of 337 results. The name was Epic Roll-up.

The size of the result set did not explain the gap: the two listings that ranked well faced 2,821 and 337 results, the two that ranked badly faced 876 and 2,794. The only variable that split the four cleanly was whether the name contained the query.

One more detail points the same way. On the *epic roll-up* query, our listing with 1 install sat 3rd, ahead of a competitor with 2,799 installs. On that query, matching the text of the name outweighed a very large difference in installs.

## The intervention: rename all four

Listing names on this marketplace can be edited on a live listing without going back through review. We renamed all four so that each name carried the phrase a buyer types: *Templatize: Issue Templates for Jira*, *SprintEstimate: Planning Poker & Story Points for Jira*, *Recurring Issues for Jira: Scheduled Recurring Tasks* and *Epic Roll-up for Jira: Epic Progress & Story Points*.

Confirming the edit was its own small trap. The public listing record is served through a cache, and after saving it still showed the old name and the old modification date. The honest proof was the vendor console reloaded from scratch, with the save button greyed out because nothing remained to save. A check that reads the cached public record would have reported the rename as failed.

## The first measurement after renaming

We measured again on the same day. The search index was still in transition: the public record showed the new name on only 2 of the 4 listings. So the numbers below are a first reading, not a final one.

Where the old name did not contain the phrase, rank rose sharply. **planning poker** went from 185th to 70th. **story point estimation** went from 67th to 31st. **issue templates** went from 179th to 85th. Two broader queries also improved: **epic progress** from 43rd to 26th, and **recurring tasks** from 19th to 11th.

Where the old name already matched the phrase exactly, rank fell. **recurring issues** went from 15th to 25th. **epic roll-up** went from 3rd to 17th: the short name that matched perfectly had been replaced by a long one that still contained the phrase, and the listing lost fourteen places on its best query.

## Why a longer name can lose

Many search engines score a match with a formula of the `BM25` family, which normalises a term match by the length of the field it was found in. A query word inside a short name counts for more than the same word inside a long one. If the marketplace's search behaves like that, both halves of our result follow: adding the phrase to a name that lacked it helps a great deal, and padding a name that already matched dilutes it.

We have not seen the marketplace document its ranking formula, so this is our explanation of the pattern, not a confirmed mechanism. The rule we take from it does not depend on the explanation: **lengthen a name only when it does not contain the target phrase; if it already does, keep it short.**

## Where we were wrong

We had put the target phrases in the taglines on the assumption that the tagline was indexed like the name. It was not, and from the day they went public in September, two of four listings sat below 170th on the phrase that describes exactly what they do.

We then over-corrected. Renaming all four in one pass, including the two names that already matched, cost *epic roll-up* its 3rd place. Changing only the listings that needed it, one at a time, would have shown the dilution effect without paying for it on our best-ranked listing.

We had also written down earlier that the marketplace's public REST interface was gone. The public paths answered normally during this measurement. What had gone were the console and vendor paths, which is a narrower statement than the one we had recorded.

## What a better rank is worth

Rank is not installs. On a crowded query like *planning poker*, with 876 results and competitors holding between 400 and 3,500 installs, even 70th place is unlikely to bring anyone. A name change alone will not lift a listing into the top ten there.

Thin niches behave differently. On *epic roll-up* the leading listings have between 17 and 24 installs, so a place in the top five is realistic and is where any discovery that exists actually happens. For a small listing, the useful target is the exact phrase of a narrow job, carried in a short name, rather than the broad query everyone competes for.

## Limitations

This is four listings on one marketplace, measured before and a few hours after a rename, with the index still half updated. Some of the movement may be noise in the index rather than the rename, and we have not yet repeated the measurement after a full reindex; we planned to repeat it 24 to 48 hours later before reverting anything.

We measured rank, not installs. A better position is a precondition for discovery, not proof of it, and we have no evidence yet that any of the four listings gained an outside install. Other marketplaces weigh names, taglines and descriptions differently, so the rule should be tested on each one rather than assumed.

## Questions and answers

### Does the tagline affect search ranking on the Atlassian Marketplace?

The tagline appears to affect Atlassian Marketplace search ranking far less than the app name. In our measurement, listings whose name contained the search phrase ranked between 3rd and 15th, while listings with the phrase only in the tagline ranked 179th and 185th. After renaming, the listings gained many places within hours. Put the phrase a buyer types in the name, not only in the tagline.

### Should I add keywords to my app name on a marketplace?

Adding keywords to an app name helps when the name does not already contain the target phrase. On the Atlassian Marketplace, adding the phrase moved one listing from 185th to 70th. Lengthening a name that already matched exactly did harm: one listing fell from 3rd to 17th. The rule is to lengthen the name only when it lacks the phrase and otherwise keep it short.

### Why can a longer app name rank lower in marketplace search?

A longer app name can rank lower because many search engines score matches with a BM25-style formula that normalises a match by the length of the field. The same query word counts for more in a short name than in a long one. On the Atlassian Marketplace, a listing whose short name matched its query exactly dropped from 3rd to 17th after the name was lengthened.

### Does a high marketplace search rank guarantee installs?

A high marketplace search rank does not guarantee installs. On a crowded query with 876 results and competitors holding 400 to 3,500 installs, even 70th place brings almost nobody. In thin niches, where leaders have between 17 and 24 installs, a top-five place is realistic and is where discovery happens. Rank is a precondition for installs, not proof of them.

### How can I check where my app ranks in marketplace search?

Checking where an app ranks in marketplace search means querying the public search with the same filters a buyer uses, then recording the app's position and the total number of results. Note whether the phrase appears in the name or the tagline. Public listing records can be cached, so confirm any rename in the vendor console and repeat the measurement after the index updates.

## How to cite

**Cite this as:** Going Stellar (2026). *Does the app name or the tagline decide marketplace search rank?*. GOING STELLAR S.R.L.. https://goingstellar.ro/research/marketplace-search-rank-follows-the-app-name/

```bibtex
@misc{goingstellar2026marketplace,
  title  = {Does the app name or the tagline decide marketplace search rank?},
  author = {{Going Stellar}},
  year   = {2026},
  url    = {https://goingstellar.ro/research/marketplace-search-rank-follows-the-app-name/},
  note   = {2026-10-11}
}
```

Licence. Free to quote with attribution.

## Also available

- This page as HTML: https://goingstellar.ro/research/marketplace-search-rank-follows-the-app-name/
- Same article in Romanian: https://goingstellar.ro/ro/cercetare/pozitia-in-cautare-urmeaza-numele-aplicatiei/