Mobile Ecosystem

Your Top 10 Mobile App Marketing Questions… Answered!

Becky Doles

    1. Do I have to know how to code to build a mobile app?

You don’t have to be a developer to build your own mobile app. If you don’t have budget for a full custom app or you just want to put together a mobile app to test the app marketplace, there are app building tools that will help you get up and running. However, before you go building a DYI app, be sure you know why you are building an app and who will be using it. This may seem like a waste of time and effort, but attempting to build an app without understanding exactly what, why, and how you are creating it won’t get you very far in the long run.

    1. How do I track and measure web to app marketing?

Device fingerprinting is used for web to app tracking. Device fingerprinting pulls basic and not 100 percent unique information from a user’s device headers, including IP address, to connect a user from click to app install. Device fingerprinting works by redirecting a user through a tracking link and collects the publicly available HTTP headers about the device. This information is used to create a fingerprint about the click of the tracking link. When a user installs the mobile app, the SDK collects the same data points from within the mobile app and sends it to the platform. The platform generates the fingerprint of the install and then searches for clicks with the matching fingerprint. The last click with a matching fingerprint is then used to attributed the install.

    1. How do I track and measure app to app marketing?

Tracking using unique identifiers enables 1:1 matching of click to install where identifiers can be passed app to app.
Unique identifier matching is done by matching the unique identifiers from the install to a click. Unique identifier matching is an automated and real-time way of comparing clicks to installs instead of manually conducting the matching at the end of a week or month using Excel spreadsheets.

    1. How do I get die-hard fans and users for my app?

As you are conducting market research for your mobile app, be sure you’re asking feedback from your beta testers to understand what features they would find valuable for your mobile app. By engaging with this initial group of fans, you can start building the buzz about your app early and build the features that will drive repeat usage.

    1. Are incentivised downloads a legit way to market a mobile app?

Incentivized downloads are offered by ad networks, which help marketers generate new users by promoting apps between different publishers. A typical incentivized offer might be a reward of virtual currency within a mobile game for downloading a promoted app or it could be a voucher-style reward, which allows a user to download a paid app for free or access some other kind of offer. Incentivised downloads can be a ‘legit’ part of a mobile app marketing campaign, but it generally produces low value users.

    1. What is the best way to get my app found?

With the app stores being the main channel of awareness for your app to potential users, this means building a good ranking in their respective stores. Follow app store optimization best practices to make sure your app listing is well optimized to be discovered organically by users.

    1. What is the best way to make money from my app?

There are several types of monetization models to generate revenue from your mobile app:

      • Pay to play – user pays to download your app
      • Freemium – free access to your app with an optional paid upgrade to gain access to additional features
      • In-app advertising – ads run on space run in your mobile app
      • In-app purchases – users purchase merchandise – badges, awards, virtual goods, privileges – in your app once they have downloaded it

There is no ‘best’ monetization method to use. Depending on the app type, one method may be more appropriate than another.

    1. How much should I expect to pay if I work with ad networks?

Networks are typically divided into three main categories based on the business model. There are blind networks, which mostly work on cost-per-click (CPC) basis; there are premium blind networks that have a higher proportion of premium publishers then blind networks; then there are those networks that focus on premium publishers – mobile sites of well-known brands, like newspapers or broadcasters – which mostly work on cost-per-thousand impressions. Even within each network category, not every mobile ad network is the same. During your evaluation process, choose a partner (or a number of partners) that suits your technical requirements, target market, geography and budget.

    1. What KPIs should I measure?

Focus on micro conversions (for example, moving from one screen to another) as well as macro conversions (such as completing a purchase) to better understand how your users interact with your app. Go beyond one set of typical Key Performance Indicators such as number of visitors or app opens. Here are five types of reports to measure the success of your app marketing campaigns:

Funnels – What are the important flows and goals in your app that you want users to follow and complete. If there is a desirable action or path that you want users to take, look at the percentage of users that are completing those actions.

Cohorts – A cohort is a group of users that completed a specific action (install, open, uninstall) for the first time within a particular window of time. Given this, we can evaluate a range of data patterns such as the rate of active users and the retention rate of users after an app update. Retention – Beyond looking at what a group of users are doing with your app, you also want to understand the length of engagement of your users over time. The analysis of this type of usage helps marketers learn how to fine-tune the design of the app and optimize particular flows throughout the app.

Loyalty – Loyalty is measured by how frequently users come back to your app. Loyalty metrics such as frequency of opens, duration, number of screens, and conversion rate for events

Lifetime Value – Beyond understanding how people engage, you also want to understand the value they are contributing to your bottom line.

    1. What is the best tip to make sure mobile app marketing campaigns are successful?

Learn how to measure your app before you release it to the public. Learn to understand your customers and how they will use your app if you hope to monetize and maximize profits.

Author
Becky Doles

Becky is the Senior Content Marketing Manager at TUNE. Before TUNE, she led a variety of marketing and communications projects at San Francisco startups. Becky received her bachelor's degree in English from Wake Forest University. After living nearly a decade in San Francisco and Seattle, she has returned to her home of Charleston, SC, where you can find her enjoying the sun and salt water with her family.

5 responses to “Your Top 10 Mobile App Marketing Questions… Answered!”

  1. Hi Jennifer Wong,
    Can you please suggest me best app builder for android app for non techy people .

  2. Alan Stevens says:

    Hi Jennifer
    I’ve launched the world’s first professional face reading apps on Google Play and iTunes ProfileMe shows you how to recognise a number of traits while ProfileMatch explains how to talk to talk to the different personality traits.

    How would you recommend marketing them please?

  3. Polly Profile says:

    This was a great post, very beneficial for any reader. Not marketing at all is probably the biggest mistake any app owner could make. Check out this post from Apperson Lab, one of the industries best Mobile App Solution Centers.
    http://appersonlabs.com/2014/01/11/connecting-consumers-mobile-apps/#.UtbqZ2RDvVs

  4. Siddharth says:

    Hey Jennifer, all points mentioned above are good, great tactical optimization techniques in fact. I think, mobile app
    marketing is a complex process and efforts shouldn’t be
    channelized to a single tool no matter how good it is, for
    instance, app review blog posts or alike. The best way to
    ensure the high visibility of your product is to implement a
    complex strategy, such as utilizing App Store Optimization
    (ASO), Twitter and Facebook support, etc. Apart from that
    discoverability is key and this is reliant on a clear app
    marketing strategy and timely execution because according to
    the Forester Research study, around 63% of new app installs
    come from surfing through the app stores.

    Read More About: http://bit.ly/1iG5LZ8

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