From practically every standpoint, the mobile app market is increasingly in the world’s spotlight. 2017 carried an astounding $77 billion in projected mobile app revenue, with 197 billion mobile app downloads (compared to 2016’s 149 billion). Join Branch’s Mada Seghete and experts from ZipRecruiter and IMVU for an exploration of tips, tricks, and best practices for optimizing mobile user acquisition in 2018.
In this webinar, we’ll cover:
-Why mobile user acquisition is so difficult
-Why investing in paid acquisition is necessary and how to leverage it
-Effective strategies to to drive user growth organically
-Examples of successful campaigns from Ziprecruiter and IMVU on driving mobile growth on paid and organic channels
5. Universal Ads
March 7, 10-10:45 AM PST
RSVP: https://branch.app.link/Mar7_WBR
Upcoming Webinars
6. Acquisition Activation
ReferralEngagement
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Are you targeting your users in the
optimal way for your app? Find out
with the words of our mobile experts.
You’ve targeted, sent out campaigns, and
brought users into your app. Now it’s
time to engage your users the right way.
Learn how to best facilitate your most
engaged users’ contributions to your
mobile growth plan.
Start your users off on the right foot
with our helpful tips for optimized
onboarding.
7. ORGANIC
Acquisition: Organic vs. Paid
PAID
Content
SEO & ASO
Instant Apps
Word of Mouth
Email
Press Coverage
Social Media
Social Media
Native Apps
Apple Search Ads
Events
Influencers
Acquisition
of new users
8. Content could be the answer to all your
mobile acquisition woes. These days, content
is utilized in a variety of forms to ultimately
entertain, educate, persuade, and convert.
Distilled has prepared the nifty content matrix
to the right. It’s important to understand the
proposed role of content prior to writing
and distributing it, so as to optimize
conversion and ROI.
Organic Acquisition: Content
9. The 7 High-Arousal Emotions That
Make Your Content Contagious
1. Awe 3. Anxiety2. Anger 4. Fear
10. The 7 High-Arousal Emotions That
Make Your Content Contagious
5. Joy 6. Lust 7. Surprise
11. What makes good content?
Useful SEO driven Drives emotion
Humans crave the opportunity
to give advice and offer tips.
Why does advocate marketing
work? Your best customers
love to help out, but especially
if they offer practical value.
Writing content with SEO in
mind, based on search trends
and search volume +
opportunity to make it to the
first page can help your
content drive more organic
traffic to your website.
Positive emotions make
people share (the happier the
post, the more likely it is to be
shared). Negative emotions
drive more clicks.
High arousing emotions drive
more shares.
12. TIP
“What you publish via social media, what press releases you push, and what eBooks and
webinars you develop all fall under the umbrella of content creation. In order to keep all
of your content organized, you need to work with calendars.
“That could mean a Google Docs spreadsheet with tabs for social media, PR, and content
marketing. It could mean a big dry erase calendar hanging on your office wall. It doesn’t
matter what your calendar looks like. It just matters that you have one. Use content
calendars to plan your release dates, manage your authors, manage your deadlines,
assign keywords, monitor promotion strategies—whatever makes sense for you.”
Create user-driven content calendars.
Shanelle Mullin
Kissmetrics Blog
“How to Master Social Customer Acquisition”
13. TIP
Leverage content marketing to
connect to your users.
“Focus on writing something that’s of interest to your audience. It doesn’t necessarily have
to be about your product. The purpose of content marketing is producing something
of value, not showcasing your product.”
14. TIP
Leverage content marketing to
connect to your users.
No existing community for the industry? No problem—sometimes, you may also need
to create an optimal channel for your users to receive the content you produce.
For instance, we founded the Mobile Growth Community so mobile growth experts
could connect, network, and advance. With free meetups spread around the world and all
throughout the year, we’re committed to not only providing quality content for mobile
growth professionals, but also providing a channel for them to access it.
15. While no longer a strategic sole focus for
mobile growth, exploring methods of App
Store Optimization can contribute to
mobile growth.
Organic Acquisition:
App Store Optimization
16. TIP
Boost your web traffic to boost your
App Store search results placement.
Higher App Store ranks for websites with higher
Alexa (web traffic) ranks is logical, but it’s also
proved by our data.
Improving your website traffic can only boost
your app’s search results spot in the App
Store.
17. With the redesign of the App Store and the
thousands of apps published every day, the App
Store and Play Store can no longer be the
primary channels for organic discovery.
Repeatedly, we’ve seen developers try to use an
App Indexing product, but find that content never
appears in search.
And don’t even get us started on that pesky
unattributed direct referral traffic.
Organic Acquisition:
Search Engine Optimization
19. Organic Content and SEO
There’s a science behind every single Google search—not every Google search is ranked
organically. Below is a slide portraying a rotated Google search for DreamWorks’ “The
Boss Baby”. Notice the limited space for organic content.
20. Organic Content and SEO
When applied to the finding that 75% of users never scroll past the first page of search
results, this creates a potentially challenging ecosystem for mobile growth professionals.
21. TIP Checklist for Improving mWeb SEO.
Pass Google’s Mobile-Friendly Test
Improve Mobile Usability
Prepare for Mobile Indexing
● Assess Mobile Site Architecture
● Assess Content Parity
Leverage Schema Markup
(Especially in High-Interest Verticals)
Improve Performance (through
PageSpeed)
● AMP
● PWAs
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22. TIP
Integrate smart banners into your
mobile website.
of app purchase revenue from
smart banner-referred app user
sessions (which are only 8% of
sessions).
70%
Smart banners make good mobile strategies great.
2.6x 20%
higher in-app purchase rate for
users originally installing the
app from a smart banner,
compared to general app users.
higher in-app purchase rate for
users entering the app directly
from a smart banner, compared
to general app users.
23. TIP
One of the more controversial mobile tactics is
the full page takeover screen, often referred to as
an interstitial because it stands between a user
and the mobile web version of the content. The
purpose of the interstitial is simple: to drive as
many people to your native app as possible. Far
and away, it is the most effective technique to
drive pure volume of installs. As it should, every
single person who visits your site is presented
with the call-to-action to install the app. If your
goal is total installs, this is the choice for you.
Consider integrating interstitials into
your mobile website.
24. Organic Acquisition: Instant Apps
Instant Apps is a new technology built by the
Android team at Google that allows you to
segment portions of an Android app to load
immediately when a link is clicked.
The user will still need to install the full native app
to engage with the rest of the experience.
Therefore, you need to design your user
experience so that users can engage with a
portion of your app experience, all the while
compelling them to get the full native app.
25. Organic Acquisition: Instant Apps
If the full app is installed, the full Android app will load instead. In a sense, an Instant App is a
replacement for a mobile website, only loading if the full Android app is not installed when a
link is clicked.
This is significant because 53% of mobile websites are abandoned if it load time is greater
than 3 seconds.
Your App
Instant App
Instant App
26. Organic Acquisition: Email
Email may not be the most exciting new technology that a marketer can use to drive
mobile user acquisition, but it remains a key component of any mobile marketer’s arsenal.
27. TIP
Deep Links point directly to content inside of an app. Deep linked emails are essential
for a positive user experience on mobile, and can drive users to a specific piece of content
inside of a mobile app.
Optimize email marketing
performance with deep linking.
Our research shows $3,000 in revenue is
lost for every 1 million emails sent without
deep linking. Users want to travel to your
app directly. With deep linking, they can.
28. Email App Promo’s
The Power of Text-based Emails Overview
To drive more app downloads, we decided to
test a new email format. We eschewed
traditional marketing tactics (sales-y copy,
polished images) in place of something more
personalized.
Results
● 500% improvement in app downloads
Key Learnings
● Demonstrate urgency in your email subject
line
● Make it personalized
● Users glaze over marketing copy / images
29. “Get the App” Pill Button
Be Persistent. Don’t get hurt by Google. Overview
Since we have large mobile web traffic, we’re
always testing new ways to drive downloads
from the web. The “Get the App” Pill button
was one of our biggest wins.
Results
● Doubled app downloads from mobile web
Key Learnings
● Large interstitials will hurt your SEO
● Be persistent but do not cover most of the
page
● Make sure to track bounce % and your click-
to-download conversion %
30. Organic Acquisition: Press Coverage
Press coverage from a high-profile outlet
can work wonders to drive awareness and
installs for your app, especially for consumer-
facing apps.
But before you reach out to a reporter at a
tech news site, make sure there’s a fit
between what your app does and what they
cover.
31. TIP
Diana Spechler & Jim O’Grady
Entrepreneur
“7 Ways to Get the Press Coverage You Want”
Weave a narrative into your press
materials.
“‘My hangover-prevention pill keeps you from getting a hangover!’ is not a story—
it's an advertisement. As such, it's not interesting to a journalist (unless said journalist
happens to be heading to Vegas for a bachelor party). Stories have a beginning, middle
and end. They have tension. They have a personal element.”
Think of the press as your audience and as a market. Just as you tailor your message to
reach different segments of your customer base, you need to customize your story to
appeal to each publication you pitch.
32. TIP
Make press materials timely &
relevant.
“When we pitch a story to a publication, the editor always wants to know, ‘Why this? Why
now?’ Help us answer those questions.
“In other words, a new headhunting company probably isn't worthy of a story. But what if
it's a headhunting company that works only with people who have been laid off, inspired
by the bleak rate of unemployment?”
Diana Spechler & Jim O’Grady
Entrepreneur
“7 Ways to Get the Press Coverage You Want”
33. TIP Cast a wide, strategic press net.
Here are a few app review sites to get you started:
● Product Hunt
● 148apps
● App Store Apps
● AppReviews
34. Organic Acquisition: Social Media
“People are talking about your brand on social
media, whether you’re listening and engaging or
not—but your customers really do want you to listen.
“Nearly half of customers expect customer service via
Facebook alone, but only 23% of brands provide it. The
cost of not being involved with social media is rising.”
Shanelle Mullin
Kissmetrics Blog
“How to Master Social Customer Acquisition”
35. TIP Leverage user-generated content.
Big brands have seen heightened user engagement
on social when featuring user generated content.
Brands like Qatar, Red Bull and BMW repost user
generated content over 60% of the time.
36. Paid Acquisition
“It’s hard to understand the value you're getting from
any organic channel. Paid is very, very consistent.”
Paid is the channel you can depend on. As long as
you optimize it, you can acquire high-quality users at
dependable volume.
Billy Shipp
Co-Founder @ Reach Mob, Inc.
37. The mobile ecosystem is fragmented, and social
media platforms like Facebook and Twitter are
doing everything they can to build walls around
their ecosystems.
You can promote and promote and promote your
social campaigns all quarter, but linking users
across the various OS’s, devices, mediums, and
platforms—and into your app—is incredibly
difficult and complex.
Paid Acquisition: Social Media
38. TIP
Watermark your social media ads with
your brand.
“We once worked with a company who saw little lift after spending $250,000 on a
campaign, realizing only after that they only had their brand name at the end of the
fifteen-second video ad trailer. When advertising on social media, you need to have
your brand watermarked throughout the entire video so the brand is immediately
recognized, and so the brand is driving awareness even when it’s not clicked.”
Hans Malzar
Global Marketing Solutions & Partnerships Manager @ Facebook
39. TIP
Facebook Dynamic Ads are highly effective
retargeting ads, with personalized dynamic ad
creatives shown to a targeted, granular audience.
Hootsuite’s AdEspresso reports a 20% increase in
click-through rates for Shutterfly, a 20% increase
in conversions for Target, and a simultaneous
34% increase in click-through rates and 38%
reduction in cost per purchase for The Honest
Company—all from Facebook’s Dynamic Ads.
Optimize Facebook ad performance
with Dynamic Ads.
40. TIP
Optimize Instagram ad performance
with relevant calls to action.
Based on data collected from over 10 million installs, Instagram is the optimal social
channel in terms of click to install rate. Particularly if you’re after app installs,
cementing a solid plan for mobile growth via Instagram could be the answer.
To optimize Instagram ads, it’s important to
create a call to action (CTA) that resonates
with your objective. For example, a CTA of
“Install Now” will target install rate, while a
CTA of “Open App” or “Use App” will target
engagement rate.
41. TIP Social Media Toolbox
Buffer is the best way to drive traffic, increase
fan engagement and save time on social media.
We’ve got a few final tools to help you sharpen your app’s social media performance.
Socedo’s mission is to bring social leads to every
business in the world. They’ve developed a demand
gen system that empowers B2B marketers to
discover, engage, and qualify prospects through
social media to increase revenue at scale.
42. FACEBOOK GROWTH
Cracking The Creative Code on Facebook
Overview
We started seeing diminishing returns
on scaling up our prospecting campaign.
We ran creative tests around audiences
to help improve results during Q4.
Results
● New Payers Growth - 56%
● ROAS Growth - 25%
● CPA Improvement - 45%
Key Learnings
● Demo. relevant UGC assets matter
using audience insights
● Regular creative refreshes pertinent
● Lookalike audiences performed best
43. GOOGLE GROWTH
Shedding Light on the UAC black-box
Overview
Transitioning over to UAC initially had a
negative impact on performance. We
tested creatives formats and in-app CPA
goals to get the UAC to work for us.
Results
● New Payers Growth - 67%
● ROAS Growth - 18%
● CPA Improvement - 56%
Key Learnings
● UAC need enough data to optimize
● Videos outperformed banner assets -
portrait outperformed landscape
● Purchase optimization worked best
44. “Functioning in cohesion with natural mobile content, native ads provide reach, branding,
and value. They not only register an 18% lift in purchase intent when compared to
banner ads, but they are also viewed 52% more frequently than banner ads.”
Paid Acquisition: Native Ads
Exploring native ads for your app could be your next stroke of acquisition genius.
“If banner ads are the ‘old school’ of app user acquisition, native ads are the youngsters on
the scene. Taking advantage of the natural form and function of the surrounding user
experience, native ads offer distinct advantages from banner ads.
Digital Turbine Blog
“User Acquisition in 2017: A Holistic Approach”
Anthony McQueen
45. Paid Acquisition: Events
“Acquisition isn’t limited to the digital space—in-person events can play a big role in
your overall marketing strategy. You’re able to make an impact by making a memorable
experience, which improves the chances that you’ll build traction via word-of-mouth.”
Elizabeth Kinsey
Director of Community & Events @ Branch
46. Apple Search Ads display at the top of App Store
search results, and can give your app an awareness
boost to accelerate its user acquisition rate.
Apple prides itself on Search Ads’ flexibility, with no
minimum spend and no long-term commitment.
Essentially, Apple will bring top-bidding apps into
the light at the precise moment users are looking to
install—for a price.
Paid Acquisition: Apple Search Ads
47. TIP
Checklist for optimizing Apple Search
Ads performance.
Build strong campaign strategy involving
branded, competing, and general
keywords.
Design ad group and keyword structure
including broad and exact matches, as well
as negative keywords.
Enable Search Match to target users
specifically searching for apps like yours,
and cover keywords you might be missing.
Set up bidding price, keeping in mind the
Search Ads auction is a second price auction
based on a cost-per-tap model.
Segment and target users based on gender
and age.
Segment and target new users vs. existing
users.
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PPC Hero
“Apple Search Ads: What You Need to Know to Improve
Performance”
JD Prater
48. Paying big industry influencers or
affiliates to share your app with
their followings could ignite your
app’s growth.
Whether early-stage or far along,
this tactic can provide significant
return on investment if executed
optimally.
Paid Acquisition: Influencers
49. TIP Find the Right Influencers.
Engagement Is this influencer getting a high engagement rate relative to followers?
Relevancy Does this influencer create content in my niche?
Demographics Would the audience that follows this influencer buy my product?
Cost What would the rate be for partnering with this influencer?
Sponsored Posts Has this influencer worked with brands before?
Authenticity Do they appear to be authentic in their posts?
Professionalism Is working with this influencer easy? Are they open to feedback?
When choosing influencers, it’s helpful to consider the following:
50. TIP
Consider both objective and search
when choosing an influencer.
Industry
Influencers
Brand
Advocates
Brand
Fans
Brand
Ambassadors
Bloggers &
Affiliates
Brand
Influencers
Engagement
with Brand
Low High Medium Medium Low High
Social Influence High High-Low Low High Medium High
Finding Them
Neoreach,
Moz,
Apptentive
Social media
engagement
Apptentive,
Localytics,
Mixpanel
Fans,
students, job
posts
Affiliate
networks,
research
Branch
Influencer
Tab