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ASO Academy
Mobile User Acquisition 101
September 28th, 2022
by David Bell
CEO at Gummicube, Inc.
Whether you're a new app entering the market or you’re established within the space already, mobile user acquisition is an essential element of your app marketing and App Store Optimization (ASO) strategy.
However, mobile marketers can often be misled about what strategies work most effectively for them. For enterprise apps, acquiring users helps drive up app store ranking. As for new apps, having the right ASO tools, technology and data are imperative to their success in early stages.
In mobile user acquisition, increasing downloads is obviously the end goal, but what strategies best set you up for success? Unlike other forms of marketing, relevance, merchandising and iteration are all fundamental in completing the acquisition funnel and there are processes inherent in ASO that help us achieve that.
Coupled with paid user acquisition, the funnel can be optimized to simultaneously drive more downloads and actually lower the cost of your ad marketing spend. You may be asking yourself, how does that work? To answer this, let’s first explore the relationship and synergy between ASO and paid user acquisition in a little more in detail.
App Store Optimization & Paid User Acquisition
Organic mobile marketing and ASO actually work together to subsidize your paid UA efforts. For that to happen, however, a strong organic backbone has to be established. We alluded to relevancy previously, and how it’s one of the most important elements in an organic growth strategy on the app stores, but what does that look like? And why is it so important? Strong brand building through consistent messaging pays off dividends in creating a seamless experience for users who are more readily convertible on the app stores after seeing your ad.
Create Relevance for Mobile App Growth
Mobile search trends can change on a dime, and both Google and iOS mobile app stores stop crawling metadata after just 2-3 weeks. Developers and mobile marketers essentially have to work with two moving targets – proving relevance to users and then subsequently to app store algorithms. Since user behaviors on mobile can change quite rapidly and indexation stops at about 2-3 weeks, it’s vital to update and test both metadata and creatives regularly.
Our ASO company has seen apps with 2019 in their metadata in 2022, we’ve seen Christmas motifs across screenshots in the dead of summer – what sort of message does that send to users? Relevance drives all growth. Apps that have well-designed and distinct icons paired with relevant screenshots are more likely to be downloaded than those that seem out of touch, even if the latter one is free.
When creating paid ad campaigns on external channels, the element of relevancy is also important. Consistent messaging of your strongest and most resonating value propositions helps drive home value and enforces branding across channels.
Understanding Mobile Seasonality, App Localization, & Iteration
The search volume for a query could be different than what it is today. Seasonality, localization and iteration are all ASO best practices that help drive relevance. Check out these blogs for more information about these elements in detail:
What is App Seasonality?
“Seasonality is the process in which app developers make adjustments to their app assets to account for changing user-facing, external, and competitive forces. Seasonality, among other ASO activities, is just one of the many ways app developers should continually optimize their apps.By nature, optimizing for seasonality is a temporary adjustment of metadata and creative assets. The duration of a “season” may depend on the length of time an app developer may want to market a particular feature or event of their app to maintain relevancy. It may also depend on the ‘season’s’ length, which can sometimes be indeterminable. “
Read ASO Academy: Seasonality for more information.
What is App Localization?
“Cultural associations, language nuances, and search behaviors often hold mobile markets back from gaining traction in foreign territories simply because of assumptions of similarity. Even countries that share languages, for example, The United States and Australia have different search patterns and cultural influences that may impact a keyword or creative strategy.It’s crucial to localize app listings for optimal conversion and visibility on the app stores. This isn’t just a simple translation but involves a deeper understanding of what leaves an impact on your users abroad. This includes translating idioms, symbols, intent, and more. ASO technology can help you determine what search patterns and queries look like abroad.”
Read the Beginner’s Guide to App Localization for more information.
What is App Iteration?
“Iteration is the process in which app developers take the initiative to optimize their app performance thoroughly and continuously to adapt to changing trends. Changes in user search trends and app store developments are inevitable, so keeping up with these trends is vital in maintaining conversion rate growth and keyword ranking.Through iteration, app developers can harness these changes and optimize their metadata and creative assets to work in their favor.”
Read ASO Academy: Importance of Iteration for more information.
Lower Paid Search Spend & User Aquisition Costs With ASO
How do all of these elements help improve better UA as a whole? With an organic backbone through ASO marketing, relevancy helps drive down the cost of ASA and GA campaigns. The more you can prove your relevance for a particular search query, the less you have to pay for ads. It’s simple in theory, but difficult to achieve.
What makes this worth the time and investment is, however straightforward. Mobile users acquired through organic app store search produce a higher customer-lifetime-value (CLV), and rankings achieved organically provide a long-term advantage over apps that burst their way to a short-lived top for both organic and paid UA strategies.
Want to learn more about App Store Optimization? Contact Gummicube and we’ll help get your strategy started.
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