Mobile App Marketing

With over 500,000 mobile apps published in Apple’s Appstore, app development companies face a tremendous amount of competition. In the last few months we’ve had the chance to help promote a Words with Friends Cheat App named Cheats & Words, created by Project Box and our client-partner MindSea Development.

So far we’ve learned the following while promoting iPhone apps:

• Pay-Per-Click marketing through traditional methods like Google Adwords and Facebook is difficult when promoting mobile apps that have small amounts of revenue (i.e. $0.69) per sale. In most cases the numbers don’t add up. Even with a very low cost per click such as $0.20, the average revenue per visitor (i.e. $0.30) is also low, and so it’s difficult to run a profitable PPC campaign.
• Enter Search Engine Optimization, where you can avoid the cost per click of PPC by investing in up-front SEO activities. This is a better model than PPC from a profitability perspective, however it assumes that customers are actively searching for the app in question, or entering search terms that relate to the app’s capabilities.
• Enter Social Media. For every one person who is searching for a program like Cheats and Words, there are many more who play Words with Friends™ and probably aren’t aware that cheating programs even exist. Social media activities are a great way to increase awareness through online conversations, without depending so heavily on a specific number of search queries every day.
• Mobile ad networks like Flurry’s App Circle can be an excellent way to drive initial adoption of an app on a pay-per-install model, which limits the risk of the app publisher.
• The App Store is only a marketing channel if you get featured by Apple. Getting featured can have a huge impact on downloads and revenue, however it’s unlikely for the majority of developers. Due to the high volume of apps in the store, unless you’re in a very niche category, we do not recommend thinking of the AppStore as a market place where buyers are likely to find you while browsing. It’s best to think of the AppStore as the mobile equivalent of a domain registry. Just as you need to register your domain before promoting your site and getting visitors, you need to publish your app in the store before promoting your app and getting visitors.

We’d love to hear your thoughts – what have you found to be most effective so far? Share your comments.

If you’re planning a mobile marketing project, feel free to contact us and we’ll be happy to share our latest findings and tactics.