With over four million apps available through leading app stores around the world, enterprises know that they must take a meticulous marketing approach to stand out. Developing a functioning mobile app is a critical factor for success, however your hard work is worthless if users don’t know about it.
Developing a mobile app marketing strategy includes all user interactions, from the point of first awareness to the point of becoming a loyal customer. As users move through the acquisition funnel, measuring user behavior in-app to make continual improvements is an important part of marketing a mobile app effectively.
It is important to acquire users who will engage with the app repeatedly and become loyal advocates of the product. A mobile app marketing strategy includes three stages and metrics to measure for long-term success. Follow this guide to learn more.
Stage 1; Pre-Launch Awareness
Mobile app marketing strategies begin with awareness before launch. Brand awareness and product visibility are the goals of this stage. What are the specific ways in which you will introduce your mobile app to your target users? You should have a thorough understanding of your brand’s messaging and positioning before beginning the awareness phase. It is a brand’s values and purpose that resonates with customers, not the features of its products. It is important to define your brand position so that your users can relate to it more personally. During the awareness stage of your marketing plan, you should follow the following steps and strategies.
1. Set a release date
With Apple, releasing your product may take longer, or you may encounter a setback you weren’t expecting. When you prepare far in advance, you’ll be able to anticipate and mitigate many contingencies that may arise during the launch of your product.
Tip: Consider events happening in your area that may overshadow your launch when scheduling your launch date.
2. Understanding your customers requires market research
Inadequate market research is a common pre-launch mistake. Identification of the key players in your specific app category is necessary before you begin any development work. In the absence of a user pain-point or a pain-point that already has a thriving app solution on the market, your app will fail regardless of how well you market it. There is a lot of useful information about the app market provided by App Annie.
Tip: Blogs, groups, forums, and websites are popular among your target audience, as are social media influencers. Reaching and acquiring users will be easier with these channels.
3. The creation of user personas
You will need to discover your target users’ values and pain points during the awareness phase in order to create a product that addresses those pain points. Each user persona has its own unique journey for a mobile application, so there can be several user groups.
You can create a user persona by imagining your perfect user partially fictitiously. In addition to demographics, past, preferences, interests, and unique identifiers, a user persona contains information about the individual as well. Besides addressing the user’s goals, personas also address the challenges the user is currently experiencing. Your mobile product will be tailored to each of your users’ preferences and needs with in-depth user personas. It’s important to resonate with your target user on all levels, including branding, in-app content, functionality, features, platforms, and monetization strategies. Your entire marketing strategy will be guided by defining your target audience through user personas. For example:
- How does this audience collectively experience pain?
- Does this audience use Android or iOS as their mobile operating system? Is it Android or iOS?
- Is this audience engaged with any particular types of online content?
- How can we deliver content that resonates well with this audience’s tone, voice, and style?
- How do these audiences’ online activities display visual branding patterns?
- Is this product’s vertical influenced by any reputable social media influencers?
- In terms of paid advertising, what platforms are most effective?
- What is the likelihood of these users making purchases in-app or paying for apps?
To attract the right audience to your product, you can use personas to answer questions like these. You cannot deliver a relevant product if you don’t properly research your audience?
4. Analyze your competitors
There will be competition for your app. You should consider the pricing, monetization models, rankings in app stores, and user experience (UX) of your top five competitors. In order to determine how your app compares with others, you can even make a competitive matrix. Ensure your app does not repeat any poorly designed features or UX elements that have been negatively reviewed by users. Make sure your app stands out from the competition by considering what would make it unique. App marketing should be influenced by these important considerations.
5. Create a landing page or a website
Apps are most often installed from mobile websites. The practice of creating a teaser video or landing page before the launch of your product has become commonplace. The video you create for your website can be reused in the app stores, on social media, or even in paid advertisements. Additionally to building hype around your app, having a prelaunch website allows you to start building your domain authority early in the SEO process. Ensure you collect your followers’ emails when creating your website so you can keep them updated about the launch of your mobile app, and new features and updates. In addition, your brand will appear unauthentic if you don’t display 5-star reviews.
6. Developing outreach initiatives
Obtaining backlinks and providing honest reviews from influencers, publications, and bloggers is one of the most overlooked aspects of marketing a new mobile product. Have relevant people in your industry or niche review your app or write about it. Include a link to your press kit or landing page in your pitch. They’ll have all the information they need if they decide to write about your app.
7. Social media promotion
By using social media platforms such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn, and Pinterest, you can expand your web presence. Consider which social media platforms are most popular with people in your target demographic if your app targets specific age groups. Here are a few things to keep in mind:
- When you look at your social profile, does it appear that you have an app?
- Does the app have an obvious purpose?
- Does it have a download link?
Get followers excited about the launch by posting company updates and features. Use hashtags when appropriate in your posts. Build a community around your app by posting and sharing entertaining and engaging content.
8. Make a Content Marketing Plan
A blog should be written months before the launch. Your following will already make you an authority in your niche when the time comes to launch. In your launch post, include screenshots, videos, and a description of your app. Content marketing can provide your app with several benefits:
- Promote brand awareness, traffic, and conversions through content
- Being an expert in your niche can help you build a brand around your app
- By creating engaging content, users will feel more trusting
- Social media or email marketing can be used with blog content to reengage contacts
Stage 2: Acquisition phase
There are endless possibilities when it comes to user acquisition. To develop a successful strategy, you need to utilize different methods, be creative, and constantly refine your approach. In the first week after launching, try to obtain as many downloads as possible. In the App Store search results, your app will rank higher if it receives downloads quickly. In order to track where your app downloads are coming from, you must track where users are downloading it. Using this method, you can improve the channels that are not profitable while focusing on those that are. User acquisition strategies are listed below.
1. Investing in paid strategies
As soon as your app is launched, start promoting it on social media platforms such as LinkedIn, which are extremely effective for acquiring new users. Although Instagram and Twitter’s reach is not as large, it’s still effective, especially for millennials, depending on your target demographic. In addition to letting businesses target desired audiences based on their interests, LinkedIn’s advertising platform lets them target audiences based on their location, too. The purpose of your social ads should convey the product’s purpose in a few seconds if you are targeting your audience via social ads. It may also be a good idea to use Google Search Ads if you’re providing a solution users are searching for.
2. Optimization of Apps (ASO)
Your App Store page can be optimized to rank higher in search results and convert at a higher rate through App Store Optimization. The App Store is the primary source of discovery for over 65% of apps. Your app will continue to rank highly for months after it ranks highly in search for a certain keyword. It is more visible to potential users if your app ranks higher. Your app should receive more downloads as a result of the increased visibility, which will enable editors to notice it. Titles and keywords play an important role in app store optimization. When your title is great, users will be more likely to click on your app to discover more about it. Titles with keywords are more likely to be found. Your listing should contain those keywords strategically so that you show up when users search for them. Consider what the user will get out of your app and what features and benefits you will offer. Videos and screenshots can add value. Due to the fact that the app is not in their language, there are tons of people who would love to use it, but they are unable to find it. Localize your app to change this.
3. An app proposal for Apple’s App Store Editorial Team
Marketing strategies can also be enhanced by getting featured in the App Store. Apps that are featured are more likely to be seen and downloaded, leading to lower acquisition costs, increased engagement, and higher revenue for the app developer.
Professional App Store curators review free and paid apps and games every day. Mobile app pitches to Apple come in by the thousands. Persuasive communication can be useful with this tactic. Outline how your app differs from others and what it does.
Stage 3: Customer Retention Phase
The majority of people focus on acquisition marketing, but if the app isn’t being used, it won’t generate revenue. To convert your new customers into lifelong users, you should develop a retention marketing strategy. In order to increase retention, you can use the following strategies:
1. Ensure two-way communication
Apps that align with users’ needs and preferences will have a higher chance of retaining users. User retention has ranged from 61 percent to 74 percent for brands using in-app messages to communicate with users.
Messages in apps are not urgent notifications, but they are nevertheless important ones to receive. A warning may reference an app issue, a payment failure, or a version upgrade. Your message will not be relevant to everyone, so keep that in mind. You can ensure that the information you provide to your audience is valuable to them by segmenting your audience.
2. A push notification system
The statistics show anywhere from a 56% to a 180% increase in user retention when push notifications are used. A push notification opt-in user exhibits 88% higher app engagement than a non-opt-in user. App stores rank apps based on retention rates.
Incentives can also go a long way in encouraging users to use your app. Rewards tailored to mobile users, special content access, coupons, promotional offers, and other incentives will help drive engagement and conversions.