Mobile User Acquisition: Best Practices

Your product needs an audience or else it’s just a prop. After considering your SDR and Developers’ salary—a very expensive prop. 

User Acquisition, or how marketing folks call it UA, is the process of generating awareness and getting new users onto your app. 

Modern growth hackers would call it “Audience Building” and that’s a good way to look at it. An audience is what separates your product from being an expensive prop and a successful app that generates revenue

Know your Ideal Customer Profile

Your ICP needs to be well defined and communicated with the whole team. This is more important for apps with a smaller niche.

Knowing your ICP will let you be clearer on the messaging and create much more targetted and relatable content—Relatable content that resonates with your target demo.

Optimize your App store Page (ASO)

App stores are one of your biggest drivers of discovery.  App stores account for more than 561 million downloads—Daily. Your app store/play store page is the face of your product. Make sure it is optimized with the right keywords. 

ASO or app store optimization also includes having a descriptive About section and an app screenshot to give better context to your users. Inclusion of short videos giving basic app walkthroughs also helps the users with making clearer decisions.

Nail your Organic Reach

Organic channels are a Cost-effective way to acquire new users. A well-optimized website with useful content is a great way to get users onto your website and funnel them to the app page. Relatable content always goes a long way.

Resources like Ebook, infographics help you create awareness by spreading your app around more and create trust with your target persona. It’s important to understand that the Content market must come with a purpose to provide. Don’t create content that nobody wants–use SEO to your advantage.

Acquire users through paid ads

Clubbing your organic reach with paid ads gives you a lot of mileage, especially in apps that are relatively new. Having a PPC campaign through google can put your product in front of your customers and also target hot leads to your page.

Creative ad placement based on different keywords and persona lets you leverage the most of paid ads. You can create funnels based on the keyword which signify which stage of the journey your customer is and create different landing pages based on it. Here is a list of 10 PPC Ad Networks you can choose from.

Social Media

Social media is a great way to let your audience know of your product. Platforms like Instagram are now being used to promote apps. If you’re a health and fitness app, there is value for you to appear under the fitness goals hashtags. Social media gives you a great opportunity to go where your persona is hanging out and also be seen there.  

Social media is a goldmine when it comes to reach. you can leverage this medium to share important news and information and it involves almost no investment. Social channels also help your organic content get more eyes. You can also use scheduling services like Hootsuite and buffer to plan your content ahead of time and let it be scheduled on days and times with the most impact. 

Consider the Lifetime Value of the user

LTV or Lifetime Value of the user refers to how much a user is worth to you. It is a mix of how much money they help you make, how much engagement they do with your app. And how much they promote your app (through word of mouth or referrals)

LTV of a user is the measure of your user’s relationship with your app. Finding users with high LTV is a great acquisition strategy and your marketing efforts should be having a focus on getting more of them. 

Social proof: Ratings and Reviews

Leverage your existing users and get as many reviews as possible. Most new users on your page will use it as a deciding factor before downloading your app. Your practice needs to have a system that rewards users who review your app (be it positive or negative)

Creating a positive user experience within your app is the obvious way to get a better rating. You can achieve this by having a user-first approach while building or updating your app.

Furthermore, you can use qualitative analytics tools to understand and see exactly what your users see and create better experiences for them.

Reviews help you twofold—acquisition and also understanding your existing problems that need fixing.

Closing

User Acquisition is the life of any company—app or otherwise. Make sure your strategies help you get the right user on your app. Have a system that even if a customer doesn’t convert, the experiences that you make ensure and positive word about your product. Lastly don’t ignore your existing customers while looking for new ones.