The Secrets Behind Million Download Media Buying

Welcome back to the Roundsquared Weekly Download Report!

This week we’re going to be demystifying the topic of media buying. Most apps realize that if you’re going to scale rapidly to the million download mark and beyond, media buying must be part of your strategy. That’s because the reality is no other marketing channel will give you the same level of direct control over growth.

Organic marketing is great for early wins and building brand awareness. Viral posts can get traction but they’re hard to replicate and lack control. App store optimization can help you capture the existing traffic in app stores but will quickly cap out. The only channel that gives you direct control over scale is paid media.

The second you have profitable results with paid advertising you can start reinvesting your profits back into the campaigns to grow. This feedback loop allows apps to go from a small budget of 5-10K per month in spend, to rapidly passing the 100k per month mark.

The key is making sure you successfully navigate what we call The Three Stages of App Paid Media Execution. This week's newsletter is going to kick off a series covering each of these three stages. Over the next few weeks we’re going to cover what each of these stages are and what you can expect from each one. By the end of this series you should have more clarity than ever before on what it takes to win with paid advertising for apps.

The Three Stages of App Paid Media Execution

There are three core stages you must pass through to develop successful paid media campaigns for your app. 

The first is the Setup. This is where you’ll be making decisions about budget allocation, platform distribution, and overall strategy. 

The second stage is Testing. In this stage you’ll be starting the process of optimizing your campaigns to achieve profitability. 

Finally the third stage is called Scale. In this stage you’re going to be working to maintain profitability while scaling campaigns to increase growth month over month. 

Once you’ve completed these three stages you will have a highly profitable channel for growth that offers virtually unlimited scale.

Let’s dive into this week's topic which is the first stage, the setup!

The Foundations of Success - Setting Up Your Campaigns

In stage one you’re going to be laying the foundation for the rest of your campaign’s development. It’s incredibly important at this stage to get things right because it will shape the results of the rest of the process. Choose the wrong platforms or the wrong strategy and you can waste months executing in the wrong direction.

The key decisions you’ll need to focus on at this stage are, how much you’re going to commit to invest each month, the platforms you want to leverage, and implementing tracking systems. Each of these elements will be pivotal in determining how quickly you achieve profitability.

Step 1: Determining The Ideal Campaign Budget

One of the most common questions we get asked by app founders and marketers all the time is “How much should we plan to invest in marketing?” This is a great question that unfortunately doesn’t have a one size fits all answer.

The best way you can understand planning budgets for app marketing is to consider a few key variables we look at with all of our high growth clients.

The first and most often overlooked is comfortability. Developing paid campaigns is a process. This is not something you’re going to achieve results with immediately. The length of time to get results can vary based on a number of factors, one of which is simply luck.

We have clients that are able to get insane results within the first few weeks, and others that it takes a few months to crack the code. Every app is going to have its own journey based on how well optimized the app is from the start, and how many cycles of iteration it takes to find winning creative and audiences that scale.

For that reason one of the key things we consider when discussing a budget is selecting a budget the client will be comfortable with for at least a period of 90 days. This gives us a reasonable runway to get ads up and running, go through the first major phases of testing required for any campaign, and ensures you’re not quitting too soon.

Occasionally we’ll get an opportunity where an app wants to trial our services for a month. In almost every case we will turn these potential clients away. Often times we’d love to wrk with them but know from experience that a month is simply not enough time in most cases to really give the campaigns a fair shot.

That’s because we’ve found one of the worst things you can do for your marketing efforts is to continually start and stop repeatedly. Each time you do this you end up retracing ground you’ve already covered and this ends up being a massive waste of time and funds.

Ideally want to decide on a budget for your campaigns that you’ll feel comfortable supporting for the long term. We’ve found over the last 10 years of helping clients with advertising that one of the biggest factors for success is the length of time you can commit to testing. 

If you follow a proven process and commit to continual improvement it’s virtually guaranteed that you’ll develop a profitable campaign. As long as you’re learning something each week, you’ll eventually achieve the results you’re after.

When considering budgets first look at identifying a combined spend and management investment you can support for at least 90 days. This will give you the best chance of achieving a profitable campaign with your efforts.

The second factor we look at is the market that your product is in. An app in the gaming space is typically going to have a significantly lower cost per download than an app in the B2B world. This just comes down to basic fundamentals of the supply and demand of the ad market.

If your cost per install is going to be higher, it’s going to take more spend to be able to get the same data from each test. A game for example may be able to test two creatives with only $100 and get 50+ installs on each. Compare this to a B2B or more niche app with higher costs and you may only get 5-10 with the same spend. This factor plays a huge role in determining how many platforms you can launch and how fast you can test with a given budget.

Generally speaking our standard recommendation is that you plan for ideally at least a minimum of $5k per month in ad spend per platform regardless of type of app. This will give you a reasonable amount of spend to be able to test effectively and while getting the best attribution.

Step 2: Determining The Ideal Platforms

The next major decision you have to make is what platforms you want to invest in. This is a key decision because every platform has pros and cons worth considering for your product. If you want to ensure the fastest possible results it’s important to select the right platform to start with.

Many apps will have the long term vision of testing all platforms. This is a great goal but you’ll want to make sure you have the budgets to support it. Ideally you’ll want to plan for a $5k per month budget for at least three months for each platform. 

If you have the budget to invest in all of the desired platforms from launch that’s great! This can be a great strategy to quickly identify the winning platform for your product fast. That said, many apps that don’t have the budget to do this can still see great results by planning an execution roadmap instead.

The goal here is to start with identifying the ideal platform for your product to launch with and then sequentially test the others as you progress. If the first platform isn’t producing the results you need after a reasonable period of time you can easily pivot to another option. This approach ensures that you’re not dividing your budget too thin across multiple platforms from the start.

The four major platforms most of our clients consider when launching their paid campaigns are Meta, Tiktok, Google, and Apple Search. You may already have an idea of which of these is the best fit for your app but he’s some guidelines to help.

Meta Advertising

The Meta platform can be one of the most powerful channels for growth for your app. The unique method of targeting it offers can help you quickly get in front of the ideal users for your product.

The largest pros of Meta are the targeting it offers and the virtually limitless scale. This platform leverages something called interest based targeting. Basically what it allows you to do is target specific interests to put your ads in front of the right people. You can target people that like certain brands, follow different people, or even just fit into specific demographics.

If your app is targeted towards a market that is easily targetable with the options provided by Facebook and Instagram this platform is generally the one we will recommend.

Ideal apps for this platform are games, fitness and health apps, and other consumer targeted products. Business focused apps can work as well if the market is large enough to support advertising. You’ll just need at least 100k people in your audience for best results.

The cons of Meta are the fact that it is not an intent based platform. When a potential user is scrolling Facebook or Instagram they’re generally not seeking to download an app. They’re on the platform to be entertained, have social interactions, and consume valuable content. That means your ads have to stop them from scrolling and convince them to take action.

TikTok Advertising 

The TikTok ads platform is very similar to Meta in terms of targeting options but also has a number of key differences. You can target specific interests on TikTok as well as audiences of people who have engaged with different types of content.

The major differences between TikTok and Meta is the audience of people on the platform and the user behavior. TikTok tends to lean more towards a younger demographic and they are much more sensitive to advertising. Ads for TikTok have a higher bar for capturing attention as users are far more likely to scroll past non-entertaining content.

If your app is targeted towards a younger demographic or more entertainment focused this can be a great platform. The costs can often be lower than Meta as there is less competition from other advertisers. Unfortunately it can be a bit slower to develop campaigns for TikTok as the algorithms and advertising are not yet as sophisticated as Meta.

Google Advertising

The Google ads platform is the first one where you can tap more directly into high intent audiences. With Search Campaigns and even Universal App Campaigns (UAC) you’re able to target people directly looking for your type of product.

When a user searches in Google for “fitness app” for example, your chances of converting that user are much higher than on a social platform. This person is in the market for a solution and looking to take action now. 

The downside is that costs and competition can be much higher as a result. Other competitors will likely target the same keywords and audiences which drives up costs. Despite this fact, the Google ads platform can be one of the best platforms to capture early wins with your efforts.

We generally recommend Google ads for apps that are targeting audiences that will likely be searching for solutions to a specific problem. For example, a potential user for a mobile game is less likely to be searching for games to download. Other products like a pregnancy tracking app are much more likely to have potential users searching for a solution. This makes them better fit for capturing in-market demand with Google campaigns.

Apple Search Ads 

The Apple Search Ads platform (ASA) is a great option for apps looking to capture even higher intent traffic. This platform operates very similarly to Google Search in that the targeting is keyword based.

As a result you’ll get the same benefits of being able to place your ads directly in front of users searching for specific solutions to their needs. The added benefit of ASA campaigns is that these users are also specifically looking for and ready to download an app.

The downsides of these campaigns are that there is more competition and you are going to be limited in terms of scale. If there are only 100 people searching each month for your specific kind of app then the maximum number of downloads you can possibly get capped at that level.

Where on social platforms if you find an audience that converts you can scale up spend to reach more and more of that audience, search campaigns are limited by the volume of searches each month. This means that even if this channel ends up being profitable for you, it will typically cap out very early and require other channels to continue to scale.

For this reason we recommend ASA to clients that have an app likely to be searched for on the App Store. These campaigns are also usually added as supplemental efforts and not our primary channels for growth due to the limitations of volume.

Sequencing Your Campaign Platform Launches

Once you’ve reviewed your options for which platforms to launch campaigns on, you’ll want to select an initial one for launch. 

Remember, if after testing one platform you find that you’re not getting the results you’re after you can absolutely transition to a different one. We recommend starting with as many platforms as budget allows but being quick to transition if results are below expectations.

This approach allows you to focus your efforts and budget on thoroughly testing a single channel before exploring other options. Generally you will want to plan for at least a two month test period per channel before transitioning. This will ensure that each channel has a chance to perform before you pivot to the next one.

Step 3: Tracking Implementation

At the core of all app marketing efforts is reliable tracking and attribution. Without properly implemented systems of monitoring where your most profitable users are coming from you’re effectively flying blind.

Quality data is critical to making decisions about how to optimize your campaigns. This data will enable you to determine where to invest more and where to pull back. It will help you identify which platforms and audiences not only convert to installs but also which are most profitable.

App marketing is unique in that the tracking requirements are much more sophisticated than web based products. In order to effectively track your efforts you’ll need to select and implement a reputable mobile measurement partner (MMP), define your key conversions, and test everything to ensure it is working properly.

What Is An MMP?

An MMP or mobile measurement platform helps facilitate the tracking of user actions between the advertising platform and your app. When a user clicks an ad on one of your marketing channels the MMP will document tag user for attribution. 

As that user takes additional actions like opening the app for the first time, creating an account, or making a purchase, the MMP will then pass that data back to the ad platform to be properly attributed to the ad they clicked.

There are a few steps required to implement and MMP that you will need to allocate development time to complete. Implementing these systems should not take a ton of time but it is absolutely critical before launching any advertising campaigns.

First you’re going to want to select a MMP that you want to implement. There are a lot of options available today but we generally recommend going with one of the major players. These platforms tend to have the best customer support and technical documentation. We recommend AppsFlyer to most clients but some options are Singular and Branch.

Once you’ve selected a platform you’ll want to create an account to access the development documentation. These documents will have the instructions for your developer to implement the required SDK into your app. This process should take no more than a few hours of development time to complete.

After the basic SDK implementation has been completed you’ll want to define the key conversion events that you want to track. For most clients these events will be things like account creation, specific actions taken, trials started, and purchase events. Once defined your developer will be able to follow the documentation to implement these in your app.

Finally you will want to have your developer test each of these events to ensure that they are operating properly. This step is critical as you don’t want to run campaigns and find out later that all of your data is invalid due to poor implementation. Each MMP will have documentation on proper testing procedures. Make sure that your developer completes this step and provides screenshots of the confirmed events firing.

That’s it! Once you’ve completed these three steps you’re all set to start launching campaigns. You should have selected the ideal budget for your campaigns, picked the perfect platforms, and implemented your tracking.

In next week's newsletter we’re going to go over how to launch your first campaigns and start testing. Most campaigns will not be profitable at launch so testing is a huge part of the game. We’re going to go over our exact process for dialing in any campaign so make sure not to miss next week's newsletter.

In the meantime, join us for App Talks on Tuesday, May 13th at 1pm ET.  During this hour you will connect 1:1 in virtual breakout rooms with 6-8 different app founders

Register now to expand your network, exchange app feedback, and make more meaningful connections with entrepreneurs in the mobile space across all categories and sizes.

Register here: https://us06web.zoom.us/meeting/register/lmkvFzCHQVmWpfDfe06Qpg