What is user acquisition
User acquisition definition
Why do you need user acquisition
How do user acquisition campaigns work
Best platforms for user acquisition campaigns
User acquisition has by now affirmed itself as an industry in its own right. According to Data.Ai, it hit an expense by app developers of $362B just in 2023.
User acquisition can either be organic and happen by chance or be non-organic and be obtained through paid or owned media marketing. Non-organic user acquisition can be achieved through different channels, like programmatic advertising, influencer marketing and affiliate marketing. Selecting the right channel goes hand in hand with reaching your set target.
User acquisition (UA) is the process through which websites, platforms and the app world in general, are able to attract new users for the services they provide, thanks to marketing activity.
Users play a key role in monetizing your app and helping it thrive amongst other 7 million competing apps.
User acquisition is therefore fundamental to effective app growth: the number of users who interact with your app is directly related to the number of opportunities for profit through in-app advertising or purchases that are presented to you.
But the quality of the users is in no way less important than the quantity. To keep user engagement high and avoid that the apps be uninstalled within 30 days or less, your user acquisitions campaigns need to have a clear end target.
You can’t appeal to everyone, so it is important to select your target audience well, in a way that allows us to acquire high-quality users and increase your ROI by not wasting the money, time and energies invested in the user acquisition process on the wrong kind of users.
Selecting the right users is in fact the first step in successful user acquisition campaigns. The following will have to be:
- Deciding on a strategy. What is your goal in engaging in a user acquisition campaign? You can use it to drive revenue growth and acquire new users; to build brand awareness; to create network effects; to improve customer lifetime value; to reduce customer acquisition costs.
- Integrating with Mobile Measurement Partners. MMPs are third-party companies essential to the implementation of user acquisition campaigns. Their work with data collection allows marketers to evaluate performance and get to know their users.
- Choosing a user acquisition partner. User acquisition partners (or platforms) help with acquiring new users by providing services such as ASO, paid advertising and social media marketing. Here at Mapendo we run programmatic user acquisition campaigns optimized for ROI through pur A.I. platform.
- Providing goals and perfecting your creatives. Set goals in terms of downloads and ad spend. Compare which versions of your ads provide the most user engagement through A/B testing.
- Monitoring and optimizing. To track the effectiveness of user acquisition campaigns, you can rely on a variety of KPIs. The most important ones are return on ad spend (ROAS), return on investment (ROI), cost per install (CPI) and lifetime value (LTV).
To keep KPIs high and at a performing level, engaging in user acquisition campaigns will have to be the focal point of your work. We’ve already seen what user acquisition campaigns entail in terms of time, money and resources.
It is a lengthy effort and that is why developers and producers prefer to outsource it: that is where the importance of user acquisition companies and/or platforms comes in. We can differentiate amongst three main different user acquisition platforms:
- Affiliate networks
- Ad networks
- DSPs (Demand side platforms)
Affiliate networks can have different features, but at their core they work at connecting companies to potential affiliates. They don’t have a mechanism for audience targeting, so they’re not the most effective platforms for market segmentation. Their activity is mainly re-broking and there isn’t transparency about where your ads are shown.
While affiliate networks outsource apps to everyone, without any audience intelligence backing it up, advertising networks work with algorithms that deliver the most relevant ads to the most interested users. They bring together advertisers, who come in looking for quality traffic, and publishers, who provide that same traffic. They’re more passive and need less monitoring.
Lastly, DSPs are the most advanced platforms for user acquisition campaigns. They possess an all-in-one functionality that allows them to work in the fastest way possible thanks to a completely automated process. They often rely on machine-learning algorithms and sophisticated targeting abilities that optimize the campaigns depending on the different goals set for each advertiser.
Mapendo is a fully managed performance DSP you can rely on to grow your mobile app. By putting your user acquisition campaigns in our hands, you won’t waste any more time or resources than necessary.
Start now and take the next step in your user acquisition process!
