The million dollar question in mobile app marketing is how can we measure the success of an app install campaign, and there are multiple answers to this question. For example, advertisers can compare the results achieved in the app install campaign with their initial goals and KPIs such as installs and conversions for in-app events. However, installs don’t necessarily lead to high-quality app users and revenues so it becomes more difficult to understand whether or not the app campaign generated money. That’s why many advertisers use ROAS as a metric to measure their performance and they evaluate ROAS-positive app install campaigns as successful. So what is ROAS ? Let’s dive deeper into it and understand what ROAS-positive app campaigns mean.
What Is ROAS ?
ROAS stands for Return On Ad Spend, and it measures how much money a business earns for each dollar spent on advertising activities. Within the context of app install campaigns then, ROAS positive app install campaigns refer to campaigns where installs and in-app events bring advertisers more revenues than the money they spend. As for the value, it can be computed as the ratio between the total gross revenue generated by the app campaign and the cost of it.
There are several ways in which you can increase this metric in order to run ROAS positive app campaigns. Firstly, you can optimize your performance using machine learning algorithms, especially in programmatic campaigns, and make advantage of the data collected. Secondly, it is possible to improve the creative performance through rotation, A/B testing and several other optimization techniques. However, the best way to increase your ROAS is to acquire high-quality app users, who download the app and don’t leave immediately but generate many in-app events such as registration, purchases, deposits, transactions and many more. These in-app events are usually aligned with business KPIs and bring money to advertisers and app developers, making their app install campaign effective and ROAS-positive.
How can you acquire high-quality users ?
As stated in the previous paragraph, high-quality app users are crucial to your app install campaigns ROAS and you have to put an effective strategy in place to acquire them. First of all, it is essential to keep track of all your relevant post-install events and the user conversion funnel. By selecting the key in-app events the user should take in order to generate money and by monitoring the conversion rate between those events, you will be able to understand who your high-LTV customers are. In addition, it is possible to develop predictive models to assess your users’ lifetime value, a metric that can help you to compute the ROAS of your app install campaign. Once you identify your high-quality app users, you can start to optimize your app install campaign to target and acquire them, by developing the proper strategy. For example, you can produce creative ads with a specific call to action targeted to the in-app events you want users to generate; or you can optimize your targeting options through machine learning algorithms.
In conclusion, the goal of your app install campaigns should be to grow your user base, but also to do it by acquiring as many high-quality app users as possible. The many in-app events they generate the more money they bring to your business and the more likely it is to achieve a successful app install campaign.
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