Eric Seufert: Free App Annie data to figure out the right marketing strategy

Mobile app marketing trends are changing from year to year, and it’s a necessity for every app developer and well as the company’s marketing department to catch up with them. The growing impact of social media into every single sphere of web and mobile app development changes the surface of existing marketing which impacts on the traditional ways the marketing has been done for years.

Mobile marketing nowadays is changing the ways companies are working with clients, the tactics they implement and the results awaited. Apart from following traditional TV advertising, more and more ads are streaming to your desktop and mobile gadgets. One of the main trends of mobile marketing automation is that the tactics involve delivering the marketing content right where the people are. By this, I mean their physical location and usually in a very specific context that is relevant only to the particular actions the user has done.

The most recent trends in mobile marketing nowadays:

• Mobile websites surfing. More than 90% of any e-commerce companies have their desktop and mobile presence in the market. The template should be responsive and extremely user-friendly, without the latter characteristics no one will come back to your page again.

• The usage of vertical streaming ads. The widely-known Snapchat is using vertical video ads. This example is followed by other companies, i.e. Burger King.

• Mobile app marketing is more and more integrated with social networking. On the one hand, this is a great thing, as it allows buyers purchasing staying in the zone of comfort: their favorite network. The select button on the product social page redirects to online payment operations straight away. On the other hand, this tendency could cause the biggest ever market disruption.

• Mobile marketing automation. This term includes predictive analytics, email marketing, extremely personalized content and various users’ behavior testing. Having done all the manipulations, using different kinds of tools, the companies create the customers’ prototypes and craft the content accordingly.

The best mobile marketing tool is considered to be App Annie, and we are about to analyze how its free data could help let your mobile app marketing grow.

App Annie has been a top mobile analytical platform since its launch in 2010. Nowadays two primary free analytical tools can be used with no charge at all and nourish you company’s mobile app marketing. The one is Store Stats, a free service for application ranking. The ranking is based on daily, monthly and annually users’ activity. The other free brainchild of App Annie is Advertising Analytics. This is a massive analyzing hub of mobile app marketing data coming up from over 40,000 advertising platforms. A talented mobile marketing specialist will know how to use all this data to perform better results.

Here are the most noticeable trends according to mobile marketing automation by Eric Seufert, an App Annie expert:

1. The increasing of marketing costs is becoming noticeable because smartphone sales are not that high nowadays, and some apps users download remains stable for the last couple of years. Users don’t tend to download many new apps. At the same time, the competing companies are facing a real fight: some are better at app monetizing techniques, and some have massive IP attachments. So if you spend much on the development of the wrong app, you will lose a fortune for sure.

2. The time spent by users to play with mobile apps is increasing. During the last couple of years, it grew from 23 hours per month to 32, but some apps used remained the same: around 26.

3. When you are planning to make a mobile application and plan its mobile marketing strategy, make sure that you hit your target audience. The European countries you could pay attention to are the Netherlands, Sweden, and the United Kingdom, as well as the United States and Canada on the American Continent. They have the highest rate of smartphones per user, the so-called smartphones penetration, around 130%-150%, comparing to 80% in France and 75% in the Russian Federation. The logic is simple: the more smartphones people have, the larger amount of apps they potentially upload to their devices.

4. The percentage of mobile advertising is growing and the prediction for the year 2020 is 77 billion dollars spent annually. Right now only 43 billion are spent. The video ads will pop up while you surf through your apps, or play a game or read the news and this is our coming future.

5. It’s important to analyze the market before you decide to launch an app. You should answer the following fundamental questions:

• Who could be the people to use your app?
• Are there a lot of such people who will want to use it and tell their friends about it?
• Do your potential users have disposable income?
• Are the users of your app competitive and social?
• Will your potential customers respond to this app’s ads?

The point is that the sooner you answer these questions, the fewer mistakes you will make on the development stage of the app.

6. Pay attention to the perfect launching process of your app; scan your application according to the scale of recognition of your brand that is at your disposal at App Annie website.

7. Make sure your app goes through the matrix trying to find its ideal niche. You have the system of axes, and the horizontal arrow has male/female at both ends, and the vertical has mass appeal/niche appeal on both sides. Your application should hit its audience. This is one of the most important things mobile marketing automation was created for.

Basic tips for mobile app marketing strategy

1. You should begin using App Annie or other tools and platforms for mobile app marketing as soon as possible. Don’t waste your time. These platforms provide valuable insights into your customers’ needs and behavior.
2. With the mobile marketing automation, there is no more space for guesses, the information you will receive is precise and accurate.
3. App Annie and similar tools are saving your time; the time to be better spent on creating unique content addressing the needs of different kinds of users.