Chances are you have your app marketing campaign completely nailed. But if you’re new to the game, or want to know how to be even more successful, then Neena, expert Digital Campaign Strategist at Bango, has some top tips to help you lay the strongest foundations for success. If you do it right, you can reach the right people with the right message at the right time helping you achieve your business objectives at a faster rate.

It’s more than setting up adverts

In my experience, many people aren’t aware that there are lots of different techniques to consider when setting up your app marketing advertising campaigns. They are missing out! Here are a few methods that work well:

A multi-prong approach

It’s a good idea to have multiple long-term campaigns running at once. One to raise awareness. A second retargeting those who engaged with the first campaign. Then a third which focuses on conversions, retargeting those that have engaged with previous campaigns and those that have previously made in-app purchases. In addition, you can create lookalikes of your most valuable customers. Keep your daily budget low and constant, refreshing your creative content and reviewing your targeting and results a couple of times a month.

Raise awareness with story ads

Consider using story ads (vertical, visual ads placed in stories feed on mobile devices) to raise brand awareness with more detailed posts to set the scene. Facebook has some great examples including these from Ikea and Redbull.

Raise awareness outside news feed ads

Use Audience Network ads (which allows you to extend your ad campaigns beyond Facebook) to tell a full story that must capture a potential customer’s attention in just 5 seconds.

Video sequencing ads

To really get to know your customers, set them on an advertising journey. If they’ve watched 95% of your video send them on a path that will allow them to view similar content. If they’ve only seen 25% of a video send them on a path that might engage their interest in another way, maybe a video with different content. Getting people interacting and engaging with your brand is a huge positive and will encourage a longer-term investment from your customers.

Have a clear objective but optimize accordingly

There is nothing more frustrating than low, or even no impressions in your Facebook advertising campaign. To avoid that your objectives need to be clear!

If you’re targeting an audience over 1 million, it will be much easier to optimize towards people likely to make a purchase. Therefore, you should choose a ROAS or conversion focussed objective.

However, if your audience is under a million, Facebook algorithm indicates that you’re targeting a more concentrated group. Your best bet for this is to run a broad campaign that reaches as many people as possible. Then run a consideration campaign that encourages people to do an action, like give their email, sign-up to a newsletter, or install an app. Finally, it’s time for the conversion campaign where they make a purchase.

Remember, one size doesn’t fit all:

  • Overusing ads that don’t interest the audience you’re targeting will result in negative sentiment from customers, low relevance scores and, as a result, more expensive advertising.
  • Think outside the box. For example, if you are marketing a streaming music app, a good trick might be to not simply target other people who like music, but instead focus on gym goers, commuters or those who travel a lot.
  • It’s best to work collaboratively with other teams in your company. Incorporating your business goals and objectives into your digital app marketing strategy ensures you are really targeting the audience that will be most interested in your app.
  • Develop a strong digital strategy that incorporates the platforms your customers and potential customers are using.

Think flexibly

The strategy of digital marketing should fall alongside the actual product or service being sold. It should be flexible and able to respond to real-time, real-life issues.

For example, the year Elon Musk put a car into space, SpaceX Starman, was a huge opportunity for advertisers of space games and car games to advertise to those areas of interest, such as using creative that related to cars being in space.

In short, be ready to capitalize on the good opportunities. And don’t forget to have a plan in place for when things don’t pan out quite how you’d hoped if your creative relates to a negative news story!

Make your life easier

In our fast-paced world, it would be easy to just set up an advertising campaign that offers a big discount as a means of increasing your new paying users. But here’s a thought: What good is that goal if your newly acquired audience have no intention of spending any money in your app! This is not the best route to monetization.

One effective advertising strategy is to play the long game and spend time and money investing in your audience. A far quicker strategy is to go straight to the paying users. Bango Audiences are made of users with a history of making in-app payments, apply them to your Facebook campaigns to focus on users who pay.