How to improve APP user retention?

As of 2017, the mobile Internet has entered a mature stage, with super apps represented by WeChat, QQ, Alipay, and Sina Weibo emerging one after another, dominating the world, and apps in other fields catching up fiercely.

Cost pressure often forces us to face a reality: retention is the first criterion for testing a product.

In the first two years of the development of mobile Internet, the demographic dividend was sufficient and the cost of acquiring customers was relatively low. Today, with the full development of mobile Internet, with the saturation of user scale, the cost of acquiring customers has increased significantly, and users may uninstall your application in minutes because of the slightest dissatisfaction. At this stage, improving retention becomes particularly important because the cost in terms of both money and resources will be lower.

So, today we are going to discuss a bigger topic:

1. How to improve APP retention

Next, let’s discuss this issue from three aspects: “ product construction ”, “ user channels ” and “ operation strategy ”.

2. Product Construction

The most important of the three factors is the product.

A good blacksmith must have strong tools himself. For users, the first impression of a product can basically determine whether most users will stay.

1. UI design

As the face of an application, UI often determines the user’s first impression. It doesn’t have to be flashy, but it must fit the positioning of the app. For tools, simplicity and elegance may be more suitable; for news, seriousness and clarity may be better; and for technological products, high-end features will naturally impress users. The UI doesn't have to be too flashy, it just needs to look pleasing at first glance.

Product Performance

Product performance is the second most intuitive experience besides appearance. High fluency, low energy consumption and high stability can further enhance users' impression of the product. Imagine if the app crashes when the user visits the app's homepage, then he basically won't want to launch it a second time. In addition to flash crashes, power consumption and data traffic consumption are also basic issues that users can easily perceive. If your app is only played for 10 minutes, the user's phone can be used as a hand warmer. Being optimistic, he will choose to play for a shorter time, but how many optimistic users are there?

Simple process

The process is simple, convenient and easy to use, which is also an important part that affects the user experience after the user installs the application. Complex processes often lead to poor user experience. For example, some applications that are not user-friendly require users to register before they can use them, which can easily cause user disgust. It is too naive to want to obtain user information before the user has experienced the product. Before basic trust is established, do not influence the user's behavior. If the user is happy with the product, they will naturally register to better explore the more interesting aspects of the product.

Interesting or useful

User positioning is a deep spiritual feeling. The meaning of any product’s existence must be useful or interesting to users, otherwise it can only stay on users’ mobile phones for 10 minutes. As for whether it is interesting or useful, it depends on the nature of the product. If the product is positioned as useful, then consider all scenarios comprehensively and surprise the user as to why you understand his thoughts; if the product is positioned as interesting, then work hard on the content and experience to make the user feel refreshed visually or mentally.

Positive Incentives

One aspect that any good product should have is to make users feel involved. For example, the sign-in reward for mobile games allows users to get virtual rewards; the comments, pictures, and videos in the circle of friends help users build social behaviors, allowing users to satisfy their vanity and show their sense of presence; and Zhihu's likes and thanks are an affirmation of an excellent answerer, bringing a sense of honor from the heart. The above cases are enough to illustrate that the interactive aspects of the product are very important. Only by satisfying the most basic desires of human nature can we effectively drive users to participate more in the product.

Finally, in addition to optimizing the product’s own experience functions, it is best to add a value-added service item to the user center, such as building a points mall , allowing all users to participate in the process to earn points, and then redeem member points for various gifts or coupons. This way, users are retained and the points mall operation forms a good closed loop.

The above is about the problems of the product itself. Another factor that affects retention data is user quality. The quality of users will also largely determine the level of retention data.

3. User Channels

As the main body of product use, users themselves are also a very important factor affecting retention data. Therefore, you need to put more effort into choosing user acquisition channels. Once the wrong channel is chosen, even if the product is perfect, it will lower the overall retention data.

At present, the main channels for promotion are:

Channels include app stores, point walls, advertising networks, social networks, exchange promotions, mobile phone pre-installations, etc. As the first entry point for acquiring apps, app stores are certainly very important for data acquisition. However, as competition among app stores becomes increasingly fierce, some app stores have engaged in data manipulation. As a result, the data on new users is very good, but the retention data is not good, so the quality is much lower than in the early days.

As paid download and installation platforms, point walls and advertising networks are more likely to inflate traffic. Some users often uninstall the app after installing it, and there is no retention at all.

As for the mobile phone pre-installation channels, since they do not understand users’ preferences, the quality of users they acquire will naturally not be particularly high. It is easy to acquire users with the same interests through promotion through social networks and exchange of traffic. In addition, due to the celebrity effect and acquaintance effect of social networks, the promotion effect will be much better.

Therefore, in terms of improving retention data, you should also spend more time when selecting promotion channels. After understanding the quality of these channels, make a decision. Carefully selected channels are bound to be much better than those that have not been selected.

If you can do the above points, at least your daily retention and short-term retention will not be a problem. However, once the novelty period is over, users are still easy to lose. Therefore, in order to improve weekly or monthly retention, it is necessary to focus on operational strategies.

1. Operational Strategy

There is indeed a reason why good products are produced through operations. Because the value of any product must be obtained from loyal users. In order to turn new users into long-term retained users, we need to put in enough effort in product operations. Good product operations can not only improve user activity and retention, but also realize product monetization and profitability. Next, let’s talk about what methods can be used to improve retention data in daily product operations.

Message Push

After users have used the product for a period of time and the novelty has worn off, it is easy for them to get tired of it. Therefore, we must continue to provide users with effective and useful things to wake them up, and message push is the best way to do that. Whether it is product promotion, event promotion or the launch of a new function, it can be sent to the user's mobile phone through message push. Once the user's interest is triggered, it will inevitably drive the user to launch the APP again, and then the retention data will also increase. Of course, there are many techniques and methods in push. Accurate push is one point, and push frequency is also a point. If a certain link is not done well enough, it may not only fail to drive user growth, but may also produce negative effects, so it needs to be done with caution.

2. User portrait analysis

User portrait data is already very familiar to developers. To study user portraits is to study the attributes and behavioral characteristics of each user, including gender, age, occupation, purchasing power, interests and hobbies, behavioral patterns, etc. Once this data is fully mastered, user behavior can be predicted, which not only lays a solid foundation for accurate message push, but also provides the necessary information support for product decision-making.

3. Social Network Promotion

For any promotion, whether it is event promotion or application promotion, social networks are one of the best ways, because social networks, as a super entrance for user traffic, can easily produce chemical reactions, thereby causing large-scale growth. Xiaokaxiu is the best example. Moreover, the celebrity effect and acquaintance effect can enable the product to quickly establish trust with users, thereby effectively driving the growth of user data.

We have outlined the methods for improving retention. Another important task is to understand the current status of our own products and actually put them into practice in conjunction with operational tools. Tencent Mobile Analysis and Tencent Mobile Push are effective tools provided by Tencent's big data platform. Tencent Mobile Analysis can not only analyze user portraits, but also analyze user channel quality, and accurately select users through user grouping. Based on the analysis, Tencent Mobile Push can realize precise push for different user groups, including version, channel and tag push.

At the same time, you can also use related free points malls , such as McLe Points , so that you can focus on spending time on product function optimization, stratify according to user data, and use the points mall API interface docking method to combine user levels with the points mall VPI zone redemption, effectively improving user retention rate

The above are some suggestions on improving product retention data. In short, when we have done our job perfectly, I believe that improving data performance is a natural result.

Author: Mai Le Points

Source: McLean Points