How to promote APP in 2018? Complete guide to explaining channel promotion!

Whether you are a rookie who has just entered the mobile Internet promotion industry , or a veteran who has been working in this industry for several years. You will encounter various difficult problems at any stage. How to distribute APP from the beginning? How to spend the budget of tens of millions in the last month. These problems are constantly plaguing the minds of mobile Internet market practitioners. What’s more important is that the way of promoting apps is changing too fast, from the app store in the beginning to the points wall and then to the current information flow ads , in just one or two years you will find that your previous experience is no longer useful. "If you don't advance, you will retreat" is an issue that practitioners in mobile Internet promotion must be deeply aware of. What exactly is APP promotion for? Is it a channel promotion through the App Store? Or media advertising promotion? Or business cooperation promotion? Or public relations and marketing promotion ? First of all, we need to understand the role of the marketing department of an Internet company, which we can divide into two categories.

Performance Marketing

We define any promotion that is KPI- and result-oriented as “mobile Internet performance marketing”. For e-commerce , finance and other apps, your target results are sales volume and investment amount. For tool , community and other apps, your indicators are retention rate and usage time, collectively referred to as active indicators.

Brand Marketing

We define promotion with the purpose of increasing Baidu Index exposure and conveying brand image as "mobile Internet brand marketing ". From small things like product slogans to large things like media and TV commercials, we define these events whose actual effects are difficult to accurately calculate as brand marketing. In this article, we will focus on how to do mobile Internet performance marketing. Before that, I still need to emphasize that the success or failure of performance-based marketing is related to the ability of practitioners on the one hand, and directly related to the core competitiveness of the product on the other. Product is the first digit at the beginning of everything, and performance-based marketing is just the addition after the first digit. If a product has a zero, no matter how many zeros are added after it, it will be a failure. Of course, for practitioners, giving their all to any product is the most basic professional attitude. Overview of mobile Internet traffic pool

Channel Distribution

Third-party application markets : App Store , 360 Mobile Assistant , Baidu Mobile Assistant , PP Assistant , Wandoujia , etc.

Mobile phone manufacturer market: Huawei, Xiaomi, OPPO , vivo , Meizu, Meitu , Hammer, etc.

Apple genuine jailbreak: XY Mobile Assistant, Aisee Assistant, itools, Syncios , etc.

Performance-based native advertising

News information flow : Toutiao, Zhihuitui , Yidianzixun, Changdu , Sohu Huisuan, Sina Fuyi, Zaker, etc. Social information flow: Fanstong , Guangdiantong , WeChat MP, Baidu Tieba , Momo , etc. Browser information flow: UC Browser, QQ Browser , Cheetah, Xiaomi, etc. DSP information flow: Youdao DSP, Duomeng DSP, Limei DSP, Imobi, Admob, Juxiao, etc. Tool information flow: wifi master key, cool lock screen, red envelope lock screen, perpetual calendar, ink weather , etc. Domestic and foreign alliances : Kuaiyou, mobvista, yeahmobi, glispa, matomy, etc. Video category: iQiyi , Youku, Sohu Video , etc. SEM / ASO : Baidu SEM, 360SEM, Shenma SEM, appstore ASO, etc.

Channel distribution status

I believe that those who were first exposed to app store promotions will surely miss the era when a single launch could bring in tens of thousands of new users. 2012-2013 was the window period for mobile Internet, and users were used to actively go to app stores to search for and download fun apps. Basically, I download whatever is ranked higher and recommended. We call that era the Little White Era. But as I said at the beginning, the development of mobile Internet is too fast, and millions of apps have emerged in just a few years. Since 2014, users' usage habits have gradually changed from actively searching for interesting apps in app stores to returning to the essence of channel distribution in app stores this year. There is a piece of data that can tell you that currently more than 75% of users who go to the app store know what they want to download, and they will leave after downloading without staying for too long. So many developers will complain why there are only a few hundred new additions in the initial launch and why the cost of buying CPT’s homepage banner is so high? Why are app stores starting to offer rewarded downloads and red envelope incentives? The essence of all this is that users’ usage habits have changed. So what should we do in response to the above situation? If your CPT delivery cost is very high, then only bid on CPD keywords . The purpose of doing CPD is to reduce the cost of acquiring users. On the other hand, it is also a defensive measure to prevent your product name from being hijacked by traffic. Huawei, Xiaomi and other mobile phone manufacturers can dig deeper as their mobile phone shipments continue to increase. If an app store becomes increasingly commercialized, you should be cautious. This means that they are beginning to pursue profit maximization, and your costs will rise sharply. So, I personally recommend not spending too much energy on the App Store this year.

Native Advertising

The main branch of information flow advertising and native advertising, the core of which is native advertising. We must make it clear that native advertising is not brand advertising. The core is to attract users through materials and copywriting . If you want to convey your brand and get a good click-through rate on a piece of material, it is very difficult. Users are more concerned about the content itself. This is the most basic truth that everyone needs to understand. If 2015 is the first year of information flow advertising, then 2016 is the explosion year of information flow advertising. If you don’t do information flow advertising this year, the cost will be very high later. From the second half of 2015 to the first half of 2016, more and more super apps began to be commercialized. This is both good news and bad news. The early stage of commercialization is a bonus period for developers, and the cost of acquiring users is very low. But once commercialization is mature enough, competition will become increasingly fierce. In this article, I will give a brief explanation of the mainstream channels. In later articles, I will explain the detailed delivery optimization strategies for each channel.

Today's headlines

Daily active users: 50 million IOS share: 30% Female: 45% Age: 18-40 years old accounted for 70% Basic situation: First of all, in addition to Toutiao, Toutiao also includes the traffic resources of Duanzilai. It is currently the largest information flow platform. Since 2016, Toutiao has started to increase its volume to advertisers. This is a must if you are running a news channel.

Read

Daily active users: 4.5 million IOS: 40% Female: 50% Age: 20-35 Basic information: Female users account for a high proportion. The advantage of Changdu is that it has many free magazine resources and can negotiate various forms of cooperation.

Sohu Huisuan

Daily active users: 8 million IOS: 30% Female: 20% Age: 28-45 Basic situation: Sohu is an old media with an overall older user base, but their actual spending power includes resistance to new products.

Sina Fuyi

Daily active users: 4 million IOS: 30% Female: 30% Age: 90% aged 25-35 Basic situation: In addition to Sina News APP and wap traffic, it also includes traffic from Xiaokaxiu , Meipai , and Dayima .

Yidian News

Daily active users: 3 million IOS: 17% Female: 40% Age: 70% between 18 and 35 Basic situation: Commercialization started at the end of 2015 and it is currently in the bonus period with more Android users. Since Xiaomi is one of the investors, Xiaomi’s backend can also be used for investment.

Zaker

Daily active users: 5 million IOS: 50% Female: 32% Age: 21-30 (60%) Basic situation: Users in first-tier cities account for 50%, the quality of the user base is relatively high, and the initial dividends from commercialization are considerable.

Smart Push

Daily active users: 50 million IOS: 70% Female: 40% Age: 18-35 Basic information: Includes Tencent News , Tencent Video , and Tiantian Kuaibao resources. IOS users are very large, which is suitable for large-scale expansion.

Fans Pass

Daily active users: 50 million IOS: 40% Female: 60% Age: 60% between 18 and 25 Basic situation: Weibo’s financial report shows 120 million daily active users, and the overall user attributes are relatively young. It is currently the largest open social platform in China, and Fanstong is relatively mature in commercialization, and is also a must-invest channel for most developers.

GuangDianTong

Daily active users: 100 million+ IOS: 40% Female: 45% Age: 18-40 (85%) Basic information: GuangDianTong includes many resources such as Tencent News, WeChat, and QQ Space. Among them, feed ads are usually the most popular. This includes QQ Space and third-party apps such as Choushibaike . It has a large scale and uneven traffic, which is suitable for various types of APP launches. The more well-known vertical e-commerce companies on the market invest tens to hundreds of millions of yuan a year.

WeChat MP

Daily active users: 500 million+ CPC: The average click price for Android is 0.8, and for IOS it is 1 yuan. CTR : 1.4% -1.8% Basic situation: CPC resources are mainly the banner at the bottom of the WeChat official account , and the Moments ads are settled on a CPM basis. The CPM is generally between 30 yuan and 50 yuan. The commercialization of WeChat MP is still not perfect, and to be honest, the cost is quite high.

UC Browser

Daily active users: 50 million (official 100 million) IOS: 30% Female: 40% Age: 20-35 Basic situation: The domestic browser has the largest traffic, and the user base covers a wide range to meet the demand for large-scale traffic, but the optimization is more difficult. The cost of implementation is still relatively high.

Baidu Post Bar

Daily active users: 30 million (official 75 million) IOS: 30% Female: 40% Age: 80% between 18 and 35, the overall age group is relatively young Basic situation: There are many students but also many impulsive consumers, which are relatively more suitable for social, game and tool products.

Momo

Daily active users: 10 million (official 20 million, nearby people PV 100 million) IOS: 30% Female: 30% Age: 18-32, accounting for 90% Basic situation: The overall delivery attribute is still biased towards CPM, and the effect of CPC delivery generally depends on the later commercialization adjustments.

DSP Information Flow

How to judge the quality of a DSP company depends on their algorithms, control over long-tail traffic and core media resources. DSP is a traffic pool worth exploring in depth, and the difficulty lies in optimizing the platform selection. For some vertical apps that want to acquire accurate users, they can dig deeper into this area. It contains the long-tail traffic of many small and medium-sized vertical apps. You also need to be prepared for extremely high upfront costs.

Domestic and foreign alliances

In essence, it is not much different from DSP, the only difference lies in the choice of media. Some foreign apps will have some long-tail traffic in China. For example, companies such as Glispa and Matomy have great advantages in foreign resources and can meet the developers' short-term demand for increased volume. The overall user quality depends on the developer's requirements and final control. DSP and ad networks are a relatively complex traffic pool, which includes long-tail traffic from many large media. It is also difficult to determine which media the traffic comes from, because they will look for many downstream parties, and you have no idea where the traffic comes from. Therefore, it is not recommended to invest large amounts of money, and the quality of users needs to be controlled. If you don’t want to impact the APPSTORE ranking by inflating the volume, then perhaps DSP and ad networks are good choices. It ensures the authenticity of the traffic while improving the ranking in the category list.

ASO

If you played ASO from early to mid-2015, I can say you were pretty good. For example, there is a well-known imported snack APP and a recruitment APP. They did gain a lot of users through ASO. But the 2016 ASO is already so popular that I personally don’t recommend playing it. First, the cost becomes higher, and second, it is difficult to obtain large-scale real traffic stably, and there is also the risk of being complained about. Of course, small companies that are not afraid of wearing shoes when barefoot can try it. ASO (Apple Store Search Optimization) is divided into three steps. Keyword coverage : Developers can use word combinations to allow products to cover more effective keywords, usually between 500-2000. This is the first step of ASO. Usually this step is the most basic and will not bring any effect. Optimization of keyword ranking : For example, if your product covers the keyword Baidu, then you need to use machine brushing or WeChat point wall tasks to raise your product's ranking to the top five. Currently, there are huge risks in machine brushing. The mainstream method is to publish tasks through platforms such as Qianka and App Tester with a CPA unit price of 3.5-4 yuan/A, and perform large-scale repetitive tasks in a certain period of time. Relatively speaking, the risk is low, but it is still recommended that small and medium-sized developers make a side app. Maintain ranking : In the second half of 2015, the mainstream keywords on the market were 20, which can be maintained for a long time with just one optimization. However, due to the adjustment of Apple's algorithm in 2016, ranking maintenance is now required on a daily basis. Expedited review : Expedited review is essentially the use of technical means to quickly skip Apple's review. There is no such thing as ghostwriting expedited emails or having any relationship with Apple. Everyone knows the channels, but how to play them? As I said at the beginning, information flow advertising is the focus this year. If your monthly budget is between 3 million and 8 million, basically the information flow traffic from Tencent, Alibaba , Baidu, and Super APP can meet your needs for volume expansion. Simply put, if you invest in 10-15 mainstream information flow channels, your KPI requirements will basically be met. As for DSP, CPA alliance, vertical APP, etc., they are all used to supplement long-tail traffic. The essential difficulty of information flow channels lies in channel optimization and channel management. Why is your competitor's product delivery cost lower than yours but ROI higher than yours on the same channel? Essentially, your competitors are doing better than you in terms of optimization. Usually, when placing information flows, we rarely cooperate with direct customers, but usually cooperate with agents. Then good agents and bad agents determine your costs and ROI. Of course, some companies will have their own optimization teams, but my philosophy is to leave professional matters to professionals. Agent strength: First, we need to determine whether the agent is a first-level agent, which determines the agent’s relationship with the media and its ability to obtain resources. Usually, I personally suggest that you negotiate directly with the media to understand the actual situation of the media at this stage, and then judge whether it is suitable to invest in this media based on your own products. Capabilities of the optimization team: Every agent who comes to talk to me will tell you that our optimizers are great. Usually we only need to focus on three points. First, whether there are APPs of similar products cooperating with them, and what the effect of the cooperation is, such as detailed data such as activation cost, conversion rate , CTR, ROI, etc. The second is to take a detailed look at the case pictures of similar product launch materials to see whether the materials can truly attract the target user group. The third is to let the agent develop a marketing strategy based on your product and estimate the cost for evaluation. Usually, only 10% of the optimizers in a good agency are truly capable, and they usually only serve large clients. Therefore, it is necessary to make it clear which optimizer will be responsible for your product in the later stage of cooperation. Agent's rebate policy: The rebate policy is quite complicated. Simply put, you need to know how much full rebate the media gives to the agent. At present, the agents on the market usually do not give full rebates unless you have a huge investment volume. However, we need to use various means to evaluate and select the most sincere agents. For example, because of the large rebate rate for Smart Push, the rebate ratio affects the final cost of your investment. Usually, you can roughly feel out the other party's sincerity by saying "I have contacted many agents. Can you tell me your maximum rebate amount?" Of course, the easiest way is to see which company the leader in the same industry is cooperating with, and then talk to that company. Channel management: It is to make timely optimization and adjustments based on daily delivery data. And the control of agents' enthusiasm and pressure. If energy and resources permit, it is usually possible to cooperate with two agents of equal strength at the same time. Create competition and pressure between both parties. Secondly, in-depth communication with the optimizer is crucial, and what you ultimately control is the results of the daily report sent to you by the agent. Channel optimization cycle: The initial launch of any channel will usually be very costly, because most media accounts require more than ten days of account optimization. This is the quality of the account. The higher the quality of your account, the more stable the cost of your subsequent investment will be. The same bid can get more exposure. Therefore, it is a taboo not to suspend advertising immediately because the cost is high in the first few days. Direction of the materials released: Different products have different directions of materials released, but the core is that your materials should attract your target user group. Instead of creating junk traffic materials purely for the sake of cost and click-through rate. Usually, you need to determine 5-10 materials with different styles in the early stage, conduct small-scale tests, and then find the materials with high volume. Control of data: Since we spend so much money every day, we must be responsible for the data. Data can provide feedback on many things, and we need to spend time studying the delivery data. Usually you need to pay attention to the cost after click, CTR, activation cost, ROI, and CPM conversion. Secondly, the quality of later users must be strictly monitored to prevent the entry of spam traffic. Build your own traffic pool. Recently, I still hear some companies complain that they don’t have enough money for promotion and their bosses are unwilling to pay for promotion. To be honest, I am worried about this company. Mobile Internet advertising has entered a situation where there are more people than resources. The pie is so big that companies with resources and funds will have more and more users, while companies without resources, funds and unwilling to spend money will be eliminated by the market. As a performance marketing practitioner, your responsibility is to make every penny you spend effective. Money is your ammunition. All promotions are oriented towards the target user group. Know where your potential target user group is and what kind of apps they usually use. Then build your own traffic pool. The traffic pools for different products are different, and the traffic pool is your resource. Use different media channels at different stages, and make reasonable budget allocation based on channel ROI. Ensure that new channels come in and old channels are eliminated every quarter, establishing a virtuous cycle of traffic pool. Finally, mobile Internet users are the least loyal users in the world, which leads to a different situation every year. The media that worked well last year may not work well next year. Therefore, practitioners must always pay attention to the more popular apps on the market. Once you cooperate with them in the early stages of commercialization, you will be the first to try new things. Although media traffic is changing, the gameplay remains the same.

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Mobile application product promotion service: APP promotion service Qinggua Media advertising

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