Let’s talk about the exchange of volume in App promotion

Generally speaking, resources for exchanging traffic are cheaper than resources for directly purchasing advertisements.

What is exchange

Traffic exchange means exchanging resources. You can exchange them one-on-one with the application market , one-on-one with other apps, or join a traffic exchange alliance. Generally speaking, it is an equal exchange, but it is impossible to be completely equal.

The one-to-one exchanges between APPs are mostly exposure (mostly friendly exchanges), downloads, and activations; the exchanges between application markets are different. For example, the rule of App Store is that you will get 2 yuan of advertising fee when you bring one activation to App Store, and you can't change it whenever you want. The threshold for cooperation is that the application must have the ability to bring 1k activations to App Store every day; join an exchange platform, such as 360 Exchange Alliance, access the platform SDK, and go on the application exchange wall. There are two modes of 360 Exchange Wall, namely ordinary recommendation wall and points wall . Applications obtain traffic on the platform through cross-exchange, and you promote other people's applications and get corresponding returns.

The significance of exchange

Get more resources:

1. Some channels may not be commercialized, resources are not sold, and can only be obtained through exchange;
2. Some channels may only sell a portion of the resources and fail to meet the demand for quantity.

Get cheaper resources. Generally speaking, resources for exchanging traffic are cheaper than resources for directly purchasing advertisements.

Maintain good relationship with channel business. Some channels have quantitative KPIs for their businesses, and they say that only those who participate in the volume exchange are eligible for better first-launch resources and event resources.

The form of exchange

The differences and effects of different forms.

1. Content Cooperation

Content cooperation is to attract accurate customers and potential customers through high-quality content, thereby achieving marketing goals. But the problem at this point is:

1. Your product has reached a certain number of users;
2. There is nothing wrong with the value and direction of your product.

2. Open screen

When the App is opened, it is displayed in full screen/half screen. Under normal circumstances, the same user will not frequently launch a single App. Therefore, compared with other forms of advertising, this type of advertising can cover relatively more independent users with the same number of advertising displays.

3. Pop-up window

A form of advertising that pops up when an app is opened. It works well, but it greatly affects the user experience. (Those with deep pockets and products from large companies can consider this approach)

4. Focus Picture

Simply put, a picture or multiple pictures displayed in the application is the focus picture. It is located in a very obvious position within the app, and is played in the form of a combination of pictures, a bit like the focus news. Just added pictures. It is usually used on the application homepage, extension homepage or channel homepage. Because it is in the form of a picture, it has a certain appeal and visual appeal.

5. In-app recommendations

You don’t have to look for a separate app to exchange traffic. There are many software that specifically recommend apps or have software recommendation columns. If the in-app recommendations are not well placed or are at an awkward middle level and the number of users is small, it can be said that they have basically no effect. Unless it is an app with a user base of tens of millions or even hundreds of millions and a particularly prominent position, it may be effective. I mean maybe. Otherwise, don't focus on this aspect.

How to play with volume

Both parties have their own quantity

Both parties exchange their own quantities. (Website, store, APP, wap, etc.)

Both parties are buying

Both parties look for channels to purchase quantities.

One side is the purchased quantity, the other side is your own quantity

This situation usually occurs in cp and channels. CP buys volume for the channel, and the channel repays with its own volume. Otherwise, there is no point in working between CPs and channels.

One party provides brand resources, the other party provides volume

It is common for CP to embed the channel’s logo in advertisements on subways, Focus Media, buses, etc., and then the channel gives CP some promotional space.

Precautions

Because disputes caused by volume exchange are endless, you need to pay attention to:

1. Your interpersonal relationships are particularly strong and you need your app to be able to recommend other apps or sites, and the result of the exchange should be as close to 1:1 as possible.

If you fail to meet the specific measurement standards, it may be difficult to continue the cooperation when others can bring you hundreds or thousands of users a day, but you can only get dozens or even less. Of course, if you are close enough to your partner, then that’s a different story.

2. Whether the positioning of your product meets the positioning of the product you are looking for. What is the purpose of exchange? It’s quantity, yes, the ultimate purpose of quantity is to monetize! If the positioning does not match, retention may be low, and then the meaning of having volume is lost. You cannot change volume just for the sake of changing volume.

3. Brand effect: Whether the level of your brand is as close as possible to that of the other party’s brand. It means equal value. It doesn’t matter if your brand is high and theirs is low. Just ask them to bring more quantity. The details depend on your negotiation.

4. The cost of CP exchange communication is very high, so communication must be efficient. Attaching your business card and explaining your purpose while saying "hello" is an effective way of communication. If the other party does not reply, try not to shake, as that may affect the communication process of others and create a bad impression. The other party will communicate with you effectively when he has time.

5. The request for materials and the exchange ratio. If both parties exchange business cards and reach an agreement, they can proceed to the next step. Materials generally include:

1. Application Name
2. Icon size and sizing
3. Application Introduction
4. App screenshot dimensions and size
5. apk. Materials should be packaged and cleared all at once as much as possible. Do not request them again and again as this will waste time and increase communication costs.

6. The exchange ratio requires communication between both parties. Generally, it is 1:1, but sometimes it will be adjusted appropriately considering the different CP levels and different unit prices of external promotions. (Of course, if the other party is willing to give you a push at a rate of 1 to several, that is also a credit to you)

7. Conversion rate is of utmost importance. The general testing period is 1-3 days. There are also special cases where the testing is longer and the external installation volume is also used as the standard. This depends on your own situation. The conversion rates of most apps from installation to activation are different. Some have conversion rates as high as 30% or even higher, but some have conversion rates less than 1%. The gap is very large. To put it bluntly, using the same resources to promote different products may result in very different activation volumes. At this time, you need to think about it. If the gap is too big and you feel that the current data makes it impossible to continue cooperation, but you still want to cooperate with this CP, then you need to communicate with the business department to increase the exchange ratio and negotiate a ratio that both parties can accept to improve the conversion rate. In short, we should try our best to pursue a win-win situation so that the next cooperation will be smoother.

8. Transfer risks. The quality standards are set by the partners. Before cooperating with the channels, we will inform the channels: we will settle the quantity approved by the partners, and will not settle the quantity not approved by the partners.

9. The other party recommends that the channel for purchasing volume should be introduced by the partner, because the channel introduced by the partner means that it is recognized by it, so the quality is more reliable.

How to buy volume

The channels for purchasing volume are somewhat troublesome, as there are too many channels and they are too complicated. The difficulty is how to find cheap ones that are good and of good quality. All you need to do is make a table:

1. What are the channels? List all the channels for buying traffic.
2. What resources are available? What can these channels promote? Many products can be promoted through general channels.
3. How much is it? How much volume can this channel bring you in a day?
4. How much are they respectively? What is the unit price of the corresponding product promoted by this channel?
5. How is the quality? Retention, activity, and quality are best judged by the target audience of your traffic conversion.
6. What is the relationship with the exchange object? Some channels have a very good relationship with the party you want to cooperate with, so they should be given priority.

After finishing, if the overall results are better, we can try to cooperate, if the results are good, we can deepen the cooperation, and if the results are not good, we can terminate it.

How to count

Android

It is enough to make a separate channel package for exchange of traffic. In this way, after the user installs the package of this channel and activates it, he will be registered in a certain channel number for monitoring. Users from different channels will naturally be distinguished. Another way is to use the timestamp and the IMEI code of the device as an identifier. The IMEI number can be obtained when registering your own app, and the source can be determined by the timestamp and IMEI provided by the partner.

iOS

It is quite difficult to actually detect the specific amount of IOS traffic exchange. Generally, the traffic exchange is to give a link to iTunes and download it directly from the appstore. If the IOS side only does this traffic exchange promotion, it’s okay. If there are many, the amount cannot be determined. Therefore, an intermediate jump page is usually made to count the number of visits to the jump page and the number of downloads. You can also consider only providing the IP A file, which allows you to count specific quantities, but this will have little impact on the ranking on the app store. You can also use third-party statistics, and technology-intensive companies can also make their own interfaces, provided that the other party supports it.

In short, it is recommended that both parties reach a consensus on every detail and sign an agreement before cooperating in exchange for volume to avoid disputes.