Short video overseas promotion strategy

On April 16, Sensor Tower released its mobile application report for the first quarter of 2020. In Q1 2020, global app downloads reached 33.6 billion, a year-on-year increase of 20.3%. It is worth noting that in this quarter, the download growth rate of iOS App Store was 25.4%, higher than Google Play's 18.4%.

Data source: Sensor Tower

Top 20 apps by global downloads in Q1 2020

In the first quarter, the impact of the epidemic was mainly limited to the Chinese market, and it began to break out overseas in March. The category distribution of downloads, except for Zoom which has emerged due to the epidemic, is not much different from the past, and is mainly concentrated in social, streaming and short video applications. Among them, TikTok ranked first in global downloads, with 315 million installations in Q1, breaking TikTok's highest installation record in Q3 2016.

In addition, Zoom's download ranking quickly jumped to 7th place due to the epidemic and entered the top 20 list for the first time. The new downloads of 80 million times were more than 11 times that of Q4 2019. The new users mainly came from India, the United States, Indonesia, Vietnam, France and China.

Zoom new user distribution

Data source: Sensor Tower

Short video track "blossoming everywhere"

As in the past, short video apps are still the main force for non-game apps to gain overseas market share. Among the top 20 non-game app downloads on Google Play in Q1, there are 5 overseas short video apps, and another one is TikTok Wall Picture, which is TikTok's wallpaper app. The new downloads of TikTok and Likee exceeded 50 million.

Data source: Sensor Tower

New downloads from Google Play in Q1 2020

The high number of downloads of several short video apps is partly related to the epidemic. Users have more disposable time and creative themes that are more likely to resonate with people, plus the support of manufacturers.

According to Zhixiang.com, the epidemic has boosted the creative enthusiasm of Indian users. During the lockdown in India, many users used short video platforms to interpret what the COVID-19 virus looked like in their minds, popularized the symptoms of infection with the virus, and demonstrated how to wash hands properly, greet people, and how to make masks and hand sanitizers. This is happening in other countries as well.

In addition, major short video applications continued to acquire customers through large-scale advertising during the epidemic, and continued to attract users to download through operations and planning.

Large-scale purchases

For the former, we can use the data of several apps on App Growing to explore them.

Data source: App Growing International Edition

Ad creatives delivered by three apps in the past 17 days

Likee, TikTok and UVideo should be considered as big buyers of traffic. Among them, Likee is the most "generous", having recently launched a total of 3,706 advertising materials on 9 media platforms including Facebook and 31 games. The delivery areas are evenly distributed in India, Indonesia, Russia, Brazil, Japan, South Korea, and the Middle East and North Africa. The main promotional functions seem to be smart cutouts and beauty filters.

TikTok is still taking a "two-pronged approach" and has placed a lot of advertisements on both platforms. The advertising materials are more technical and continue to buy traffic.

With large-scale purchases of traffic and in line with this year's commercialization, TikTok topped the revenue list according to the March monthly index ranking released by App Annie two days ago.

Data source: App Growing International Edition

The number of creatives UVideo has recently served between 3.19 and 4.12

In addition, UVideo, a subsidiary of Kuaishou, is also doing large-scale advertising, but the advertising areas are relatively concentrated. 68% of the ads are placed in India, and the rest are mainly placed in Canada, Indonesia, France and Japan. The advertising materials mainly tend to be funny and picture and video splicing special effects.

Tips: The different advertising styles of the three apps actually reflect the differentiation of functional positioning and the idea of ​​leveraging strengths and avoiding weaknesses. Likee's parent company YY originated from live streaming and has unique advantages in special effects and beauty. In China, Kuaishou's style tends to be humorous and funny, and it has experience in operating in the sinking market; while TikTok wants to continue to establish the "professional" image of PUGC.

The crowds of competitors are not a big deal; what is scary is the inability to find the right positioning.

Extreme localization

As for the second method, it relies on reasonable user operations and deep localization to attract users to download and use it (the much-talked-about localization still has to be mentioned, but this time there is something different).

VMate is probably the one that has done relatively well in this regard. Alibaba is relatively conservative in advertising on VMate, but through the method of "operating in towns and promoting in villages", it supports some creators to gain attention and achieve success, and then become loyal users of the platform. These creators are then allowed to influence their fans and people around them. It can be said that "the rich lead the poor."

If you want to know more, you can read the detailed description of VMate’s operation in Baijingchuhai’s previous article "TikTok has risen to the second place in the global app revenue list".

UVideo and Helo are two representatives of successful localization in India. Different from other applications that are committed to globalization, UVideo and Helo want to settle down in India, so naturally they have to spend more time in India.

Image source: App Annie

Helo App Introduction in Google Play

A lot of information in a short introduction. WhatsApp is the most commonly used social app by Indian users, cricket and Hollywood movies and TV series are the most popular entertainment activities for Indian users, and 14 Indian languages ​​cover most dialect areas in India. Helo has done everything possible to find common ground with Indian users and resonate with them. In October last year, it reached a strategic cooperation with the 13th season of the popular Indian variety show "Big Boss". In order to increase user attention, Helo will also invite one lucky user to meet and interact with the variety show contestants. According to official data, the views of "Big Boss" related content on Helo exceeded 20 billion. The author believes that this cooperation has brought Helo closer to the mainstream entertainment industry in India, allowing Helo to maintain a good download volume even without large-scale purchases. In addition, it is rumored that Helo is currently deepening its English support. The stable user base in second- and third-tier cities is no longer enough for Helo to feel safe in the fierce competition. At the same time, it also wants to take advantage of this opportunity to get closer to the "elite group".

UVideo focuses on another perspective. In addition to the humorous positioning and sinking market mentioned above, UVideo also takes advantage of the bonus of "religion". Some people call religion, astrology, Bollywood and cricket the four major national businesses in India, which shows its importance.

UVideo Creative

Data source: App Growing International Edition

Many of UVideo's advertising materials reference religious elements. An intuitive proof of this is that the active index (App Growing's indicator for measuring advertising quality and effectiveness) of other ads is mostly between 70 and 85, but the active index of ads with religious elements has reached 96. Moreover, compared with the complexity of the language, India's religion is relatively clear. According to encyclopedia data, 83% of Indians believe in Hinduism and 13.4% believe in Islam.

Tips: It is important for opportunities to come, but it may be more effective to cater to the preferences of more users as much as possible.

Author: Xin Tong

Source: White Whale Out to Sea

Related reading:

6 ways to monetize short video traffic!

2020 Short Video Live Streaming Operation and Monetization Guide

Analysis of techniques for creating popular short videos on TikTok

Useful information | Short video advertising and operation strategies!

Getting Started Guide to Short Video Promotion!