App Marketing in a Privacy-Focused Era

By Xavier Klein, Marketing Services Director, Making Science UK

As digital marketers navigate an era of evolving consumer privacy, app marketers are increasingly challenged to not only reach target audiences but to produce a clear attribution picture.

With the current economic climate creating additional pressure to demonstrate ROI, attribution is a key measurement for campaign optimisation and success. However, the obstacle posed by growing privacy measures, such as those introduced in iOS 14.5, and the resulting reduction in consumer data, is determining where marketing spend is allocated and its level of efficiency. Although this is an obstacle, it is not insurmountable.

In terms of revenue, the UK is the most lucrative mobile app market in Europe. Evidently, there are app marketers in the UK who are doing it right, so what should brands be considering in their app marketing strategies to overcome the issue of attribution and replicate others’ success?

Unifying data sources for a clearer picture

To address growing privacy restrictions, many platforms are introducing their own data and management tools to monitor marketing performance in a privacy-compliant manner, offering a user-friendly, integrated option for app marketers.

The introduction of new features, Today Tab and Product Pages in Apple Search Ads, mean Apple now offers four browsing placements where marketers can promote their app. The expansion gives marketers more reach and the opportunity to drive installs from Apple’s App Store, using the Ads Dashboard to monitor performance insights such as impressions and taps.

It is a similar story with Google Analytics 4 (GA4), the advanced measurement tool from Google. Marketers can utilise Consent Mode’s machine learning functionality to develop a more accurate understanding of their target audience using modelled data for opted-out users, which results in more refined data. By analysing the patterns of users who accept cookies, marketers can build a picture of those who decline them. Leveraging this tool means marketers can anticipate an increase of approximately 30% in the quantity of data available for decision-making, since about 30-40% of users do not consent to cookies.

Social media platforms also provide advertisers with privacy-conscious campaign optimisation tools; TikTok, Snapchat, and Pinterest offer options to leverage highly specific audience targeting based on user data.

While this range of tools provide beneficial insights per platform, these are difficult to transfer and analyse holistically across platforms, so combining this data for one single-source of truth is important to gain the clearest picture of current attribution. By taking a unified look at data across all platforms and channels in real time and in a single place gives a streamlined view of true conversion and delivery metrics.

Informed decision making

Once marketers have aggregated privacy-compliant data, the insights delivered are critical to inform marketing decisions – particularly around purchasing – and can optimise tactics such as automated ad bidding and placement.

For example, a bid strategy could focus on app installs but analysis might suggest greater gains by optimising towards in-app actions such as purchases. With greater insight comes greater cost-efficiencies. Marketers can steer the budget towards the most effective bid strategy in real-time while a campaign is live.

Marketers can also use their understanding of what creative works best on which channel to optimise their ads further. At a time when marketing teams are having to make demonstrable gains from advertising activity, A/B testing can be implemented to evidence and support the development of the most suitable and best-performing creative.

Audience targeting is another factor which can be informed using aggregated data. While user acquisition and basic install volume can indicate short-term success, users must buy into the app long term to avoid devaluing their purchase.

By analysing past top of the funnel, marketers can build a picture of whether users are buying into the app longer-term, a key consideration for ultimate success. Looking at indicators such as app registrations and subscriptions can help identify whether audience targeting is appropriate for the campaign objectives.

However, understanding lower funnel conversion is equally important, with numerous indicators such as in-app purchase rate, purchase value, retention and subscription rates all providing valuable insight into the immediate conversion success.

Understanding the value of activity in the lower marketing funnel is not only important for new app products, whose audiences may not be established or clearly defined, but also for more mature apps to keep growing sales through audience expansion.

Solving the attribution conundrum

Currently, to receive privacy-compliant campaign insights, most marketers are relying on the main levers of control in tools such as Google App Ads and the aforementioned Apple Search Ads to build a picture of attribution. These tools allow them to manage their bidding, budget, and optimisation goals for better performing campaigns per platform, but they are not providing deeper audience insights to app marketers.

While these tools cater for the era of increased privacy, app marketers are struggling to clearly showcase and understand campaign success. They must embrace new strategies and leverage tools capable of ingesting multi-platform data to overcome the challenge of attribution by unifying data. Aggregating data in real time and conducting deep analysis, from the top of the funnel down, will offer greater insights into audience, conversion, and delivery to inform future strategies.

Not only will these insights help to optimise campaigns, but also justify reinvestment for reaching new audiences and continuing strategic app growth.

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