A Complete Guide for Promoting Your Mobile App

Mobile App Marketing Plan

Renowned entrepreneur and author, Gary Vaynerchuk, once remarked, “It’s not about ideas. It’s about making ideas happen.” These words relate so well, when it comes to mobile apps. Making your mobile app idea happen by promoting it effectively is what lets you accomplish your app as well as business goals. We go deeper in knowing how promoting a mobile app is crucial here.

Are you an app developer struggling to get your mobile app noticed? Or a business owner looking to increase your customer engagement through a mobile app? If yes, then you must be knowing that developing a mobile app is only half the battle – promoting it effectively is equally crucial. With over 1.85 million iOS apps and 2.56 million Android app available in the respective app stores, it can be overwhelming to make your app stand out and attract downloads.

In this cutthroat environment, promoting an app is a gigantic task at hand. But don’t despair – you’re not alone in this challenge. Many businesses and developers are facing the same issue, but the good news is that there are proven mobile app promotion strategies to help promote your mobile app and drive user engagement.

In this complete guide, we’ll cover everything you need to know to promote your mobile app effectively. From optimizing your app store listing to leveraging social media and influencer marketing, we’ll provide actionable tips and insights to help you reach your target audience and stand out from the competition.

Why Your Mobile App Needs a Strategic Marketing Approach

With over 80% of the world’s population wielding smartphones and dedicating 5 to 6 hours daily to their digital companions, the mobile realm has become a bustling marketplace. According to BankMyCell recent data, the number of apps available on app stores worldwide reached nearly 3.553 million mobile apps are accessible, up from around 2.6 million in 2016.

As the competition continues to intensify, businesses—both big and small—have recognized the need to go mobile, with a staggering 65% of small businesses and virtually all large corporations already boasting their own mobile applications.

But here’s the kicker: standing out amidst this app extravaganza isn’t a walk in the park. To flourish, you must rise above the noise, captivate audiences, and carve a distinct niche for your app. This daunting task requires something more than luck—it demands a well-thought-out mobile app marketing plan.

Why, you ask? Allow me to reveal the hidden gems within:

  • Grabbing the Spotlight: With thousands of apps clamoring for attention, your marketing plan becomes your beacon of visibility. It sets the stage for your app’s grand entrance, ensuring it doesn’t get lost in the digital abyss.
  • Targeting the Right Audience: A strategic marketing plan helps you identify and connect with your ideal audience. By understanding their needs, preferences, and pain points, you can tailor your app’s message to resonate deeply with them.
  • Building Credibility: Your marketing plan is the architect behind your app’s credibility. It enables you to establish trust, showcase your unique value proposition, and position your app as a reliable and indispensable solution.
  • Driving User Acquisition: A well-executed marketing plan acts as a catalyst for user acquisition. It propels your app into the hands of eager users, ensuring a steady influx of downloads and installations.
  • Nurturing User Engagement: Once users have discovered your app, the marketing plan keeps them engaged and captivated. Through targeted campaigns, personalized experiences, and continuous communication, you create a bond that transcends mere usage.
  • Adapting to the Changing Landscape: The mobile app world is an ever-evolving realm. A dynamic marketing plan allows you to adapt to industry trends, consumer behavior shifts, and emerging technologies, ensuring your app remains relevant and impactful.

Now, armed with this knowledge, you hold the keys to success. Remember, creating an exceptional mobile app is only the beginning. With a well-thought-out marketing plan, you can conquer the mobile world, captivate audiences, and transform your app from a mere dream into a resounding success story.

Pre-Launch App Marketing Strategy

Although every app developer’s wish is to reach the peak of download numbers immediately after launch, it happens so rarely that even those with flawless post-launch marketing strategies often experience a disappointing start. Indeed, the app market is overly saturated, but what really makes the biggest difference is the pre-launch app marketing strategy. Here’s how to promote your mobile app before it’s available for the public, and ensure to grow sales from day one.

Establish an Early Timeline

Your first day of app building should simultaneously be the first day of your marketing campaign as well – the sooner you generate excitement, the more time your app’s public image will have to mature. Even if you don’t start the media push right away, this early phase will help you determine your marketing direction and set the ground for a more aggressive advertising investment in the future. In App Savvy, Ken Yarmosh defines this process as a gradual marketing progress that starts soft at the beginning, continues to build, and eventually peaks with the app’s arrival in stores.

Proceed with Market Analysis

As always with marketing strategies of any kind, a market analysis is the unavoidable step to success. In your particular case, it suggests defining your target audience and conducting a competitive analysis. Although these techniques come in many variants, the simplest of the sort is to track your competition on social media and hence determine in which way their products are comparable to yours, as well as what kind of audience is attracted to apps similar to yours. By following customer behaviour, you’ll learn more about the specific needs and preferences of your future buyers.

Promote & Engage

Once you have established your target audience and identified the unique selling points of your app, it’s time to promote the app and engage with potential users. This step is crucial for creating hype and generating buzz about your app before its launch.

Create a Landing Page

Creating a landing page is an important step in the pre-launch app marketing strategy. It is a dedicated webpage that serves as a one-stop destination for all the information regarding your upcoming app. The landing page should be designed in a way that effectively showcases the app’s unique features and benefits, as well as its value proposition to the target audience.

The landing page should have a clean and visually appealing design that aligns with your brand identity. The content on the page should be concise, easy to understand, and highlight the app’s key selling points. It should also include clear calls to action (CTAs) that encourage visitors to sign up for updates or notifications about the app’s launch.

Having a landing page not only captures user interest but also helps in building an email list of potential customers who are interested in your app. You can use this email list for email marketing campaigns, keeping users engaged and informed about the app’s launch, and building anticipation.

Social Media

Now that you know who your audience is, it’s time to start approaching them on social media. And while all popular networks make a fine platform for doing so, Twitter seems to be the best tool for making an initial contact, simply because it’s packed with tech-savvy people your industry benefits the most from.

The way you prioritize your social media presence will depend on the very nature of your app and your target audience – LinkedIn, for instance, is perhaps the best choice if your app is business-related, while the new buzz-maker Snapchat is most suitable for targeting young, mobile phone-addicted millennials.

All the same, try spreading the word and sharing exclusive sneak peeks, teasers and promo videos of the app across all available networks and develop your marketing campaigns according to the feedback you gather.

Email Marketing

The word around campus is that email marketing is making a huge comeback. For your specific purpose, this strategy is essential since it attracts the other part of your audience. While tech-savvy adopters will spontaneously come through your social media campaigns, the email route will lure in those unenthused about the app industry, but still eager to purchase something that will offer a practical solution to their problems. That way, the email list does a great job of widening your initial target audience.

  • Leverage Feedbacks

In addition to being a great traffic booster, social media campaigns are a great method of engaging real app users with a lot of experience in the industry and leveraging their feedbacks for potential modifications and further improvement. This may be just the most important part of the pre-launch marketing strategy – instead of simply promoting app, try engaging your future buyers in the very process of building and development.

Engage Influencers

Influencer marketing involves partnering with individuals who have a significant social media following and are considered influential within a particular industry or niche. By collaborating with these influencers, you can tap into their established audience and gain exposure for your app.

To begin with, you need to identify potential influencers who are relevant to your app and have an audience that aligns with your target demographic. Once you have shortlisted a few influencers, you can reach out to them and propose a partnership. This can be in the form of a sponsored post, a review, or a giveaway that highlights your app.

Influencers can help build credibility for your app by providing an authentic endorsement to their followers. They can also create engaging content around your app, including tutorials, demos, and testimonials, which can drive downloads and user engagement.

In addition, influencers can provide valuable feedback and insights about your app, which can help you improve and refine your marketing strategy. By collaborating with influencers, you can also build long-term relationships that can extend beyond the launch of your app.

  • Build user persona

User personas are an important tool in promoting a mobile app marketing strategy, helping you to create a more personalized and effective approach. By creating a semi-fictional character that embodies your ideal customer, you can gain insight into their demographics, interests, and pain points.

Through user personas, you can identify the operating system your target audience prefers, the type of content that resonates with them, and the influencers they follow. This information can guide you in creating a marketing message that speaks directly to your audience, using the tone of voice and visual patterns that catch their attention.

Moreover, user personas can help you to identify the problems and pain points your potential users may be experiencing. By addressing these needs in your app, you can create a more customized experience that closely matches their expectations.

Running a beta test is a crucial step in ensuring the success of your mobile app. This process involves recruiting a group of real users to test your app before its official launch. Beta testers can provide valuable feedback on the usability, functionality, and overall user experience of your app.

  • Run a beta test

To run a successful beta test, you need to identify your target audience and recruit beta testers from this group. You can leverage social media, email marketing, and other online platforms to find potential beta testers. It’s important to select beta testers who are representative of your target audience and who will provide honest and constructive feedback.

During the beta testing phase, it’s essential to communicate with your beta testers regularly and gather feedback from them. This feedback will help you identify and address any issues or bugs before your app’s official launch. It’s also important to set up a system for tracking and managing feedback, so you can prioritize and address issues effectively.

Take Things Into Your Own Hands.

Although potentially the most effective tactic for promoting your app, social media presence should not be your only marketing strategy. In the online world run by Google, searchability and SEO-friendliness bare a significant part, which is why you should certainly take things in your own hands and start generating quality content. If you haven’t already, start working on your website and put some effort into building your own blog.

  • Lean into videos

Video content has become an essential part of mobile app marketing strategies in recent years. In 2021, video content accounted for 69% of all mobile traffic, and this number is expected to reach 79% by 2027. The reason behind this trend is that video content is more engaging and catches the viewer’s attention more easily than text-based content.

Nowadays, social media platforms such as Instagram, TikTok, and Snapchat have shifted their focus to video and visual content. These platforms provide a great opportunity to reach your target audience and introduce your app to potential customers through video campaigns.

Post-Launch App Marketing Plan

Once your pre-launch campaign is solid enough, the marketing crescendo Yarmosh refers to in his book will coincide with the app launch date. That way, you can only continue the progress that’s already been started and additionally boost it with press releases, app store optimization tactics and further promotional methods. Here’s how.

Organic Promotion

Although your pre-launch marketing efforts – email lists, social media presence, influencer campaigns, website and blogging in the first place – will serve as a stable base for some free post-launch app promotion, there’s plenty of creative methods for making those efforts even more effective. Contest-driven social media campaigns may be the most successful way of doing so. Take Glu Mobile as an example – in order to increase app installations of their new game, Diner Dash 2016, the company created smart photo ads displaying a real chef and added some Diner Dash food items from the game to the ad image and shared it on Instagram, thus increasing their sales for 39%. And, if these don’t up your download numbers the way you need them to, try with giveaways.

Being a social proof of your app’s quality, these numbers are initially more important than the profits you make; if anything else fails, sacrificing a small portion of your early profits may be a worthy way of engaging more people with your product.

Paid Promotion

If you’re looking for a quick and efficient way to boost your app’s promotion, paid mobile ads are the way to go. Social media platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Google offer powerful advertising tools to help you reach a wider audience with increased targeting capabilities and re-marketing features. With Facebook App Install Ads, for example, you can target users based on their interests, behaviors, and demographics to maximize your ad’s effectiveness.

Twitter Ads offer advanced targeting options, including keywords, interests, and events. Instagram Sponsored Posts can increase your visibility to a younger demographic with visually appealing content. And Google Universal App Campaigns use machine learning algorithms to optimize your ad performance across Google’s platforms. With these paid promotion options, you can drive app installs and boost engagement for a reasonable cost.

App Store Optimization

ASO, or App Store Optimization, is a special strategy that requires much more than writing a great description on your App Store page. In general, it revolves around SEO-friendly keywords, which can improve your app’s search ranking by an average of 10.3%.

The same applies to the app description that, in addition to being searchable, needs to be original, compelling, and professionally written, all the while providing valuable information. Screenshots, as you might know, are crucial for showcasing your app’s key features, but a complementary video that highlights the app’s USP (unique selling proposition) and serves as a user guide at the same time will certainly increase your download numbers and consequently rank your app higher in the Store.

A/B testing

Imagine you have a mobile app that you’ve been working hard on developing. You want to make sure that the features you’ve included are appealing to your users and that they are easy to use. This is where A/B testing comes in.

A/B testing is a way to test two different versions of something (in this case, your app) to see which one performs better. You can test anything from the layout of your app to the color of the buttons to the wording of the onboarding process.

Here’s an example: let’s say you want to test the wording of your onboarding process. You create two different versions: one that uses more technical language and one that uses simpler, more conversational language. You randomly show each version to different users who are downloading your app and then track which one leads to more downloads and sign-ups.

Based on the results, you can then make changes to your app to reflect the version that performed better. This way, you can constantly improve your app based on real user feedback.

Consistency & Other Tactics

No matter how successful your overall marketing campaign, the engagement of new customers, as well as clever customer retention, should not diminish for some time after the launch. The previously started SEO-friendly blogging campaign should continue as well. In the meantime, start looking at customer comments and reviews so you can pinpoint potential weak points and understand in which direction to take the post-launch update phase.

The same valuable info comes from analytics and stats, particularly the DAU and MAU (Daily and Monthly Active Users), App Retention Rate (for how long the users use your app before uninstalling), and ARPU (Average Revenue per User). As mentioned earlier, these pieces of information will help you learn more about your update urgencies and point out the overlooked bugs that need to be promptly fixed.

Only by covering all channels, enticing an audience that goes beyond your targeted group and providing high quality promotional material, your app might stand the chance in the saturated market. To increase your chances, stay unique, sharp and proactive – in the digital times, mobile apps are a lifestyle choice, and you should always treat and recommend yours as such.

The Final verdict

Promoting your mobile app is crucial to its success, and requires a well-thought-out marketing plan that includes pre-launch and post-launch strategies. By creating user personas, conducting competitor analysis, leveraging social media, email marketing, engaging influencers, and running a beta test, you can effectively market your app and create buzz around its launch. Don’t forget to also create a landing page and continually update your app to keep users engaged and satisfied.

If you’re looking for a reliable and experienced partner to help you develop and promote your mobile app, Finoit Technologies is a renowned mobile application development company providing innovative mobile app development services. We have developed over 450 mobile apps and have assisted many solopreneurs in their journey of startups by functioning as a tech partner and rolling out their product ideas. Connect with our development expert for questions/queries, you may write to us at [email protected].

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