Where to Advertise iPhone Apps

I’ve been lucky enough to do lots of iPhone app advertising in the past couple years.

I’ve spend money on:

• iPhone ad networks
• Incentivized downloads
• Promotional activities

It’s a process that takes:

• Money to spend
• An understanding of where to spend/not spend
• Ability to track conversions so you can measure success
• Creative and a test plan
• Willingness and understanding of how to measure your ROI

It’s actual hard to do without either lots of background or a willingness to make mistakes.

Good luck in your advertising efforts!

App Marketing Basics

Most of the time, I write about very practical how-to-do app marketing stuff.

But for some folks new to app marketing, it may make sense to start with the basics?

What for starters, is app marketing?

It’s all the efforts you make to put your app in front of potential customers.

It could be things like:

• Creating a press release for PrMac
• Testing pay per click ads with Admob
• Contacting app review sites
• Developing Youtube videos about your app

Some of these activities are more for driving awareness than downloads. PR, for example, will help you drive awareness, but is less likely to drive downloads. Spending money with Admob on the other hand is less for awareness and more for driving downloads.

Whatever you add to your app marketing “to do” list I encourage you to watch it, measure it, and evaluate it.

Good luck!

Cost per Install Companies

There are SO many cost per install marketing companies today.

They focus on driving downloads of mobile apps, so that app developers can rise in the app store rankings.

Here is a list of a few of them:

• Apperang
• AppRedeem
• Flurry
• Tapjoy
• TapZilla
• WeReward

If you’ve got marketing dollars to spend promoting your apps, you might want to take a look at each of them.

Some quick thoughts:

• The main benefit of these companies is driving your app ranking. If they aren’t doing that, it’s not worth it.
• Make sure that you are getting lots of organic downloads from the money your spending with CPI companies
• Play with the bid prices so you are not over bidding for downloads

Questions? Comments? Good luck!

Cost per Download (CPI) Marketing

iPhone app marketing gets more and more competitive all the time. You’ve made a great app, but now you need LOTS of people to download it.

Cost per Install (CPI) Marketing is becoming a popular way to drive app store rankings,which in turn drive app store downloads.

In CPI Marketing you only pay when someone installs your app. You can use companies like Tapjoy and Flurry to market your app. You pay them $.25-$1 per install.

Why would you do this?

Because if they can drive a certain # of installs quickly, you can move up the iTunes app store ranking. By being ranked higher, you’ll get lots of new people seeing and downloading your app.

Questions? Comments?

 

Top SEO Tips

Why do so many websites get designed, created and launched AND THEN someone thinks about search engine optimization? It’s never too early to start thinking about creating an SEO friendly website.

When mapping out website, you should have an SEO Checklist:

• Domain
• Page title
• URL
• Content
• Incoming Links
• Meta keywords
• Meta description

Each of these areas should be considered when you are building a new website or creating new content.

Get a cross departmental team of marketing people and technical folks involved.

Best of luck in optimizing your website!

 

My Top 3 Mobile Ad Networks!!!

How do you monetize your iPhone apps?

One common and effective way is to run banner ads in your apps to generate revenue.

But which mobile ad network are the best?

Here is what I look for when choosing my top mobile advertising partners:

• Do they have enough volume?
• Can they drive high eCPMs (effective cost per thousand…defined by how much an advertiser will spend per 1,000 impressions)?
• Are they easy to integrate with?
• Are they easy to work with?
• Do they have GREAT reporting?

I’ve tested probably a dozen partners and have three favorite mobile ad networks.

They are:

1. iAds,
2. Google AdSense, and
3. Millennial Media.

They each have their BIG strengths.

Here they are:

• iAds = higher CPMs than others
• Google = higher fill rates than other
• Millennial = a good combination of both

I think you should consider testing these three networks. Good luck!!!

iPhone App Marketing by the Numbers

As an iPhone app developer you can’t just be creative, you need to run your business by the numbers.

You should have solid numbers for:

• Estimating the costs for development
• Overall marketing
• Each part of your marketing plan
• For what you think a customer will be worth

iPhone app marketing analysis is just as important as the creative side.

So put aside your fear of spreadsheets and get to it!

Good luck!

iPhone App Marketing – Gotta Be Creative

This year I’m working on being more creative. It’s been a bit of a weakness in the past. I’m a bit more analytical than creative.

It is SO KEY to be creative when you’re doing iPhone app marketing.

Why so?

The iPhone and iPod touch are entertainment devices even more than communication devices (the phone part doesn’t alway work so great!). If you’re creating boring, dull, or confusing apps, you’re entertainment level is probably quite low.

Here are ways I encourage you to be creative:

1) Dreamin up your next iPhone app
2) With all your images (icons, screenshots, etc)
3) Developing / running ads

Find a quite spot, a piece of paper, a pen, and start writing down all the creative ways you can make your app better!

Does that make sense? Best of luck!

8 Tips on Shopping Cart Optimization

One of the most overlooked optimizations done on website are the SHOPPING CART.

In order to optimize your shopping cart you often need buy in from these folks:

• CEO
• Head of marketing
• Person doing the coding

Make sure everyone’s on board and then get going! By increasing the conversion rate on a site by 1% if you’ve got 10,000 visitors a month, you’ll see 100 more orders.

Best of luck!

Brook

iPhone App Review Sites

If you’ve developed a GREAT iPhone app, you are looking for sites that will review your app. It can be really frustrating to either not get reviews or get bad reviews.

Let me give you some tips on approaching iPhone App Review Sites.

First, read the submission page carefully!
Second, be brief in telling them about your app.
Third, explain clearly what makes your app SO GREAT.
Fourth, link to a short YouTube video about your app if at all possible.

Hope that helps.

Good luck. Questions?