Revisiting the Fundamentals of App Marketing Post IDFA — Thomas Petit
Apr 22, 2021
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App marketing expert Thomas Petit discusses the importance of paid user acquisition, the evolution of app marketing, optimizing user conversion on Facebook, the limitations of IDFA for tracking, and app marketing challenges in the post-IDFA era.
Creative is the key driver of user acquisition success in the post-IDFA era.
Building an owned audience and utilizing earned marketing are crucial for app growth.
UA managers need to adapt to the evolving marketing landscape and embrace a more strategic approach.
Deep dives
The changing role of UA manager and the importance of creative
The role of a UA manager has evolved over time, with automation taking over many aspects of bid management and audience targeting. Today, UA managers primarily focus on producing, testing, and deploying creative. Creative has become the key driver of UA success, as platforms like Facebook optimize for engagement signals such as video view duration and interaction. UA managers need to adapt their strategies and think strategically about the data they feed back to networks. Creative plays a crucial role in driving user engagement and influencing ad relevance on platforms.
The importance of owned and earned marketing
Owned and earned marketing play a vital role in app growth. Building an owned audience through strategies like email lists, content creation, and community engagement helps establish a strong user base. Earned marketing, such as PR, featuring, and word-of-mouth, can also contribute to app growth. These activities should be started early to gather feedback, validate hypotheses, and work towards scaling the product. The relationship between UA and owned/earned marketing is essential. UA managers need to provide insights and collaborate with other teams, such as the growth team and engineers, to optimize retention and drive user engagement.
The shift towards a new era of marketing and the implications
The marketing landscape is undergoing a significant transformation, driven by factors such as automation, platform changes, and evolving user behavior. UA managers need to adapt to this changing landscape and embrace a more strategic approach. The focus of UA has shifted towards creative production and testing, recognizing that creative plays a crucial role in ad performance and user engagement. The role of UA manager has become more specialized, requiring a deep understanding of data, ad platforms, and the interplay between creative and user behavior. The rise of subscription-based apps adds another layer of complexity, with different metrics and bidding strategies to consider.
The challenges of app attribution and the impact of IDFA changes
App attribution has been a unique challenge due to the absence of cookies and the intermediary role of app stores. Mobile measurement platforms have helped marketers understand where their installs are coming from, primarily relying on the IDFA. However, with Apple's changes to app tracking transparency, attribution methods are being disrupted. The reliance on IDFA is diminishing, and marketers need to adapt to new measurement approaches. Networks like Facebook are affected by these changes, as their attribution relies on the IDFA. The shifting landscape of attribution and the evolving privacy landscape are redefining the way marketers approach paid user acquisition.
Facebook's Challenge with Apple's App Tracking Transparency
With Apple's new policy, Facebook will no longer be able to use the IDFA to track users across apps, limiting their ability to optimize ads and target users. While Facebook has a vast amount of first-party data, they are now restricted from mingling it with third-party data collected through their own SDK in other apps.
The Importance of Deterministic Measurement in Advertising
Deterministic measurement, enabled by the IDFA, allowed Facebook to track users who clicked on ads and see their actions within the app they installed. This feedback loop helped optimize ads and target users more effectively. However, with the introduction of Apple's SKAdNetwork, which has limitations and relies on probabilistic attribution, the future of precise ad measurement and optimization becomes more complex and uncertain.
