Guest Blog: Matthew Hrushka is currently Director of Acquisition Marketing at Startpage. He worked in Mobile/Digital Advertising since 2011. His career began at the Washington based MLB team, Washington Nationals, where he managed all marketing including radio, TV, digital advertising, and scoreboard promotions.
After his tenure with the Nationals, he went on to work for a Mobile Ad Network, Verve Mobile, where he managed the Ad Operations team. After building Ad Operations skills, he accepted a position with Rosetta Stone where he oversaw digital marketing for the company’s flagship mobile app, Learn Languages with Rosetta Stone, on both iOS/Android.
ON METRICS
Results are all that matter. At the end of the day, are you reaching the right consumer without overspending and driving a high LTV within those users? There are a ton of additional variables prior to that first click all the way into first launch, but this is why we test.
I’ve always found the best thing to do is not to buy into hype of larger social networks. Don’t get me wrong, they have incredible reach and granular targeting, but it comes at a premium. Other networks can provide the same, if not better targeting and features at a much lower cost and higher downstream event count/conversions. My primary focus is growing an app with positive ROM and high engagement.
One item that needs to be monitored is your fraud console within an attribution partner. Regardless of a large or small network, monitoring high click volume, time to install, click stacking, etc. gives you incredible insight into the partner and what you’re receiving on the backend in terms of valued users.
ON CREATIVES
Creatives are similar to UA partners—you’ll want test to understand what works with your targeted audience. This is also the entry point to your application, so think before just throwing something out there. This could be the first exposure of your application which can ultimately drive a purchase or lose a customer.
Let’s take a second to think about that first exposure, “What defines your application from your competitors?”, “What’s the value?”, “How can I drive engagement?” When building creative or a slew of variants, you should be answering these with images and limited text.
Once you have creative variants and start testing, think about the connected modeling and building a marketing funnel for those users that didn’t install but were exposed. Maybe non-installers didn’t like the creative or it didn’t offer them enough to take that next step. Take notes of those changes or wins within creative to apply to your next build and UA/re-engagement campaigns.
Learn more about Matthew from his Mobile Heroes profile.
ON OPPORTUNITIES
Your biggest opportunity is your data. Most companies have more than they know what to do with, so simplify it. Understand short and long term goals and leverage data for your campaigns. There is an important lesson to learn with each audience segment or overall profile. Just like testing mentioned above, try everything to either rule out or determine a success.
If you don’t have a robust data set, build it into your SDKs. This is incredibly important when testing a partner for UA/re-engagement because they really are only as good as the data they receive. If your goal is to hit a specific event, build multiple passable events past that “Goal event” allowing your partner to continually optimize and get smarter about their media buying, not to mention pooling users for re-engagement programs down the line.
THE LAST WORD
Test everything. If something doesn’t work, understand why it didn’t work.
Data is everything. Invest in your platform, build your platform, and reap the benefits.
Never stop learning. Read, go to conferences, network, etc. and put yourself out there, have a beer and talk Mobile.