Dariia Opanasiuk

Q&A with Dariia

Dariia Opanasiuk is Chief Marketing Officer at Impulse, a leading brain training app with over eight million users. Since 2018, Dariia has managed health & fitness, education and gaming apps. With a team of experienced marketers, she currently leads the performance marketing and advertising strategy for the Impulse app and crossword game, Wordsgram. Dariia’s focus is on growing the Impulse marketing team and improving creative & media buying processes.

In your own words, tell us about the app(s) that you manage?

Impulse is a combination of bite-sized games that help improve memory, concentration, problem-solving and more. It is your daily brain training and productivity coach—irreplaceable in today’s busy and fast-paced lifestyle.

I primarily manage performance marketing and advertising strategy for the Impulse app but also the crossword game, Wordsgram.

How did you get started in mobile marketing?

Over the last seven years, I managed different businesses before landing in mobile marketing. To me, it is a booming industry that gives young professionals opportunities to grow. So almost four years ago, I decided to devote my career to mobile marketing.

At Impulse, I develop growth marketing processes and oversee all creative production. From 2018 to the present, I led the Impulse marketing team through our first release and soft launch to become one of the top downloaded iOS apps in the US and the top brain-training app worldwide.

What do you like most about mobile marketing?

The opportunity to grow fast, gain experience quickly, accept challenges and overcome obstacles. Mobile marketing is one of the best industries for ambitious rising professionals.

What does it take to succeed in mobile marketing?

Mobile marketing is a field that demands strong decision-making, flexibility and a goal-oriented personality. To be the best, you must test and scale faster than competitors. That’s why it is important to stay flexible, respond to changes and proactively look for new ways to reach business goals.

What strategies work best to convert installs into engaged app users?

Make a product customers will be obsessed with. To successfully do that, you need to focus on customer needs. ​​Update your business model and objectives to put customers at the core. It's much easier to engage users if you are focused on solving your target user’s problems.

It also helps to segment users at each stage of the creative. Connect creative concepts with parts of your product and use deep links to land users where your app is the most interesting for users. For higher engagement, pay attention to app events tracking, user segmentation and push notifications.

In the past year, what is one tip you can share which made the biggest performance difference for your UA strategy?

Involve your marketing team in the analysis. Show team members the results of each test and work on users’ feedback together. When everyone contributes to understanding better what works and what doesn’t, it is easier to generate ideas and improve the app for your audience.

What advice can you offer marketers to successfully re-engage mobile app users?

1. The first step toward re-engaging app users is to learn why they have become disengaged. This will give you the right direction on what to do next.
2. Use analytical tools to see disengaged users. Know what the ideal user behavior is for your app.
3. Analyze data discrepancies. For example, gaps in login frequency or length of an app session. Then build and validate or disprove the discrepancies.

What’s your top tip when it comes to mobile ad creative?

Your creatives are eighty percent of your marketing strategy’s success. If you find a high-performing creative—make as many variations with it as you can.

A key tip here is to not make any significant changes to the high-performing creative initially. The creative should only be slightly different for the users but completely different for ad platforms. Iterations after will help extend good performance for the long run.

Stuck on what variations to do? Involve your teammates in generating creative content and a fresh perspective. Show the top-performing creative and use a rapid ideation technique at team meetings to gather ideas from colleagues. Select the best options and remember that any idea, even if it sounds insane, is worth testing.

What are your top 3 go-to resources for keeping up with the mobile ad tech industry?

I regularly read TechCrunch, MobileDevMemo, AdExchanger and blogs from ad networks & MMPs like Liftoff, ironSource, or Appsflyer.