App Growth Talks: Tom Nguyen

This is an episode of App Growth Talks, interviews with experts on mobile marketing and growth. This episode’s special guest is Tom Nguyen, Digital Marketing Enthusiast & Tucmedia Founder. Tom is an entrepreneur, expert on mobile gaming, apps, ASO and user acquisition.

In this interview, as a qualified mobile marketer and digital business owner, Tom shares a lot of personal experience, thoughts and tips in terms of his professional journey in mobile marketing, entrepreneurship, work with mobile game titles, ASO, mobile ads and versatile user acquisition channels.

Below, you will find timecodes, key topics and some thoughts Tom shared during the App Growth Talk, while other interesting comments, insights & tips you will find out by watching the interview or listening to the podcast. 

01:00 Tom, what do you do now and what’s next?

Watch the interview to find the answer.

03:08 What are the most important things you’ve learned during all these years working in the mobile industry? Have you ever thought about writing a book?

• Fighting stigma and doing unconventional things
• How competitiveness pushes the boundaries
• Facebook vs Instagram case

09:02 What does entrepreneurship give you?

• There needs to be a delicate balance in a team. One person that thinks differently is enough.
• Among successful experiments there are tons of other experiments and tests that didn’t work out. 
• If you have only one good experiment out of 10, the chances are this one experiment is going to financially make up for the rest of the experiments. 

14:52 You worked with app store optimization. What’s more important for ASO: creativity & innovation – or data & analytics? I know that both are important. But which one trumps the other?

• Two sides of the coin that are equally important.
• “Working on a couple of game titles, I’ve seen that in terms of data, or technical part, there is only so much you can do. Getting the technical part of ASO is one thing – but it’s gonna pay off for some time.”
• Creatives are unlimited options. Keep on A/B testing. 

19:23 What are your user acquisition tips that are still effective?

• Art (creative, marketing) & science (data, tech, algorithms) approach 
• Creative that works on Facebook isn’t going work on Instagram. 
• Creatives are king. 

21:45 There is a “Bring ROI home” motto on your LinkedIn page. What are other metrics you track when evaluating your performance marketing campaigns?

• You have to figure out such metrics for your product. It depends on the game category, etc.
• Even if it’s gaming and two different games of the same genre – it’s not going to be the same metrics to look at. The game mechanics is different, the audience might be different, monetization loops are different.
• Having a look at the funnel – from impression to purchase – is crucial.
• Looking at ROI is cool on the top level but in terms of day-to-day managing campaigns – most of the time it’s not going to work.

31:13 What’s your opinion on Apple Ads? Do you believe it’s possible to scale with this channel?

• There is a push & pull differentiation between channels and campaigns. If Facebook is push, Apple Ads is pull, since the search part is based on incentive.
• To scale any pull-campaign, you should create this incentive first – through the push campaigns.

35:19 Have you ever noticed that Apple Ads campaigns boosted organic keyword rankings?

• Totally.
• You should look at ASA from a different perspective – and this is a boost to ASO. 
• Insights you can find in Apple Ads, you won’t find in ASO. With Apple Ads, you will be able to make informative decisions. 

40:13 What are key things you should know to succeed on TikTok? 

• Today I wouldn’t call TikTok a social media platform, but rather an entertainment platform.
• Creatives on TikTok are next level. I have never seen any channel that would be as complex to figure out when it comes to creative. 
• Ads on TikTok are actually a set of native organic content. You want to be as appealing and entertaining, as the native organic content that people see to make them click on your ad.

46:36 What new technology are you most excited about?

• AR & VR, especially for e-commerce apps
• Voice AI. “My home is full of Alexa”

52:25 The ATT framework has come into force, do you allow tracking as a user?

Watch the interview to find out the answer.

54:47 How in your opinion, the mobile industry differs from non-mobile businesses in terms of marketing?

Listen to the podcast to find out.