App Growth Week Day 5 Recap: App Lifecycle Strategies
Gabriel Kuriata
Gabriel Kuriata 
Some apps are like grocery stores: they do their job well and users get angry when they move stuff around. They keep the snacks in the same place and retain customers for years.
Some apps are like a box of chocolates. Even the most persistent heroes may take an arrow to the knee and cease grinding in your procedurally generated dungeons. Or matching crystals, conquering neighbours or generating AI images (which is apparently all the rage now).
There’s time for rapid growth, time for updates and optimization, creative in-app events, some honest communication, international expansion or… moving on.
Just not everything, everywhere all at once. Each phase in an app’s life cycle has its own strategies and best practices to achieve the ultimate goal of generating revenue.
These strategies were explored on the final day of our biggest online event ever: App Growth Week. It came on Friday, so all the knowledge was transferred through four open discussions or ask-me anything sessions that featured 10 experts from 6 companies.
It was a great conclusion to an equally fantastic adventure: for all the people involved and the audience that stayed with us till the very last minute before chilling out :)
The last day of App Growth Week came on Friday, which is a good day to just plant some ideas to grow during the rest of the day or or the weekend. We kicked off with a creative discussion between three experts Sarah Touimi, Senior ASO Manager at AppTweak, Anastasiia Baranchikova, Senior ASO Specialist at Prequel and Natalie Tishkevich, Senior Customer Success Manager at SplitMetrics. They shared their insights for the phase during which many apps are no more than a few sketches on paper.
Publishers can start their testing process at different stages of development, market research, prototyping, etc. But the best way is to start testing even when the app or game is not in production yet.
But later stages of the pre-launch stage were discussed too…
App developers and publishers should really consider making their app or game available in pre-order on the App Store or pre-registration on Google Play, because this move can create a big burst of downloads on the first day of the launch.
…as well as the implication of doing things the right way for the future.
My recommendations for 2023: create a consistent user journey, to an app store through advertising, to the onboarding inside the app. The second one that I’m personally in love with is the culturalization of creatives, so we can adopt them to different groups of users.
Perhaps you’re sketching something or brainstorming new features? Then this is a great video for the start of your day:
Validation helps you reduce risk of developing a game or app that won’t attract users, saving you money, time and resources.
There’s no simpler way to put this. This best-practices session shows that it’s never too early to test your ideas.
This video will show you the way we here at SplitMetrics run tests – a full, 8 step framework. With additional insights, interesting visual examples, Hagar Seri, Head of ASO & Mobile CRO at Moburst and Nadia Nazarova, at the time Head of Product at SplitMetrics deliver a session worth saving for future use.
To make users install the app, understand its category. Identify similarities in colors, messaging and tone.
Enjoy:
An ask me anything session is a great way to discuss the many challenges related to maintaining long term growth. Three experts shared their insights on the topic of retention strategies. Here are some of their thoughts:
What retention metrics should be looked at? Weekly, monthly, daily? With subscription apps the example I use all the time is the VSCO app. I don’t use it daily, I don’t use it weekly, I don’t even use it monthly, but when I take a photo that I really care about it goes into VSCO, because I want it. For subscription apps it’s about delivering value.
You should focus on the onboarding flow. That’s where you will get the biggest impact on activation and the rest of the life cycle funnel. As for an industry specific example, in CRM for example it’s really about nailing the experimentation process. There are three pillars for that: first, send less one-offs and focus on automated campaigns. Second, make sure to test your campaigns. Finally get rid of the open rates and click rates and focus on conversion rates, revenue or retention.
Driving retention doesn’t come from a single powerful channel but really from leveraging the mix of channels and having a strong brand to support it. Marketers really need to find where their users are spending their time and exist within their ecosystem. So it could be CTV, it could be social, could be mobile apps or a mix of them, but retention really comes with a good product that leverages its high communicated value.
With three experts and specific questions, expect a lot more insights like this in the video:
After five days of App Growth Week even seasoned specialists can agree that there are a lot of things to do in order to grow and make money. So, as a closure, perhaps it’s the right time to put our newest service into the spotlight.
SplitMetrics Agency is a full-cycle mobile marketing agency driving unparalleled results for top apps and brands. Its two representatives show why more and more companies are switching to their services: Eugene Ilnytskyi, Head of Agency at SplitMetrics and Karina Klepikova, Account Executive at SplitMetrics. Watch and learn how an agency can help you:
Friday discussions were like watching those scientific videos on Youtube. You’ll be inspired, but at the same time – wanting more.
Some people threw the idea of doing an App Growth Month next time, but would it really allow all the people we gathered to talk of everything? Sometimes it’s best to do what we hope our App Growth Week did – planted ideas to mature and turn into successes for you. We could discuss them next November and see what the future holds. See you!
