From the moment Apple announced the changes that would come to the App Store at the WWDC, app marketers started looking for ways to adapt their mobile user acquisition strategy for the new era of iOS 15 app marketing.

However, what to expect from these changes and how to adjust marketing strategies to the new system emerged as puzzling aspects for most. With the participation of  Roy Yanai from AppsFlyer, Laura Krivetskaya from Product Madness, Chen Ofir from yellowHEAD, and the moderation of Yusuf Barutçu we covered everything you need to know about iOS 15 user acquisition in our webinar.

For those who missed this valuable discussion session, we handpicked the most valuable takeaways from the webinar and compiled them in this article.

Huge changes are on the way from being able to do testing with Apple Search Ads to SkAdnetworks. What should we as app marketers expect?

Roy: Besides the testing tools that come with iOS 15, another important consideration is how Apple will deal with information gathering. With ATT, Apple removed the capability of deep linking to the app where the journey of users starts with more accurate elements. 

For example, when a user encounters a hotel ad, the journey in the app used to start with the very same hotel, thanks to deep linking. However, this doesn’t seem possible with SkAdNetworks. So it will be interesting to learn how Custom Product Pages and paid marketing will roll out and how app marketers will measure these aspects. 

Laura: First of all, we should understand Apple Search Ads strategies and consider it as a tool that can be beneficial for our ASO efforts. Moreover, in the next year, these features will be available for Apple Search Ads and Custom Product Pages will replace creative sets. So, we should track the performance of our keywords, check the conversion rates, and optimize our ASO efforts utilizing these coming changes. For this matter, a clear plan should be made and we should prioritize tasks and goals to benefit from the opportunity that Apple gives us. 

How will In-App Events affect the user acquisition strategies and how do we prepare for them? 

Chen: In-App events will have a huge impact on the entire ASO work. They have huge potential to increase visibility in the store and to attract new users and re-engage the old ones. So, this is also great for retention purposes. We can also mention the keyword targeting opportunities. Because we know that In-App events will be shown in the search results. Meaning that their titles, short descriptions, and keywords will be indexed. So, another growth opportunity there. 

Moreover, they will also have an impact on browse traffic. Because the place which belongs to featured apps before will be in-app events’. So, those apps that are featured on a daily basis and get browse traffic from there should adapt their strategies to these changes. Otherwise, they will face a drop in their browse traffic. 

Every improvement brings its own drawbacks. So what are the pros and cons of SkAdNetwork?

Roy: Apple released a new feature within SkAdNetwork which is a copy of the postback to its designated endpoint that the advertisers can define within the app. And this is actually great because it shows that Apple listens to the market. We were saying that the data should go to the advertisers and not to the ad networks. So it is a great move but now the question is what to do with it.

As Appflyer, we are providing additional data such as the rate of redownloads. This is something other SRNs(Self-Reporting Networks) currently don’t do, it doesn’t benefit them. However, it is an important metric. And this is one of the disadvantages when the data goes to the Ad Network. 

How should we get prepared for the upcoming changes? 

Chen: The main aspect to notice here is the collaboration between UA and ASO teams. Because of all those changes that are about to come into effect in iOS. Of course, UA and App Store Optimization teams are also working hand to hand now. But their collaboration will get even tighter. These teams will have to gain insights from one end to another to help each other and grow the work. And the creative team will be on board more than ever with these upcoming features. All those features will require a huge amount of creatives. So it will be a challenge to adapt to these changes. This is why smaller brands and apps with smaller creative capacity should begin strategizing their creatives and marketing purposes in advance.

Roy: So What happened is that SkAdNetworks actually leveled everything down to the same capabilities and now everybody is blind in the same way. A lot has shifted to creative optimization. However, what we see as the distinctive skill in the new era of iOS 15 app marketing is the ability to control the conversion volume. If you know how to set your conversion volume in the best way possible, you will win. 

In addition to these, especially with custom product pages, we see that the creatives are becoming more and more significant for app marketing. And on SkAdnetworks, I would like to say that hold on tight, I believe everything will get better soon.   

Laura: My recommendation is to choose wisely. I would say that you should try to close the gaps between the departments. Especially if your responsibility is to optimize keywords and improve conversion rates. You should keep your creativity at a high level. And you should focus on differentiating the tools you use while revising the existing ones. You should also follow what’s happening in the market, what your competitors are doing, and try to get everything ready before these features come in.

Takeaways

In this recap, we have seen that the industry experts are meeting on the common ground that creatives will take the center stage in 2022. Our speakers have shared some golden tips on how to get ready for these changes. So let’s conclude by going over their suggestions.

  • Analyze the market and track your competitors. Otherwise, you may fall behind in the user acquisition race. 
  • Product Page Optimization and Custom Product Pages will bring a lot of work that requires a tighter connection between departments. So make sure that all of your departments are working closely. 
  • Plan ahead for your marketing purposes and begin preparing your mobile ad creatives.
  • In-App Events will have a huge impact on ASO by increasing visibility and retention rates. However, they will also change the dynamics of the app store, so app marketers should adapt to the new system. 
  • Apple Search Ads benefits organic user acquisition in many ways and is becoming the center of mobile advertising for iOS. Therefore, app marketers should start mastering Apple Search Ads to maximize their growth in the next chapter of iOS 15 app marketing.

Getting ready for these upcoming changes might seem challenging. However, with the right toolkit, you can start building your way up to the top. Schedule a demo with our experts now and learn how MobileAction can help you thrive in this time of change for the mobile growth ecosystem.