Tag Archives: App Monetization Insights

Introducing the redesigned AdMob with new tools that make it even easier to earn

It has been a busy time here in Mountain View as more than 7,000 developers joined us at Shoreline Amphitheater for this year’s Google I/O. We made a number of big product announcements but I can’t help being most excited about one in particular — the newly redesigned AdMob!

Many of you rely on in-app ads for revenue — in fact, over 1 million apps now use AdMob to earn across iOS and Android. And to date, we’ve paid out over $3.5 billion dollars to developers like you. But we knew we could be doing even more to help you be successful. So we rebuilt the AdMob platform from the ground up to help you build a profitable business faster and to stay profitable as you scale.

Simple to use with a brand new user interface

Your time is valuable and we want you to spend it growing your business, not navigating our screens. With the new AdMob, everything from navigation to dashboards has been organized around your apps. The tools and features you need most are right at your fingertips. We’ve also applied Material Design across the entire AdMob platform to make your experience intuitive and productive at every step.

When you log in to the new experience, you’ll see a streamlined interface that surfaces key growth trends and gives you a quick snapshot of how your apps are performing. Whether you have one app or fifty, the new app picker will help you rapidly navigate through the new AdMob experience. In addition, we’ve added a simplified dashboard with a complete breakdown of your revenue. From here you can see how ads are impacting critical metrics like lifetime value, engagement, and retention for each app.
With the new AdMob, it’s easier to find your way to what you need

Richer insights with a deep integration with Firebase

We know that you have many different options when it comes to making money for your app business. Whether you decide to use in-app purchases, subscriptions, ads, or commerce, we know how valuable a holistic view can be for making decisions and monitoring how even slight monetization changes can impact user experience. Historically compiling all of this data has required multiple tools and has been time consuming at best and impossible for most. So we’re putting comprehensive analytics at your fingertips through an integration with Google Analytics for Firebase.

With this integration you can see new reporting across all of your revenue sources and dig deeper in Firebase to see how both lifetime value and user behavior are affected.

To get started, link your AdMob and Firebase accounts and update to the latest version of the SDKs. Once linked, you'll have access to detailed ad revenue data and user insights like time spent in the app and in-app purchases—all in one place. Your Firebase account can now access your ad signals and AdMob can access your app usage signals for deeper level insights. With instant access to detailed ad revenue data plus consumer insights like session duration and ad exposure you no longer have to deal with endless spreadsheets or make wild guesses.
Power a smarter monetization strategy with the right data, all in one place.

With a more complete view of lifetime value, you now have the data you need to create a monetization strategy with complete confidence. Marcin Krakowiak, co-founder of Byss Mobile, is already a fan: “Creating a sustainable monetization strategy has been the core focus of our team as we continue diversifying our portfolio of apps. Having meaningful, accurately connected data sources is key to developing that strategy. This new integration between Firebase and AdMob does just that. We are finally able to analyze lifetime value of both in-app purchases and ads to test and create a more profitable monetization strategy.”


Advanced controls to help you scale with Mediation Groups

If you already use AdMob, you know that mediation is a great way to monetize across multiple ad networks. Well, mediation just got even better with the addition of mediation groups.

Historically, you needed to configure mediation for every ad slot and geography. Developers using mediation often found this process extremely time consuming. We’ve introduced mediation groups in AdMob, to make all of this easier. Just set up mediation once and then assign that group to different ad units and countries across all of your apps in a single step. You can also make calls to outbound networks up to three times in a mediation chain, helping you to maximize revenue.
Set up and activate a new mediation group with just a few clicks.

We hope you’ll take advantage of mediation groups and everything else the redesigned AdMob platform has to offer — because it’s been built with you in mind! We’re here to support your success as an app developer, and we’re really excited to see how you use these new tools to grow your business. Become a part of the millions of apps using AdMob by putting our new monetization tools to work.

Visit the Help Center or contact your Google account team to see when you’ll have access to these great features.

Posted by: Duke Dukellis, Group Product Manager, AdMob











Source: Inside AdMob


Optimizing App Monetization with Google AdMob

All views expressed in this blog post are solely those of the author, and not that of Google. This guest post is from Sreeraman Thiagarajan, a Google Developers Expert in the app marketing and monetization space and a published author on the Economic Times. Sreeraman is featured as our guest blogger to share insights and tips from his experience to help AdMob developers grow their earnings. If you’re new to AdMob, be sure to sign up here.

In the introductory post we saw how AdMob lets app developers take control of monetizing their apps - here’s the second part on optimization and measuring.

Optimizing revenue and volume: A counter question I often get goes like this “But other networks offer better eCPM (more dollar for every one thousand impressions served), why must I choose AdMob?” Answer for this lies in understanding two metrics and the two respective fundamentals behind each of these metrics.

The first metric is ‘fill rate’ which means how many relevant ads can the ad network fulfill as requested by your app? A simple demand-supply equation is the fundamental behind this metric, because there are a lot of advertisers on Google, nearly 1million plus advertisers who want to show their ads (demand) to a potential audience who could be using your app (supply). This equation generates a very high amount of ‘ad requests’ of 200 billion per month, globally. With AdMob on your app, you can join the supply side.

The second metric of eCPM is how much money per thousand impression your app can earn? eCPM differs from network to network, however a simple multiplication of eCPM with fill rate answers this question. If network A offers $1 at a fill rate of 85% then you get 85 cents revenue per thousand ad request (aka RPM). Now if network B offers twice as much at $2 but with a lower fill rate of 30% then you only get 60 cents of RPM. That’s a 25% loss on potential earnings.

Choosing the type of ads to show: There a few standard types of ads, namely Banners, Interstitials, Rewarded, and Native. There’s no fixed formula for which type of banner to use, but one principle developers must strongly adhere to is to ‘preserve user experience’ by integrating ads as unobtrusively and as natively as possible.

Game developers have an advantage in using rewarded ads, this a form of interstitial ad units that enables you to reward users with in-app items such as an extra life, a level jump, a feature unlock, etc., for watching video ads.

Native ads is a boon for publishers and content based apps. It is a component based ad format that matches the look and feel of the app where the ad is being displayed. This makes the ads look like they  are  a part of the app and reduces obtrusiveness. A simple example of this is a promoted tweet on Twitter or a promoted post on Facebook. It is essentially a tweet or post like any other, but an identified sponsor has paid to promote it.

Banners and interstitials are pretty standard formats. Apps can choose to display banners at fixed positions on screen like the top or bottom. The full-screen ads are called interstitials, these are displayed at natural transition points in the user journey such as between two levels in a game, between two news articles, etc.

Stop guessing and start testing: App developers often suffer from the curse of knowledge, that is, they assume their users know and use the app the way it was meant to be. But more often than not, this is not true and building the app’s advertising strategy on gut feel is bad for business. Optimal monetization happens when users’ journey from acquisition to retention is deeply understood. Thanks to the integration of Google Firebase with AdMob, app developers can use Firebase’s free & unlimited analytics solution for deploying intelligent ad monetization strategies.

Importing Firebase SDK into apps requires no complicated coding. Once integrated, developers can get details like sessions, demographics of users, revenue from in-app purchases, etc., from Firebase Analytics. Besides this, AdMob’s own reports will give you a ringside view on how revenue is generated.

To optimize monetization, it is imperative developers inculcate a habit of continuous testing and tweaking their product strategy based on data and hard insights.

In conclusion, ads are above fifty percent of total revenue generated by apps. According to data point by App Annie and IDC, in-app ads are projected to grow at 3.2X in next two years1. As stated by Gartner, this year, over 268 billion apps are expected to be downloaded worldwide2; apps have no boundary and you never know audience from which country maybe your biggest fans.

Successful app monetization happens when there’s a mind-set of growth. Grow your audience base, preserve user experience, integrate AdMob, and ad revenue will start taking care of itself. Thus giving developers bandwidth to build more products or enhance existing features.

Google has made a lot of resources available on AdMob and if you are a developer with apps that has over 100,000 downloads you can request a free consultation. Both the resources are free of cost. Godspeed and love to see India rise up in charts for generating app revenue.

1 - https://s3.amazonaws.com/files.appannie.com/reports/App-Annie-IDC-Mobile-App-Advertising-Monetization-Trends-2013-2018-EN.pdf 
2 - http://www.gartner.com/newsroom/id/2654115 

Source: Inside AdMob


How Gaming Apps Can Increase Monetization Through Creative Strategies

Many game developers use other successful titles (whether their own or from another developer) as examples of how to best design a game or monetize. This can be a smart move, especially when it comes to user interface elements like control scheme, player progress, and currency economics. However, when it comes to knowing what is the best way to monetize your app, copying other apps may leave you with money on the table.
It's tempting to look at how successful titles in the app market are making money and mimic it. If it works so well for those games, you might say, it should work just as well for my game. While true in some cases, not all titles can bank on the exact same rhythm of in-app purchases and a sprinkle of rewarded video ads to meet revenue targets.
So what can you do? Focus on what makes your game different-- from the art design to the leveling-- and experiment with in-app purchase and ad placements to fit to amplify this experience. Oh, and here’s where a little out of the box thinking can come in handy-- new ad formats can be very effective in holding user attention without breaking the core loop.  Be sure to test how these work in your game-- they could offer a whole new level of return for ads, and even build the suspense for the player journey.
Fantasy world; real solutions - 4 steps to get you started
Let’s travel to a parallel dimension, a place where a strategy game called Collision of Tribes is not doing that well from a monetization standpoint. In fact, it is just one more app in the store. Its core mechanics have great balance, the user base is engaged, but for some reason the revenue isn’t quite there. Here are some steps to consider as to how an uplift in revenue can be achieved using AdMob:

  • Consider new ad formats - the transition point between a battle report and town management screen is a perfect spot to use an interstitial ad. An even better practice would be to target only users that had success on their raid. Combining an ad with a positive experience in-game will increase it’s effectiveness.
  • Test it - there is no need to release the new ad feature to all users. Developers can choose a small segment of their user base (say 10%) to make sure the effect in revenue is positive. 
  • Gauge user response - just as you would when changing a game mechanic or implementing a new one, look at your engagement metrics to see if there is any wanted or unwanted effect. Reading store reviews will give a more personalized understanding of how users perceive the change.
  • Back to the drawing board - even when things are going well, there’s always room for improvement. Use the data you have to balance and rebalance frequency capping, floor prices and placements. On the other hand, if interstitial ads don’t bring the expected results, how about trying native ads or other formats instead?

Following the above steps can help not only for Collision of Tribes’ developers, but hopefully you as well. If following the leader only got you so far, try something new to take that extra step forward.
Until next time, be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ pages.
Posted by Omri Dolev, Strategic Partner Manager, AdMob.

Source: Inside AdMob


[New eBook] Download The No-Nonsense Guide to Native Ads

Today we’re launching a new eBook called "The No-Nonsense Guide to Native Ads", the latest in our No-Nonsense series. This guide is designed to provide a comprehensive overview of native ads and share practical tips and best practices for implementing native ads in your app.

Over the last several years, app users have raised their expectations for a high quality app UX. To meet these expectations, ad formats have evolved accordingly. The most fitting new format that meets these higher expectations is native ads – ads that match the look and feel of the surrounding app content. And as spending on native ads is expected to grow to $21 billion in 2018, this presents a huge opportunity for publishers to enhance their user experience and tap into new revenues.

In the eBook, you’ll learn:

  • Guiding design principles that will help you better implement native ads 
  • Practical tips and best practices for implementing native ads with lots of examples 
  • Tips on how to set up a proper A/B test to begin testing native ads 
  • How AdMob can help you implement native ads

Download your copy here:

Vishal Kumar, Senior Product Manager, AdMob

Source: Inside AdMob


India-based Neurosurgeon Mohan Noone Builds Popular Travel App and Grows it with AdMob

“This experience has been life changing. From a hobbyist, who would have at most written apps used by a few friends, I have now an app used by millions, every day! It is just unbelievable... I am extremely grateful for this opportunity, and it has been the defining story of my life!” - Mohan Noone
Dr. Mohan Noone is a neurosurgeon who was interested in programming. In 2011, he came across a service that provided live updates on train schedules and envisioned bringing that information to mobile devices. With that spark of inspiration, Noone purchased an Android book to start learning code. As he was building his app, he made sure that it was simple, functional and compact to create the best user experience. After listing his app on the Google Play store, he saw his app Indian Railway Train Status grow to over 5M downloads in just 3 years. Today, the app has over 500K daily active users.

The problem
Several months after the app was released, Noone looked for ways to monetize his popular app. He decided to implement banners, but didn’t see great results at first due to poor ad placements.

The solution
Noone then decided to move the banner ad to the homepage and saw his revenue skyrocket about 10X. Afterwards, Noone decided to add interstitials, which helped him triple his revenue overnight. He believed that it was important not to overwhelm users with ads. Instead of showing interstitials in every session, he randomly triggered the loading, which meant fewer ads for the users.

The results
Over the years, Noone’s dedication to creating a positive user experience helped Indian Railway Train Status achieve over 5M downloads.

Indian Railway Train Status’ banner ad
To check out Mohan Noone’s success story, or any other of our other success stories, visit us at at the AdMob website. Until next time, be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ page.

Posted by Henry Wang, AdMob Marketing

Source: Inside AdMob


Game developer Sohomob leverages AdMob mediation to grow revenue by 300%


Founded in 2011, Sohomob is a Hong Kong based company that’s well known for its successful mobile board game apps. They take pride in delivering high-quality games to users and focus on making the games beautiful, easy to use and functional. As a result, Sohomob’s games have attracted players from all over Asia, with Battle Ludo earning over 10M downloads.
“AdMob is the most comprehensive and reliable product in the market” - Daniel Ho, co-founder, Sohomob
The problem
To build a sustainable business, Sohomob needed a way to monetize its growing user base without interfering with social gameplay.

The solution
Turning to AdMob because of its reputation for global reach, Sohomob implemented a variety of ad formats including banners, interstitials and videos. To avoid interfering with gameplay, Sohomob showed ads only in between levels and at natural breaks. This helped them engage users without disrupting the gaming experience. Sohomob also leveraged AdMob mediation and ad network optimization to maximize earnings for ad placements. AdMob mediation allowed Sohomob to serve ads from multiple ad networks and ad network optimization enabled Sohomob to serve the highest paying ad from their mediation stack automatically.

The results
Adding AdMob mediation and enabling ad network optimization helped Sohomob increase its total revenue by 3X. After seeing so much success with AdMob, Sohomob decided to implement AdMob house ads and in-app purchase ads, helping them cross promote their apps and introduce in-app purchases to their users.

Sohomob is not stopping there, with the aim to build the largest social board game community in the world. To check out Sohomob’s success story, or any other of AdMob’s  other success stories, visit the AdMob website. Until next time, be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Twitter and Google+ page.

Posted by Henry Wang, AdMob Marketing

Source: Inside AdMob


Cheetah Mobile grows revenue 4X for Battery Doctor with AdMob native ads



Six years ago, Cheetah Mobile began as a small company of ten employees that built softwares for PCs. Today, they’re one of the world’s leading developers with over one thousand employees. Their popular apps Clean Master and Battery Doctor have been downloaded by millions around the world.
“What we also enjoyed is seeing the speed at which AdMob is innovating, delivering new features. One good example is the support for native ads.” - Charles Fan, Chief Technology Officer, Cheetah Mobile

The problem

With a growing user base, Cheetah Mobile needed a partner to help them expand to the global market while monetizing their apps.

The solution

Cheetah Mobile turned to Google as their first partner, using AdWords to drive downloads and AdMob to increase revenue from their apps.

The results

Within three years, Cheetah Mobile saw its user base grow 16X with 600M active users. 74% of their users came from outside of China and after implementing native ads for its popular Battery Doctor app, Cheetah Mobile saw its revenue increase 4X.

To check out other success stories, visit us at the AdMob website. Until next time, be sure to stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Twitter, LinkedIn and Google+ pages.

Posted by Henry Wang
Product Marketing

Source: Inside AdMob


App Monetization Insights: How MobiSystems adapted their way to success

This is post 4 of our 5-part blog series featuring monetization tips straight from successful app developers. If you’re interested in further exploring the question, “what’s the best way to monetize my app?”, check out our free No-nonsense Guide to App Monetization ebook.

Our guest this week is Elitza Bratkova, Director Business Development at MobiSystems, the company behind a few of the most popular business and productivity apps on Google Play.  Their flagship product, OfficeSuite, is a successful mobile office solution for Android with a user base of over 200M download and preloaded users.

A clear company value surfaced as a big part of MobiSystem’s success – flexibility. Check out ways you can also use flexibility to your advantage with these tips:


1. Adapt quickly to promising platforms and opportunities.

MobiSytems started over 10 years ago. In its early days, they created dictionaries for the most popular platforms – PalmOS and Pocket PC. When a new platform popped up called Symbian, they were quick to build for it, with some success.

Then Android came along in 2007, and Elitza saw the opportunity, despite the business being resource constrained.

“It was clear that mobile devices were becoming more popular for working professionals. The trend was clear. While we did opt-out of building for smaller platforms, this opportunity was in line with our vision and it seemed promising. It seemed like a platform where our target users would be. It was a risk, but we took it.”

The risk paid off. Being one of the earliests apps on the Google Play Store, and being pre-loaded on thousands of devices helped boost MobiSystems presence. Android as a platform significantly grew, expanding the user base that MobiSystems had access to.

MobiSystem’s most recent analysis of their target audience revealed that 15-20% of their users have devices on more than one platform. They’re now working on a new iteration of their products that allows users to use one license to access the app on multiple platforms.

2. Be flexible with your monetization strategy.

MobiSystem’s early users were accustomed to only one type of app monetization model from business apps – paying for access to premium versions. As consumer apps became successful with new models, the MobiSystems team was eager to adopt new monetization features in Android.

Since profiting from in-app purchases was a business model they could easily adopt, they decided to offer a version of their app for free with an in-app subscription to gain access to premium features. They saw a huge spike in downloads but some initial decline in revenues.To solve this, they turned to a monetization model that business apps never tried before—in-app advertising.

Transitioning to ads did take some time, but worked out positively. By starting slowly, experimenting with placement, being committed to showing high quality ads, and being clear that ads were critical in supporting their free version, MobiSystem bridged their revenue gap and built a successful business. Best of all, they’re able to sustainably offer a useful app for free. One of their products, OfficeSuite, has over 100,000 daily installs and has been consistently on the top free apps list in the the Play Store’s business categories.

When considering your app’s monetization strategy, consider all of your options thoroughly. There may be potential to use business models that are unusual in your space.

We hope you enjoyed the tips from MobiSystems. If you found this information helpful, don’t forget to check out The No-nonsense Guide to App Monetization. Also, stay connected on all things AdMob by following their Twitter and Google+ pages and be sure to connect with MobiSystems on Twitter here.

Posted by Joe Salisbury, Product Specialist, AdMob

Source: Inside AdMob


App Monetization Insights: How TapBlaze designed their game app for user retention

This is post 3 of our 5-part blog series featuring monetization tips straight from successful app developers. If you’re interested in further exploring the question, “what’s the best way to monetize my app?”, check out our free No-nonsense Guide to App Monetization.


Our guest this week is Anthony Lai, founder of TapBlaze, a popular game app company based in Los Angeles, California. TapBlaze has developed over 15 titles, collectively garnering millions of downloads. Anthony’s been able to grow the company from a one-person show, to a team of 7 full-time developers, designers, and artists. Check out these tips from Anthony.



1. Design your app for retention.


When Anthony first started TapBlaze, he initially focused on building simple, virtual simulation games. An example was his app “Good Pizza, Great Pizza”, which allowed users to virtually make and sell pizza. These early apps were interesting concepts and received a lot of attention but had a difficult time retaining customers. After the novel experience wore off, users had little reason to come back.

For his next game, Anthony wanted to build something that would keep users engaged for months, not days. To do this, he infused 4 elements into his new match 3 puzzle game named Gummy Gush: 1) a compelling story, 2) fun challenges, 3) rewards, and 4) multiple levels that built on each other. This took a lot more time to develop, and his key metric (retention) took a little longer to measure than downloads, but the work payed off.

“When we first launched Gummy Gush there were some players that only played for a few days, but there were others that clearly liked the art, story and puzzles and just kept playing. It was working! That was enough encouragement for us to keep improving these elements into the game. Ultimately this investment lead to much higher revenue, and even to rapid growth. Since launching in March of 2015, we have over 1,000,000 downloads.”

Consider designing your app for retention. Retention is a key metric for successful monetization and nailing retention will lead to a much more long term, sustainable business. To learn more about practically how to retain users, check out this video from Google Developers called “The Zen of Monetization: The Art of Retaining Users”.

2. Understand the amount of polish your app needs to succeed.


Early last year, Anthony’s team was focused on launching Gummy Gush as quickly as possible. Anthony’s a firm believer in swiftly getting product in the hands of users to collect real user feedback, then iterate. His aggressive timeline meant making sacrifices with the polish of the app, but because he had a few artists on the team he was confident that v1 would be “good enough”.

After launch, there was no user feedback on the polish of the game. But, a new engineering hire with a lot of game development experience urged them to invest in perfecting the look and feel of the game – standardizing UI elements, smoothing out all animation, and adding the finishing touches to the art work.

At first, Anthony was skeptical. But, they decided to devote 2 weeks to the initiative and see how it affected their key metrics. The overhaul paid off big time. Within the first week of the update, Gummy Gush saw a 25% in average revenue per user (ARPU).

Depending on the type of app you're building, fierce competition may have raised the bar for the amount of polish that users expect. For Anthony’s niche, a beautifully designed app built trust and increased revenue. If you’re in a highly competitive sector, it's important to assess what the industry’s threshold for aesthetic finish looks like and decide whether an investment in design app is worth making. Check out Google Play’s “Top Charts” to see what the benchmark is for your category.

3. Use analytics to prioritize your team’s next steps.


After launching, user feedback started rolling in. Although a lot of the reviews were helpful, there were also a number of issues that were unclear. He explained,

“We’d receive a lot of positive and negative reviews and emails from users and didn’t know how representative the feedback were of the broader user base. Were the complaints from users who’d complain no matter what? Or were the complaints serious problems that deserved to prioritize?”

What made it tougher was the time already spent on some of the features being criticized. For example, Anthony had invested in building an engaging introduction story that played the first time users opened the app. He even worked with a professional story writer to impart light-hearted humor in the story. His instincts knew that the story made this new app more compelling than his older apps, but did he go too far?

His solution: test solutions with his users. The team built the smallest version of solutions to proposed problems, taking no more than 2 weeks to release. They’d then monitor key metrics to see if the change had a positive affect. For the introduction story, the team quickly built a “skip” button. After releasing it, nearly 60% of users used it, confirming that it was a real problem worth solving more deeply.

For your app, use in-app analytics to test the individual pieces of feedback you get from users and internal hunches your team comes up with. Overdevelopment is more costly only to find out that your assumptions are wrong is much more costly that actual testing and observation. To learn more about observational testing, check out Tomer Sharon’s talk at Google I/O called “Don't Listen to Users, Sample Their Experience!”.

If you found these tips helpful, don’t forget to check out The No-nonsense Guide to App Monetization. Also, stay connected on all things AdMob by following their Twitter and Google+ pages and be sure to connect with TapBlaze on Twitter here.

Posted by Joe Salisbury,
Product Specialist, AdMob

Source: Inside AdMob


App Monetization Insights: How Hydro Coach rapidly reached 22 new markets

We created The No-nonsense Guide to App Monetization to help you answer a burning question, “What’s the best way to monetize my app?”. Our new 5-part blog series provides additional tips straight from successful app developers.

Hydro CoachThis week, meet Christoph Pferschy, the app developer and designer behind Hydro Coach. Hydro Coach is a drink reminder and water intake tracker that’s been growing in popularity, now receiving over 5,500 downloads a day. Check out these tips from Christoph.

1. Start small to get big


Christoph is best known for his app Hydro Coach, but his company, Codium App Ideas, has a bigger vision. In his words, they’re on a mission “to create useful and high-quality health-related apps that are combinable to a single health & fitness system.”

But right now, Christoph is focusing on just one app – Hydro Coach. Why?

Because he believes the best way to accomplish a big goal is to focus on a critical piece and nail it. He chose Hydro Coach because he’s personally benefited from drinking more water and he saw that there was less competition in the space.

Now that his business is growing, he’s begun moving forward with his larger plan, connecting with other services and platforms. For example, he explains, “we’ve connected Hydro Coach to Google Fit to synchronize users’ weight and we’re also very proud to be featured as a partner app with Samsung’s S Health,” syncing all drink inputs with their platform.”

Consider Christoph’s approach to building a company: start small to get big. Focusing on too much, too early, might not allow you to build an app experience that user’s love.

2. Assess users’ needs before choosing a business model


Settle on a business model for your app before it launches. Spend time assessing your users’ needs and your business goals to get there. Start by asking yourself guiding questions that will help narrow down the decision for you like, “Who is your audience?”, “What value does your app provide?”, and “How do you intend to promote your app?”. Learn more about these guiding questions and business models in our No-nonsense Guide to App Monetization.

Once you do choose your business model, consider continually improving your app’s user experience, especially when it affects monetization. Christoph is meticulous about providing the best experience for all of his users, explaining,

“We try to improve each user experiment segment with small and careful changes over time. For example, we’ve fine-tuned the algorithm that determines when, how and how often ads are displayed, thanks to Manuela (our AdMob consultant). We also invest in small things that mean a lot to our users, like being sure to say ‘Thank you’ after a user makes an in-app purchase and making the flow after a purchase as smooth as possible. It all adds up.”

As you look through your app, be methodical when choosing your overarching monetization strategy. Once you’ve chosen your model, focus on tweaking the user experience and providing the best possible monetization flow.

3. Consider having your users help with localization


Christoph has done an amazing job getting Hydro Coach fully translated into 22 languages. His secret weapon? His users.

As he explains, “It’s no secret that translating the app is the first and most important step. So here’s my tip: ask your users to help translate. It results in a high-quality translation because people who are already using your app have the needed context and interest. There are several services for this that you can use, but you’ll be surprised how many people love to help.”

If you found these tips helpful, don’t forget to check out The No-nonsense Guide to App Monetization. Also, stay connected on all things AdMob by following our Twitter and Google+ pages.

Posted by Joe Salisbury, Product Specialist, AdMob

Source: Inside AdMob