Deck of the presentation I gave during the Unity Grow event in Berlin on March 30, 2023. I chose to discuss about the best ways to grow iOS apps in a privacy era.

1. Welcome to
Meeting U
Berlin
March 30, 2023

2. Hi, I’m Nadir Garouche
Previously: Currently:
Independent consultant
Gaming/app growth
+10 years in game
marketing
(Mobile, Web/PC)

3. Driving Growth for
Your iOS App

4. Agenda
1. Monetization
2. Attribution and Measurement
3. Organic and Conversion Optimization
4. User Acquisition
5. Creatives

5. Improving your app monetization

6. Developers’ main challenges: UA and Retention
Unity 2023 Gaming Report

7. Average Day 30 Retention Rate on iOS: <5%
Appsflyer Retention Benchmarks for 2022

8. Increasing retention = increasing revenue
Top ways to increase engagement:
● Challenges
● Updating content
● Leaderboards
● Daily rewards
● Special Events
● Limited offers
● UI/UX
● Bug fixing
● Community management

9. Make use of rewarded ads

10. But aren’t ads bad for retention?
Well, not so much.
Rewarded ads make
players stay longer in a
game.
Unity 2023 Gaming Report

11. Attribution and Measurement

12. Attribution before: Most users did not block tracking
✅ Advertising ID
✅ Retargeting
✅ LTV calculation
✅ Unlimited user events
✅ Precise campaign details
✅ Cohorts

13. Attribution now: Users have to opt-in to share their data
❌ Advertising ID
❌ Retargeting
❌ LTV calculation
❌ Web traffic
✅ Limited events shared
by Apple (SKAdNetwork)
✅ Only Apple Search
Ads can be fully tracked

14. How to measure ROI
Blended Approach SKAN Based ROI
Opted-in Users LTV Incrementality
No unique method. Use a mix of several strategies:

15. SKAdNetwork (SKAN)
Apple’s solution to measure advertising while preserving privacy.
Very limited features:
Now (3.0):
● 1 postback per install
● Tracking limited to first 24
hours
● Delayed data
● No campaign detail
● Privacy thresholds
● 64 conversion values
Soon (4.0):
● 3 postbacks (up to 35 days)
● Few more campaign details
● Web traffic supported
● Small campaigns reported

16. Configure your conversion schema for SKAN
Track key events with your MMP and attach a value to them.
Focus on important events occurring at Day 0/1 that correlate with long term value
(engagement/monetization):
● Tutorial completed
● Account created
● Trial started
● Level 5 reached
● Rewarded ad watched
● In-app purchase
● etc.
You can also use funnels in your conversion values
(ie. registered + view product + added to cart)

17. Organic and Conversion Optimization

18. Focus on ASO: Keyword Optimization
Optimize your search fields for all languages.
Search Downloads Uplift After an ASO update of a game on 23 languages Use Apple Search Ads to identify keywords

19. Focus on ASO: Keyword Optimization
No ASO/localization resources? No problem. Use AI tools.
ChatGPT:
Provide keywords and ask it to come
up with names, subtitles, it can even
generate keyword strings based on a
search term lists.
DeepL:
You can localize with ChatGPT but I
find DeepL to be closer to human like
translation.
Article: ASO Automation with ChatGPT

20. Focus on ASO: Conversion Optimization
Constantly test Icons, Screenshots and Videos.
Make use of Custom Product Pages.

21. Focus on ASO: Custom Product Pages
Discord
example
Create a custom
product page for
every audience to
highlight specific
features.
Use them for
organic traffic and
UA campaigns.
Default
Gamers
Students

22. UA on iOS

23. Top iOS channels for apps and games
For more details by category, see AppsFlyer Performance Index

24. Scaling UA on iOS: a progressive approach
Spend
$
Install
campaigns
Install
campaigns Install
campaigns
Install
campaigns
Soft-launch Maturity
Install
campaigns
Purchase/VO/
event campaigns
Ad and IAP based game/app
Re-engagement
Re-engagement
Purchase/VO/
event campaigns
Purchase/VO/
event campaigns
Purchase/VO/
event campaigns
Global push
Install
campaigns
T1 launch

25. Optimization techniques
Bidding
● Install campaigns
● Purchase/VO
● Event
Demographics
● Broad
● Gender
● Age
● Languages
Geos
● Top countries in standalone campaigns
● Group T2/T3 geos (similar LTV/languages)
Channel mix
● Social
● Search
● Video networks
● Influencer marketing
● DSPs
Targeting
● Broad
● Interests/Hashtags/Behaviours
● Lookalikes

26. Managing your campaigns: best practices
● Start with small budgets
● Bid high
● Wait 5/7 days after a campaign is live to evaluate results
● Early good signals:
○ Increase daily budget by increments of +20% max
● Bad performance:
○ Raise your bids
○ Also: check creatives, targeting, goals, bidding method etc.
○ Results improving: increase daily budget
● Don’t make bid/budget changes too often
● Automate bids with ad networks’ APIs or UA tools

27. Creative optimization

28. The right creatives will reduce CPIs and increase user engagement

29. Best practices for creative testing and optimization
Install campaigns
Android
Measure CPI/CTR/IPM,
reactions
Test
Create edited versions of
your winners
Iterate
CPI/CTR/IPM
Share of spend
Measure
Pause low performers
Increase budget if new
creative picks up fast
Optimize
Upload winners to live
iOS campaigns
Launch

30. Creative benchmark: use TikTok Creative Center

31. Focus on creative excellence
● Adapt your assets for all sizes (ie. square, landscape, portrait, 4:5)
● Test different video lengths (ie. 5, 10, 30, 45 sec)
● Diversify your assets: videos, images, playables, texts
● First seconds of your videos are key
● Replace low performing assets often
● Introduce branding early
● Optimize audio tracks (especially for TikTok)
● Don’t ignore localization (voices, texts)

32. Thank you
in/nadirgarouche/
@nadir