What’s Working Right Now in Mobile App User Acquisition

These apps are killing it right now. Find out the strategies they’re using to acquire quality new users.

In the world of mobile apps, marketers face fierce competition for user acquisition in almost every vertical. To compound that pressure, the UA strategies that worked yesterday may not be effective today. Still, some apps seem to have it figured out, climbing and staying at the top of the charts, thanks to innovative user acquisition (UA) strategies. 

Enerjoy, Experian, Rollic, and Upside have all implemented successful campaigns to grow their apps with AppDiscovery. Read on to learn from their success and gain valuable insights into what’s working right now in mobile app user acquisition.

Enerjoy: Expanding globally

Enerjoy, a studio producing popular fitness, health, and productivity apps, sought to expand the user base for its apps, ShutEye, Me+, and JustFit – and achieve incremental growth in new global markets. 

Running cost-per-purchase (CPP) and ROAS campaigns, Enerjoy expanded to over 40 countries, relying on AppDiscovery’s AI-driven advertising engine to efficiently target high-value users. By tapping into new markets like India, it achieved a 14x increase in installs and improved ROAS by 15% while decreasing cost per purchase by 20%. 

AppDiscovery also became one of Enerjoy’s top UA channels, with users acquired through the platform generating 23% more revenue than other channels.

Experian: Scaling up with a performance-driven approach

Experian, one of the best-known names in credit reporting, made huge strides in acquiring new users by adopting a performance-driven approach. Experian aimed to scale its mobile app user acquisition using a cost-per-event (CPE) strategy, optimizing for new registrations. 
Experian took full advantage of the brand-safe environment in-app advertising offers, launching 30-second full-screen video ads in popular apps. Zeroing in on high-quality inventory, the brand saw a significant increase in user registrations while lowering acquisition costs. AppDiscovery quickly became one of Experian’s top three user acquisition channels, responsible for over a third of their new installs from programmatic sources.

Rollic: Efficiently achieving global scale

Rollic, a prolific mobile game developer known for its insanely addictive hyper-casual games, trusted AppDiscovery to help scale its global user acquisition efforts. The company had historically relied on country-specific campaigns, as it found going broader geographically is challenging – and a drain on resources. It wanted to find an efficient way to scale globally. 

By leveraging AppDiscovery’s automated global budgets and reduced learning phase, Rollic was able to run advanced Ad ROAS and blended ROAS campaigns that attracted high-value users across multiple geographies. This approach led to significant success with their game Twisted Tangle, which hit #1 in app stores in 30+ countries within six weeks of its launch. 

Rollic’s use of AI-optimized campaigns allowed them to focus less on manual geo-based targeting, yielding faster results and broader reach.

Upside: Rapid growth, the sustainable way

Upside, an app that offers cash back on everyday purchases, struggled to balance its growth goals with its budget targets. Campaigns that scaled saw high acquisition costs, while campaigns that met budget goals didn’t achieve the desired scale. 

Like Experian, Upside scaled its user acquisition efforts with a CPE strategy, focusing on driving user signups. Upside relies on users activating cash-back deals as a sign of their potential to become frequent users and acquisition costs (CPA) are an important metric. Upside’s services are only available in the US, so its opportunities for growth were limited geographically. However,  by leveraging AppLovin’s AI-driven targeting, it was able to optimize for cost efficiency and still scale – rapidly. 

In just a few months, AppDiscovery became one of Upside’s top sources for new installs, decreasing CPE by 85% and achieving substantial growth.

Key takeaways for your mobile app’s UA strategy

The success stories of Enerjoy, Experian, Rollic, and Upside offer valuable lessons and takeaways for any mobile app looking to improve its user acquisition strategy:

• Run parallel campaigns: Like Enerjoy, consider testing parallel campaigns optimized to complimentary goals (in this case, CPP and ROAS) to target different subsets of users to maximize growth. 

• Engage audiences with new touchpoints: Take a page from Experian’s book and create new, engaging opportunities to interact. Regardless of vertical, leverage the brand-safe, full-screen experience in-app advertising offers to acquire new users for your app. 

• Optimize to KPIs: Upside’s approach underscores the importance of targeting high-intent users to maximize your ROAS. Understand your audience’s needs and tailor your messaging to meet them.

In today’s competitive app market, it’s not enough to simply acquire users—you need to acquire the right users. By adopting these strategies and leveraging platforms like AppDiscovery, you can get the most out of your UA efforts, making sure they’re not only effective but also sustainable in the long term. Whether you’re aiming to boost installs, drive engagement, or maximize ROAS, the right approach makes all the difference. 

Ready to take your UA strategy to the next level? These case studies offer actionable ideas that you can implement to make your user acquisition campaigns more powerful. Now it’s up to you to implement these insights and grow your app business.