Introduced by Google in 2015, the Universal App Campaign or UAC is a new app advertising campaign that allows advertisers to advertise their products in front of a wide audience. In modern day, marketing has become a huge part of every business. With so many different companies competing from all over the world (especially if they offer similar products) marketing could be the key difference between success and failure. With more than 5 million apps in marketplace, advertisement is a must to raise product awareness. This article will go over some of the best practices that an advertiser can do for their Google Universal App Campaign.
- Utilize third party tracking
While the main goal of any app campaign will be to ensure product recognition and increase the number of installs, it is also important to keep track of other stuff as well. Reports have shown that most apps once downloaded are mostly used regularly for the first month or so. About 25% apps are only used once after installation. Third party tracking will ensure that app optimizations can be introduced for app users. This can be done with setting up an app tracking SDK. Some of these SDKs include Singular, Appsflyer, Firebase (offered by Google) and more.
- Prioritize app install campaigns
If you are new to the whole advertising campaigns business, then it is highly recommended that you always start with max app install campaigns first. The reason behind this is that the whole system needs data to better optimize your ad campaigns. Without the said data, you will not get the results you are hoping for. A max install campaign will bring in more users by increasing the number of app installs. With each install, Google will collect data points which can then be used to better optimize your ad campaigns.
- Don’t tamper with your budget too soon
As mentioned above, Google Universal App Campaign takes some time to deliver the results you are looking for. There is a lot of machine learning involved and Google must collect enough data points before properly optimizing your campaigns. It will take around 2-4 weeks for the optimization process to kick in, so avoid making any huge changes in your budget in the early days no matter the performance. Even after this optimization, don’t make any large changes to your bids. This will reset the whole optimization process.
- Running ads in countries that match your app language
One thing you need to know is that your ads are not automatically translated by the Google Universal App Campaign service. If you see an ad in a language you don’t understand, you reaction will be skipping it completely due to the language barrier. Thus, it is recommended that you run your app campaigns for countries that your app is fully localized for. Your app’s language will match the country’s language and cultural preferences and will derive better results overall.
- Try segmenting your ads
Finally, you can try segmenting your ads. Segmenting allows you to run targeted ads which is necessary to target your app audience. You can segment your ads by using various categories like country or language. Also make sure not to segment your ads too much as it can allow your own ads to compete against each other.
Conclusion
These were some of the UAC best practices you can use to optimize your ads using the Google Universal App Campaign. And as mentioned, make sure to give your campaign some time and let the optimization process run its course before making any major changes.