A Step-by-Step Guide to Marketing Your Mobile App

by Mikel Clarkk Guest Poster

App stores of every major mobile platform are overflowing with applications. With the constantly increasing demand and the growing number of smartphone users, new mobile apps rely on marketing to surface above each industry’s giants.

Marketing a mobile application is not a static process. Your strategies and campaigns need to change throughout the app’s whole lifecycle, ensuring that it stays visible to new customers and retains the existing clients as well. Although there is no single right way to market an application, several steps discussed below can help you approach the process comprehensively and keep track of the major milestones that will ultimately define the app’s success.

In case you are still in the first stages of this venture and looking for a development company, visit this website to kickstart your journey. Then, read on to learn how to present your future app to the masses and make it bring profit.

Step 1. Research Your Target Audience and Competition

This step is crucial not only for marketing but for the development of your application as well. By researching your potential customers, you will better understand which parts of your application are the most valuable to your target audience and which need adjusting. This process also reveals the app’s strengths and weaknesses compared to the competition in your sector.

Also, this preliminary research will help you get a grasp on how to communicate with your potential users. Depending on the demographic that you are targeting, different approaches to marketing will be appropriate. The message and ways of communicating it should depend on each group’s age, industry, and other factors relevant to the purpose of your application.

Step 2. Start Marketing Before You Launch

Many businesses make the mistake of marketing their application after they develop and launch it. This approach misses out on an essential element of every successful marketing strategy: building anticipation.

Engage with your audience before you release the app. By bringing the message out into the world, you create interest among your target customers, building a potentially loyal base of future users. Those who have been waiting for an app to come out are more likely to download and use it than people who see it on an app store in passing.

Step 3. Adopt Content Marketing and Create a Website to Maintain Customer Interest

Content marketing is a powerful tool that can help you promote your application without being pushy. This approach aims at reaching out to your potential customers by providing content that relates to your services and presents additional value depending on the interests of your target audience. Content marketing delivered via a website or a blog is an applicable strategy both before and after the launch of your application.

In addition to blogging, utilize social media to maintain more direct and consistent communication with your future customers. Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and other social media channels are incredibly effective in creating and supporting your app’s visibility. Different platforms promote different types of content, from long posts to images, enabling you to customize your media presence and display your app from several angles.

Step 4. Research Outreach Possibilities

It’s a good idea to secure the assistance of influencers, bloggers, and other people who will be able to test your application when it’s released and give honest reviews. Acquiring loyal customers is easier through a third trustworthy party sharing their true and personal experience with your software. This step also helps your app gain greater exposure in the first crucial weeks after the launch.

Step 5. Invest in App Store Optimization and Advertising

After you launch the app, it has an incredibly small window of time to make an appearance. It’s critical to gain maximum momentum in the first weeks and top the rating charts of app stores to gain exposure.

One of the pillars that support any application’s rapid promotion is good App Store Optimization (ASO). ASO helps your application to be discovered by searching for specific keywords, thus bringing it out into the spotlight. ASO consists of many factors, including a strong title, strategic placing of keywords in the body of your description, and a well-written features and benefits section, to name a few.

In many cases, it makes sense to delegate ASO, along with advertising, to a third party, since the benefits of professional assistance are likely to outweigh the expenses.

Step 6. Establish and Maintain Communication Channels

Marketing doesn’t end with customer acquisition. To retain existing users over time, make sure to provide them with direct ways to leave feedback and communicate with you about any issues. Encourage users to share their opinions on the app and leave reviews to attract other customers. This way, you can learn and fix any emerging bugs faster, as well as identify areas that need improvement.

Talking with customers in a way that corresponds to the specific features of each of your target groups can also reinforce the sense of having a personal experience. It makes using your application more enjoyable and improves the loyalty to your brand.