Most mobile apps don't get downloaded more than 1,000 times. Find out how to make yours the exception to the rule
VW GTI AppEvery brand wants a mobile app, but the truth is that very few of those apps get downloaded. So hopefully marketers at the Yahoo! Connect Forum yesterday perked up when AKQA chief creative officer Rei Inamoto shared some tips to make mobile apps a hit.
According to Inamoto, 80% of mobile apps are downloaded less than a thousand times. Less than 1% of apps are downloaded more than a million times. "We get the most requests for helping clients with mobile than anything else--but it's the hardest thing to do right," he said.
AKQA has developed some of the top-branded apps, including the Nike Workout Partner and Real Racing GTI for Volkswagen. When VW relaunched its zippy GTI, it did so not with paid advertising, but with Real Racing GTI, a racing game that used the GTI as the store. The app was downloaded almost seven million times, and directly drove automotive sales.
Based on AKQA's experience with ads, Inamoto offered three tips to help apps engage with customers:
- Tap into an existing audience. Real Racing was already a top paid racing app with millions of downloads, so AKQA hired its creators to make a white-label version for VW. Moreover, the GTI's audience loves both cars and tech—so a racing game was an effective way to reach them.
- Make a tool, not a toy. That may sound odd coming from someone who created a game to sell cars, but Inamoto said that brands need to avoid apps that only serve as fluffy pieces of fun for a short period. The GTI game keeps people engaging with the brand for a long time and—importantly, for Volkswagen—sends people directly to their local dealers.
- Don't tell, enable. Too often, Inamoto said, brands only think of mobile as a storytelling medium, but "Mobile is shifting from telling to doing." The Heineken Star Player app let users not only follow along Europe's Champion League football action, but play along with the action to win points and interact with the friends.
Despite the difficulty, Inamoto says that brands should continue to pursue mobile as a channel, because apps provide possibly more engagement with the brand than TV does. "It's not that easy to communicate an idea if you're not actually using it," he said. "Seeing isn't believing anymore. Using is believing."
--- Jeff Sweat, Editor-in-Chief
