DEVELOPER S GUIDE 3 EASY STEPS TO MONETIZE ANDROID APPS WITH ADS

Transcription

1 DEVELOPER S GUIDE 3 EASY STEPS TO MONETIZE ANDROID APPS WITH ADS

2 Monetizing your app 1 Step 1 - Intro to Mobile Advertising Intro to mobile advertising Breaking down ad formats 5 7 Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats Identifying your goals 12 Ad Format Examples 22 Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation Analytics Optimization INDEX Integrating Ads Need-to-Know Terms 37 38

3 Where do I begin? Developers would argue that developing the app was the easiest part. The hard part comes after the realization that making the app was only the first battle. You ve probably spent sleepless nights time perfecting the design and mechanics of your freemium ios or Android app and put off any thoughts about monetization. The thought of strategizing a return on your investment turns your stomach. But you ll be glad to know that if you re reading this ebook you re already one-step ahead of your competitors. You ve recognized that you need to weigh all available monetization options and identify the strategy that works best for your app. The only problem now is that you re probably asking yourself, I want to monetize my freemium app, but where do I begin? Fortunately, we can help with that. If you re unsure about any mobile advertising terms discussed in the ebook, check out AppFlood s Need-to-Know Terms in the Index page. Monetizing your app 1

4 Why mobile ads? Say that your app is available for free on Apple s App Store, Google Play, or an alternative Android app store and generating a few thousand, or even tens of thousands of downloads. You might not realize it, but your app is primed to make money. All that s left to do is to figure out how to convert these free users into paying users. There s plenty of talk centering around freemium monetization strategies like in-app purchases and affiliate marketing. While these are options you can explore, advertising is making a strong case regardless of its bad rap. In fact, advertising is the best option for new developers. Not convinced? Here s why. As more smartphones and mobile devices enter the market and more apps are downloaded per phone, time spent on mobile devices is skyrocketing. In fact compared to 2012, U.S. mobile device owners in 2013 will spend 30.3% more time on mobile reports emarketer. Combine this a 31% growth of smartphone subscribers globally in 2013, the supply of mobile advertising inventory continues to grow despite not having enough advertisers to fill this inventory. Digging deeper, we can look at Mary Meeker s 2013 Internet Trend report to identify the opportunity cost of mobile advertising. Monetizing your app 2

5 Why mobile ads? (cont.) According to Meeker s findings, the time spent on mobile devices in the United States heavily outweighs the $4 billion ad spend in The result is a $20 billion opportunity cost in unspent Internet and mobile ad spend. In other words, for the time that people spend on their mobile devices, advertisers must collectively spend nearly $16 billion if they want to fill all the empty mobile ad inventory. As more advertisers recognize the value of mobile and hop on board on the mobile ad bandwagon, mobile advertising will heat up. But from the publisher s perspective, you can look at the ad spend opportunity this way: $20 billion is the total pie that you can get a cut of once advertisers pick up their mobile ad spend. Monetizing your app 3

6 Step 1 Intro to Mobile Advertising

7 There s no such thing as a universal app. Likewise there s no such thing as a universal ad format. So to retrofit the variations in app designs, ad networks have come up with different ad formats to choose from. For example AppFlood offers interstitials, panels, banners, app lists, customized ads, icons, and notification ads. But wait a minute. What the heck are interstitials, lists, and panels? The jargon that we re suddenly throwing around might be confusing, we know, but don t worry. We ll walk you through the major ad formats that you need to know and familiarize you with the mobile advertising industry. Eventually, you ll be able to quickly identify the ad format that best suits your app and become a publisher in no time. But before we delve into the nitty gritty details, we ll go over the basics starting with ecpms. Step 1 - Intro to Mobile Advertising 45

8 What is ecpm? ecpm is a core concept in advertising and it s important enough that we ll take a moment to dig deeper into its meaning. ecpm (also known as effective cost per thousand impressions ) is a widely used benchmark in advertising that s used to measure how much money you re making from each advertiser per 1,000 impressions. Generally speaking, ecpm is a measurement unit that gauges the quality of an advertiser. Let s take a look the ecpm formula so we can get a clearer picture of what ecpm actually means. ecpm = Total Earnings Total Impressions x 1,000 total number of impressions that advertiser s ad has gotten, shows you how much you re earning for a single impression. Since CPMs are measured and paid out per 1,000 impressions, the result is multiplied by 1,000 to give you an ecpm value, or in other words how much you re average for every 1,000 impressions. Theoretically if you want to generate more revenue, what you want is to maximize your ecpm. $1 $5 Word of caution: As great as the ecpm metric is, you should know that it s not a foolproof standard for measuring your ad s performance. One advertiser with a high ecpm might generate less revenue for you than a lower ecpm advertiser simply because you ve distributed more impressions to the lower ecpm advertiser. Learn more about why the ecpm metric isn t as simple as it appears. Step 1 - Intro to Mobile Advertising 46

9 What is a Banner Ad? Banner ads are inescapable and we ve all seen them on our favorite websites before. If you re a developer who s looking for a quick advertising solution, banner ads slide up or pop up at the top or bottom of the screen. The simplicity of deploying a banner ad makes it a popular choice among developers, despite its negative reputation. What is a Full Screen Interstitial? The interstitial advertising format in a mobile app takes over the app s screen, which might remind you of a pop up ad. No one likes pop up ads. But you ll be surprised to learn that because of its full-screen nature, interstitials can sometimes generate high CTRs compared to other ad formats some more than 25% or even 40% as we ve seen on AppFlood s network. Interstitial 790 x 470 But interstitials can be considered spammy if balance between showing the ad often enough to generate impressions (the number of times the ad is displayed), without annoying users. Developers earn more money with interstitial ads. Here s why. Step 1 - Intro to Mobile Advertising 47

10 What is a Panel Ad? Panels are an ad format often embraced by game publishers. The ad format displays five ads with the largest ad panel at the top of the screen, followed below by four thumbnail ads. More Games 454 x 222, 182 x 89 More importantly, panels offer your users an unobtrusive user experience. Publishers can implement a custom button, somewhere within the app s navigation bar, that can trigger the ad should the user tap on it. Either an ad list of More Games or More Apps can be displayed. What is an App List? An app list displays ads in list form. The app list was designed keeping in mind that smartphone users are familiar with this ad format. You might App List recognize that app lists resemble app store lists. At the same time, the layout of the app list is inherently designed to pack in as many ads as possible into a mobile screen. So somewhere down the list, an app is bound to catch the user s interest. Like panel ads, this format can also be triggered from a custom button. The catch is that the app s creative (the image advertising the app) has only enough retail space to display a single icon for each app. On the other hand ad formats like interstitials and panel ads reserve a larger surface area for larger creatives. Step 1 - Intro to Mobile Advertising 8

11 What is an Icon Ad? Icon ads are pushed to the user s home screen and displayed within an app s icon. When the user taps on the icon, the ad format opens up either a panel or list ad format depending on the publisher s choice. Icon Ads Because icon ads are banned from Google Play we d recommend Android developers to avoid integrating this ad format. However alternative Android app stores continue to accept apps that use icon ads. What is a Push Notification ad? Push notification ads push ads to the smartphone s system notification dashboard. With Google s developer guideline update, push notification ads have also been banned from Google Play, but the format can be integrated into apps published to alternative Android app stores. Notification Ads Step 1 - Intro to Mobile Advertising 9

12 What is a Custom Ad? Custom With custom ads you can opt to creatively display ads in customizable formats of your choosing. Since custom ads aren t a default ad format on AppFlood, implementing this requires some extra leg work from you or your development team. However since you re in control of how you want to style this ad format, you can mix and match two existing ad formats if you wish, reskin an existing format, or even design a brand new format that displays ads natively in your mobile app. If you have additional questions about any of AppFlood s ad formats, feel free to reach out to AppFlood and we ll answer any questions. Step 1 - Intro to Mobile Advertising 10

13 Step 2 Goals & Choosing Ad Formats

14 What s your monetization objective? We ll start off by saying that there s no such thing as a rule of thumb for identifying the ad format that fits best for your app. That Ah ha! moment when you identify the combination of ad formats that works for you won t come on day one. You have to factor in what your advertising objectives are and the type of experience you want your users to enjoy. Seeing as how there s no one solution-fits-all even with the preset ad formats that AppFlood provides, there s plenty of room for creativity. To find the ad format that works best for your app, you ll have experiment. But with that said, we ve outlined a few strategies based on your monetization objectives to help guide you as you determine a suitable ad format for your app. Are you looking to balance revenue with a tolerable user-experience? Do you want minimally invasive ads? Do you need to monetize quickly? Is your app a mobile game? Do you want to maximize your earnings? Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 12

15 1 Looking to balance revenue with a tolerable UX? Now if your focus is to create a user-experience that balances UX with revenue, most publishers will opt for interstitials. Taking a look at AppFlood s network of publishers in the month of August 2013, 58.52% of publishers opted to integrate this ad format because it s easy to deploy and tends to generate the most revenue for advertisers. Of course, how an ad format is deployed and the number of impressions you ve given an ad affects revenue. Ad Format Usage on AppFlood (Aug. 2013) 1.11% 2.07% 2.15% 13.95% Banner Custom ads 21.93% Intersitial 58.52% List Panel Others Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 13

16 1 Looking to balance revenue with a tolerable UX? (cont.) You ll see from the chart Impressions by Ad Format, impressions from interstitials on average are higher than other ad formats. Because the full-screen takeover encourages enough users to click-through, we ve found that earnings also tend to out-earn other ad formats. Impressions by Ad Format (Aug. 2013) Banner Custom ads Interstitial List Panel one (or more) of the following four scenarios: the user enters the app, exits the app, the ad displays in between game levels in lieu of a loading screen, or it displays in conjunction with a Game Over screen. Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 14

17 1 Looking to balance revenue with a tolerable UX? (cont.) List ads are a close second favorite if you want to minimize the chances of annoying your users, but maximize revenue. It generates the highest ecpms on AppFlood s network, and the second-highest CTRs. We ve also found that list ads will best all but the interstitial ad format in earnings. List ads can be deployed to trigger at the user s volition or it can be customized to show up, like interstitial ads, before an app s start and exit screens. Despite its good reputation, list ads are underutilized with just 2.07 percent of developers using the format. The issue with list ads is with the ad s design, which in many cases is a problem of user-experience compatibility. For instance news readers, calendars, and games can display list ads without interrupting the app s user experience, since these apps may display content in a list style, but the ad format isn t suitable for every app. Have you already settled on an ad format? Here s how to get started. Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 15

18 2 Do you want minimally invasive ads? If your number one priority is the user experience, panel and list formats are discrete and your best bet. If you have the resources to spare, you can opt for a custom ad. The benefit as we ve explained already is in the freedom to design a format that fits within the design scheme of your mobile app. Ideally the ad might not even feel like an ad to the user. Custom ads however require extra developement and design resources, which can be time consuming. Panels and lists can be formatted to be accessed through a button that sits within the app s navigation bar, effectively giving your users the choice to open up the ad. From a user-experience standpoint, you re not forcing an ad on the user so the chances of annoying a user is minimal. ecpm by Ad Format (Aug. 2013) Banner $0.01 Custom ads $0.03 Interstitial $0.23 List $2.25 Panel $1.01 $0.00 $0.50 $1.00 $1.50 $2.00 $2.50 Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 16

19 2 Do you want minimally invasive ads? (cont.) On closer inspection, panels command the second highest ecpms and among the highest CTRs, but the impressions are comparatively low so don t bank on panels being your cash cow. List ads have ecpms that are 2.22 times higher than panels, nearly twice the impressions, and you ll find that earnings are higher with list ads. If it were left up to us, we d recommend using list ads, but keep in mind that not all developers apps are the right fit for the ad format. All-in-all, both of these formats are a great way to supplement your earnings, but we wouldn t rely solely on them if earnings is a concern. Here s how to decide between app lists or panel ads. Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 17

20 3 Need to monetize quickly? For those of you that have an unexpected wave of new users flooding into your app, each day that passes without ads in your app is another day that you ve missed out on revenue. If you re in this boat, you ll be glad to know that the solution is actually quite simple. If time isn t on your side, deploy banner ads or interstitials. The sheer ease with adding these two ad formats makes them great short-term solutions. Both generate high impressions. So, as long as people are seeing ads, you can tinker around with the ad format s placement or design to figure out how to boost clicks or installs. Banners and interstitials may have unremarkable CTRs, with a modest 5.70% CTR for interstitials and a 0.23% CTR for banners, but that doesn t go to say that interstitials and banner ads aren t useful. Click-Through Rate by Ad Format (Aug. 2013) Banner 0.23% Custom ads 0.37% Interstitial 5.70% List 7.14% Panel 12.60% 0% 3% 6% 9% 12% 15% Even if these formats are a short-term fix, click-through rates aren t end-all solutions that determine how much you earn. As a matter of fact, these formats can generate the highest revenue. If fast money is on your mind, there s no time to waste. Get started with installing interstitials or banners. Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 18

21 4 Is your app a mobile game? The beauty of gaming apps is that there s a good chance that just about any type of ad format will work. Panel and list ads can be embedded natively into any navigation menu, interstitials can display mid-level or immediately before the app closes, and banner ads can slide up from the bottom of the screen as you may have seen within mobile trading card games. How custom ad formats are implemented vary, but you can find plenty of examples of publishers who have deployed various ad formats into their games. Games make money with ads. If you re not convinced, we ll show you how. Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 19

22 5 Want to maximize your earnings? If you re not particular about an ad format and all you re looking to do is to maximize your earnings, we ll have to dip our toes into more advanced concepts that delve into CPC, CPI, and CPM campaigns. We ve already defined CPC, CPI, and CPM so you should have a basic idea of what these terms mean. Generally speaking, you can t control the campaign types and advertisers that advertise in your platform, but ideally you can optimize your earnings by using the ad formats that perform the best regardless the types of campaigns that advertisers are running on your app. First, earnings doesn t equal ecpms It s easy to come to the conclusion that if we strictly looked at ecpms, list ads and panels are the formats you d want to default to. But ecpms merely judge the quality of an advertiser, and as we ve stressed already, ecpms aren t always reliable and depend heavily on several variables including the volume of impressions and bid prices. In fact because interstitial ad impressions are displayed 28 times more frequently than list ads, ecpms are naturally lower. Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 20

23 5 Want to maximize your earnings? (cont.) What ad format makes the most money? Now if we run through a few quick calculations, we ll discover based on AppFlood s data that despite the staggering differences between ecpms, interstitial ads outperform list ads (which came in second) in total clicks and total earnings within CPC, CPM, and CPI campaigns. With a CPC advertiser, publishers averaged 22.5 times more earnings from interstitials than lists. With a CPI advertiser, publishers averaged 5.6 times more earnings from interstitials than lists. From a CPM advertiser, publishers averaged 28.2 times more earnings with interstitials than list ads and 2.6 times more earnings with interstitials than custom ads - the second highest earning format for CPM campaigns. When in doubt, go with interstitials. There s money waiting to be made. Here is how to get started with your first interstitial ads. Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 21

24 By App Category If you re not certain about what ad format you should use in your app, take a look at the following ad formats publishers, based on App Store categories, have used before. Puzzle (Game) Interstitials Communication Panel ads Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 22

25 Racing (Game) Interstitial Arcade & Action (Game) Interstitial Personalization Custom ad Tools Custom ad Step 2 - Goals & Choosing Ad Formats 23

26 Step 3 Analytics & Optimzation

27 Now that you ve familiarized yourself with ad formats and may even have an eye for one that you d like to test out, there are a few more details and strategies you ll need to know before you re ready to get AppFlood s ads up and running. Mobile advertising isn t just about deploying an ad. Generating revenue is what ultimately matters to you, so before you jump into the thick of it all, you ll want to understand how to analyze your earnings and utilize these optimization strategies that we ll make available to you. Monitoring your app Say that you ve deployed an ad format. What do you do from here? You need to first-and-foremost be able to understand what you re looking at when you re going through an analytics dashboard. This is after all the command center where you re tracking your app s earnings. There are plenty of free and in-depth analytics platforms out there that you can pick up depending on your Pixalate and Apsalar and other advertising networks like AdMob, LeadBolt, and of course AppFlood. ecpm $3 $1 $5 $4 $2 Earnings $100 $500 $30 $10 $10 But for the sake of this overview we re using Appflood s dashboard as an example. We ll run you through what a dashboard looks like and what you need to know to keep track of your ROI. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 25

28 Monitoring your app (cont.) With any analytics platform, what you as a publisher need to track on any ad network are four core metrics: impressions, clicks, installs, and revenue. With this raw data you can calculate your ROI based on CTRs, IRs, your ecpm, among other calculations. Most ad networks will display some of these metrics for you like CTRs, IRs, ecpms, saving you time. But not every ad network offers complete transparency. In comparison, AppFlood is an ad network that provides complete transparency so that you can see every detail of your monetization strategy, from the advertiser s impressions, CTR, IR, daily limits, ad campaign type (CPI or CPC), to the fill rate. To find these metrics, just click on the name of your app and this will open up a list of advertisers and the respective metrics associated with the ad campaign. You ll find a column titled Installs, Bid (the price that the advertiser is bidding), and Type, which displays whether the campaign is CPI or CPC. As for the far right three columns, these are customizable. Here you can find the impression numbers, clicks, CTR, IR, daily limit, ecpms, earnings, and the types of demand side platforms (other partnered ad networks) that the advertiser is running their campaigns from. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 26

29 Monitoring your app (cont.) To the far left column, you ll find a switch that s by default switched On and a column titled Allocation. These are advanced modules baked into AppFlood that when used correctly can help optimize your ad campaigns. The switch grants you the power to prevent the advertiser s ad from showing in your app. Allocation allocates traffic to an advertiser s ad. By is set to Auto. It s O.K. if you re not familiar with allocation. We ll delve further in depth with these features shortly. But before that happens, we need to look at the final tool that you ll use to analyze your app s monetization. What I m referring to are charts. Charts conveniently take care of your trend reporting with organized data points and advanced filters. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 27

30 Monitoring your app (cont.) For instance in AppFlood all you need to do is select your app, the metrics you want to plot, the date, and set a filter - whether by country, app type, OS version, and language to name a few. AppFlood will do the heavy lifting and plot a visual representation of your app s monetization performance over time. You can even customize your AppFlood report through Advanced Options and download the data onto your computer. Learn how to master AppFlood s transparent dashboard and analytics. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 28

31 Now that you ve got an overview of what you ll find in an analytic dashboard and the metrics you need to know on a dashboard like impressions, installs, CTRs, and ecpms, you ll use these tools for planning a strategy to optimize your earnings. These strategies will include analyzing data for A/B testing ad formats to find one that works best for you; blocking or allocating traffic; reaching out to advertisers about direct deals; boosting your ecpms; and even avoiding monetization mistakes. Mobile monetization mistakes to avoid To start off, a basic way to optimize your earnings even before you even think about downloading an ad network s SDK is to avoid the mistakes of monetization altogether. These include: 1. Never asking your ad network for help - Just reach out and ad networks will help 2. Failing to analyze data - We ve stressed this already. Use all of your resources on hand, especially an ad network s analytics dashboard, to help you make educated decisions. 3. Carbon copy ios and Android monetization strategies - There are stark differences between monetizing on Android and ios. For instance there are differences in user behavior, which you may discover by analyzing the CTRs and IRs. One may be far lower than the other for a certain ad format. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 29

32 Mobile monetization mistakes to avoid (cont.) 4. Being afraid of interstitial ads - You should know by now, since we ve looked at the performance of interstitial ad, that if there s any ad format to test it s interstitials. 5. No attempts to creatively integrate ad formats - The last thing users want to see is an interruptive or intrusive ad format. AppFlood s ad formats are highly customizable and can be formatted to fit the theme of your app so that distractions are minimized. 6. ecpm isn t Pandora s Box - An ecpm isn t the end-all metric as we ve stressed earlier. ecpms merely judge the quality of an advertiser, and the metric doesn t represent earnings. Impressions and fill rates are key factors in determining your earnings. 7. No clear growth strategy - Have a strategy for growing your app s userbase and revenue. Merely monitoring your app for earnings and implementing an SDK doesn t guarantee more revenue. You still need to do your due diligence through promotional campaigns. For instance you might save up your earnings and use this to purchase a high volume of installs in a short amount of time to boost the ranking of your app in the app store. If you d like more information on how to avoid these common monetization mistakes, you can read more about these mobile monetization pitfalls in AppFlood s 7 mobile app monetization mistakes to avoid. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 30

33 A/B testing A/B testing will require you to deploy multiple ad formats and collect data to identify the format that generates the highest ROI. For instance if many advertisers are running CPI campaigns in your app, we ve established that interstitials may be the go-to choice. However other publishers may discover that interstitials may not be the highest earning ad format and decide to boost the visibility of the app list s trigger button, and decrease the number of times interstitials show up in their app. Some publishers may even discover that rather than leaving it up to the users to trigger the panel ad, displaying panel ads before the app s start screen generates more click-throughs. Allocation Allocation is intended to redistribute traffic to high-performing advertisers. If you discover an advertiser who is generating high ecpms and satisfactory earnings, you may want to allocate more traffic to that advertiser s ad so that you ll continue generating more revenue from that specific advertiser. This is an effective and quick tool for optimizing your earnings, but it comes with a warning. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 31

34 Allocation (cont.) What is allocation? Allocation is far more complex than it appears, which is why we recommend new publishers to keep allocation on Auto, which lets AppFlood s AppMatch allocate traffic automatically to avoid giving out invalid installs. To explain, the daily limit on the number installs or clicks set by the advertiser is network-wide. In other words you re sharing the daily click or install limit from that single advertiser with other publishers. This means if you decide to funnel more traffic and fill more of your inventory with a specific advertiser s ad, you might increase earnings in the short-term, but you ll also run the risk of exceeding the advertiser s daily limit and wasting your inventory. For example, say that the advertiser s CPC daily limit is 100. You ve taken a look at your dashboard and seen that of the 100,000 impressions today, advertiser X has received 30,000 impressions and generated 30 installs. This translates to 30 installs for 30% allocation (30,000/100,000 impressions). If you increase the advertiser s allocation to 100% that means you re giving them 100,000 impressions and hopefully 100 installs. The catch is that there s a chance that another publisher has given advertiser X 12 installs the same day that you gave the same advertiser 100 installs. If this is the case, since you don t earn money from installs that went over the daily limit, you ve given away 12 installs for free. When to allocate traffic There are a few cases when manually selecting your allocation is a better choice than using AppFlood s AppMatch. One of these cases is if you re seeing a sudden increase in users from Saudi Arabia for instance, you may want to allocate more traffic to advertisers that are specifically targeting Middle Eastern countries. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 32

35 Boosting ecpms Higher ecpms indicate better quality advertisers, and of course an increase in revenue, but how do you increase ecpms? 1. Choose ad formats with high ecpms Selecting the highest ecpm ad formats is an obvious strategy, although this may not necessarily be the best way to generate the most revenue. You might recall that app lists and panels command high ecpms and CTRs, however earnings pale in comparison to interstitial earnings. You might want to think about mixing and matching ad formats to find the highest performing combination. 2. Choose the right network & don t fall for ridiculous ecpm claims Ad networks tend to flaunt ecpm numbers that are too good to be true. ecpms over $30? Please. You ll want to try out multiple ad networks and use the one that you find to be the best for you regardless of ecpm claims. At the same time, without risking bloating your app s package size, you shouldn t integrate too many SDKs at once. Or, to solve this problem, networks like MoPub and AppFlood use an SDK that comes integrated with multiple ad network partners. If you re looking for more tips on boosting ecpms and earnings, read these 10 great ways to maximize app ecpms and revenue. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 33

36 Boosting ecpms (cont.) 3. Minimize the middleman's importance Middlemen ad networks facilitate negotiations, transactions, and can sometimes affect your app s earnings performance. When ad networks partner, one ad may go through up to four ad networks before it appears. That means ads that load slowly, low ecpms, and lost revenue. With AppFlood, you can view the middlemen that your advertisers are using to advertise on AppFlood s network. Just click on Demand Side Platform in your analytics and control dashboard. With this information, you can accordingly block advertisers using middlemen or allocate traffic to advertisers advertising directly with AppFlood. 4. Reach out to advertisers about a direct deal You can negotiate better terms that benefit both yourself and the advertiser by suggesting that they offer a direct deal. In a direct deal, you would reach out to a favored advertiser directly and ask the advertiser to propose a higher bid price. In return you would allocate more traffic for the advertiser so that they d get more installs or clicks, and therefore slightly higher earnings per click or install for yourself. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 34

37 Wrapping up Smartphones and tablets, thanks to their portability, are ever-present in subways, at bars, offices, and of course your living room. Regardless of where people are, they re spending their entertainment and productivity time on mobile devices, which presents an opportunity for Android publishers like yourself to make money with mobile ads. If you ve read through this ebook, you should have a pretty good feel for identifying and strategizing a mobile app monetization plan. At the same time, by now you can identify an ad format that fits your monetization goal, while ensuring that your ads are performing optimally to maximize ecpms and revenue. With that said, you re finally ready to get started with monetizing your Android app. Head over to the Index section of this e-book to learn about how you can add mobile ads into your app. Step 3 - Analytics & Optimzation 35

38 Index

39 How to get ads into your app Now that we ve gone through the details on how to identify and implement ads into your app, you re ready to take the next step to get AppFlood s ads up and running. The instructions are a cinch to follow. 1. Sign-up with AppFlood 2. Log into your account and add the app to AppFlood that you want to monetize 3. Download the Android SDK 4. Wait for your app s approval. AppFlood will respond to your approval request within 24 hours. For more information, you can check out AppFlood s publishers portal. If you get lost you can always reach out to our customer support specialists at [email protected]. If you have additional questions about signing up with Appflood, reach out and we ll help you get started. Index 37

40 Impressions The number of times an advertiser s mobile ad was delivered and displayed in the publisher s app. Native Ads Ads that display contextually within an app to minimize interferences with the user experience. Direct Deals Advertisers propose advertising deals for display ads by contacting publishers directly to negotiate over ad inventory and bid prices. Click-Through Rate (CTR) A metric for measuring the rate that ads are clicked on. The CTR can be calculated by dividing the number of times an ad was clicked on, by the number of times the ad was shown. Install Rate (IR) The rate at which users install the advertised app. The IR can be calculated by dividing the number of times the ad was installed, by the number of clicks the ad received. Cost Per Click (CPC) Cost Per Install (CPI) Cost Per Mille (CPM) effective Cost Per Mille (ecpm) The cost the advertiser must pay to for one click. The cost the advertiser must pay to for one install. The cost the advertiser must pay for 1,000 impressions. A standard of measurement that identifies the quality of an advertiser by analyzing the average cost of every 1,000 impressions given. Knowledge is power. You ll find more free resources here, which will be essential to your app monetization strategy. Index 438

41 AppFlood is the only 100% transparent cross-promotion platform for buying, selling and exchanging mobile traffic. The network gives developers an unrivaled level of transparency and control over app marketing efforts. Launched by PapayaMobile in July of 2012, AppFlood has since attracted more than 7,000 Android and ios developers. appflood.com