The 2016 Mobile Growth Handbook: Best Practices, Tips, and Growth Hacks

A revolution is changing the rules of ecommerce.
ARE YOU GETTING LEFT BEHIND?
BETTER RESULTS
FOR
MOBILE ECOMMERCE
Authors: Rishabh Gupta • Mada Seghete • marketing@branch.io
The 2016
Mobile Growth Handbook
This book includes:
- 45 tips, real-life hacks, and best practices from top mobile growth experts
- Mobile Growth Chart with a list of metrics/analytics and tools available to measure them
- Graphs, numbers, and data to help you understand the mobile app ecosystem
- Links to the best blogs, sources, and community for Mobile Growth

Growing an App is More and More Challenging
Top 3
apps…
Others
20%
2M
Apps
2.2M
Apps
App Store PlayStore
Big apps
dominate traffic…. In a sea of apps…. And it’s getting worse….

Native Mobile is Taking Over + Drives More Revenue
Source: https://www.internetretailer.com/2014/08/13/jackthreads-proves-deep-linking-e-mail-apps-boosts-sales
http://www.businessinsider.com/time-spent-mobile-browsing-vs-apps-2015-9
http://colehaan.com
…Native app
converts
1.5x desktop
and
3x mobile
web
While
desktop
still converts
2x mobile
web...
http://colehaan.com
3.7 hours
per day in
app
20 mins
per day on
mobile web

2015 Holiday Shopping Season Recap from the IBM Watson Trend Hub
Mobile is Only a Fraction of Growing Revenue

- 2 Million+ apps on Google Play and Apple App store
- Today, 50,000 apps are being launched every month
- 80% of the time-spent is captured by 3 Apps (Facebook, Chrome,
YouTube/ WhatsApp)
Given the odds, mobile growth
cannot be left to chance

Acquisition
Channels ASO
PR / Social
Media
Paid Marketing
Organic
Growth
Partnerships
Content
Marketing
Referrals
Mobile
Website/Website
Email Lists SEO
Metrics/
Analytics
App Store
Analytics
Campaign
Measurement
Install Attribution Event tracking
Attribution Linked
Cohorts
Content
Analytics
Attribution Linked
Cohorts
User Analytics
Email
Analytics
Keyword
performance
Activation
Channels
In App
Notifications
Push Email
On-Boarding
Tutorial
UI/UX Personalization
Community
Engagement
User Support Deep-Linking Retargeting
Metrics/
Analytics
User
segmentation
A/B Testing
Activation Email
Analytics
Heat Maps Event Tracking
Conversion
funnels
User Analytics Time to Resolve
Deep-link
Attribution &
Analytics
Campaign
Measurement
Retention
Channels Push
Drip Emails /
Newsletters
Personalization
Lifecycle
Marketing
Cross-Platform
Linkages
Marketing
Automation
App Performance Retargeting
Offers/
Discounts
Deep-Linking
Metrics/
Analytics
A/B Testing
Drip Campaign
Analytics
Event Tracking
Funnels/
Cohorts
Screen Flows Conversions
Performance
Analysis (Battery,
space, speed etc.)
Churn
Segment
LTVs
Deep-link
Attribution &
Analytics
Referral
Channels Text
Email Contact
List
Content Sharing Promo Codes Word of Mouth
Blogs /
Multimedia
Content
Widgets/Embeds
Metrics/
Analytics
Clicks and
Conversions
Invites sent &
accepted
Shares and
Conversions
Conversions Organic Growth Shares Clicks
What’s Inside
1. 45 tips, real-life hacks and best practices from the top mobile growth experts across top apps
2. Mobile Growth Chart with a list of metrics/analytics and tools available to measure them.
3. Graphs, numbers, data to help you understand the mobile app ecosystem
4. Links to the best blogs, sources, and community for Mobile Growth.
Complete Chart Inside

We are a community of 16,000 of top mobile app developers and
marketers (iOS and Android) curated by Branch. This global community is
headquartered in Silicon Valley and spread across 40 cities around the
world. We have an online community at https://mobilegrowth.org/.
If you are passionate about the mobile ecosystem or mobile growth, join the
community (https://branch.app.link/kxw2vqgHav). You can also attend a
growth meet-up near you, check out our annual calendar here
(https://branch.app.link/dCTwYMDHav). Our Meet-ups are attended and hosted
by top apps like AirBnB, Pinterest, SoundCloud, Instagram, Medium, Flipboard,
LinkedIn, Intuit, PayTM, SnapDeal etc.
Who are the Mobile Growth Experts?

+
more
Our mobile growth experts

Join our Online
Community
Attend a Global Meetup Follow us on Medium
Join Mobile Growth Community
https://branch.app.link/dCTwYMDHavhttps://branch.app.link/kxw2vqgHav https://branch.app.link/pcEuz9FHav

Growth Framework: AARRR by Dave McClure
ACQUISITION
REFERRAL RETENTION
ACTIVATION
Note: We are leaving the 3rd R: Revenue, as this eBook’s scope is to discuss Mobile User Growth

ACQUISITION
“Most apps die within 6 months.”
“It’s too hard. I’m going back to web.”
--Anonymous mobile developer

The Acquisition Tool Kit
KEY PROBLEM
a. Most tools promise to do everything, but best suited for few things.
b. Interlinking data between tools is very difficult. The tools do not integrate well with each other.
Channels ASO PR / Social Media Paid Marketing Organic Growth Partnerships
Content
Marketing
Referrals
Mobile
Website/Website
Email Lists SEO
Metrics/
Analytics
App Store
Analytics
Campaign
Measurement
Install Attribution Event tracking
Attribution
Linked Cohorts
Content Analytics
Attribution
Linked Cohorts
User Analytics Email Analytics
Keyword
performance
Tools
Google Analytics (Premium) / Mixpanel / In-House / Kochava ($$)
SensorTower Mention Branch KISSMetrics Adjust Hubspot Branch Tune Mailchimp Moz
AppAnnie HootSuite AppsFlyer Apsalar KISSMetrics Marketo Tune Amplitude Responsys DeepCrawl
App Store
Dashboard
Keyhole Adjust Amplitude Tune Amplitude Adjust Appboy Marketo Kenshoo
Google Play
Dashboard
Nanigans Tune Mixpanel AppsFlyer Kochava Answers SendGrid Marin

"When we first started, we built hundreds of simple utility apps and all of
them cross-promoted and advertised to download Dolphin. We built
hundreds of utility apps. Once we reached 1M to 2M installs we went to
other developers with massive installs to promote our app. We realized
category to category user acquisition works; Games to games,
utilities to utilities etc. Once we reached 10M+, we got into big
partnerships with OEMs, mobile companies for preinstalls….”
Edith Yeung, Dolphin Browser, Partner
500 Start-ups Mobile Collective
TIP 1: Category Cross-Promotion

”Very often, developers launch iOS first or Android first as they develop
apps for the other platform. We did one simple hack that worked really
well. When we launched our Android app, instead of ‘iOS coming soon’
logo, we asked people to submit their emails as a waitlist for iOS app. We
had thousands of emails by the time we launched our iOS app. We also
used this list for our iOS Beta users and all of this at no extra cost – just
replacing COMING SOON with JOIN THE WAITLIST turned out to be a
goldmine.”
TIP 2: Replace “Coming Soon” with “Join the Waitlist”
Alex Jubien, Start-up coach and mobile
strategy consultant

"One of the things to leverage early on is – PR. We figured out which
competitors were written about, and who were those reporters. We
compiled a list of all these reporters. Then, we made a list of how
interesting we were compared to competitors, and sent it to them. By
doing that we got picked up for a lot of press during our launch.”
Jean Luc David, Docler
TIP 3: Get Early PR by Doing a Competitor Comparison

"Hustle hard to get at least one coverage, and then leverage that to send
to others and get more free press. Once you get one coverage, email back
to all the relevant reporters with the link to that coverage. If one
legitimate site covers you, many smaller will cover you automatically.”
Tim Hsia, Workflow
TIP 4: Create a Press Domino Effect

"You need a minimum of five ratings for the
rating of the latest version of the app to
show up. Your cost of acquisition goes down
when you have good ratings on your app.
‘How to get these ratings? Call your Aunt’. No,
seriously call every friend or family member
to make sure you start every version with at
least five 5-star rating.”
Ethan Appleby, Vango
TIP 5: Get at Least 5 Reviews

"The best way to get [your] app featured is,
networking; both Apple and Google organize
meet-ups where you can talk to
representatives who can put you in touch
with the right people. Going on LinkedIn and
cold emailing people can work as well.”
Zaid Al-Husseini, Gogobot
TIP 6: Get Your App Featured

"Building a working relationship with your category manager at the
Apple and Google helps…They talk to us about their future plans and
technologies and we try to build features into our products that map
onto those, so we are more likely to be featured.”
Billy Shipp, Yoshirt
TIP 7: Use Latest Platform Features to Get ‘Featured’

"If you start from zero you just have to hustle – get very creative and
reach out to everyone you know. Figure out whether there is some sort of
barter system you can engage in – you promote someone’s app and in
turn they promote yours. Once you have a first user base, figure out what
it is they love about your app and then take those experiences and make
them even better.”
Deema Tamimi, Flipboard
TIP 8: Use Barter to Promote Your App

1 2 3
Example: App to App Barter
Partner with adjacent businesses to drive mobile commerce
YUMMLY + INSTACART
Deep link to
ingredients

"If a problem exists and user exists, they already are talking about it
somewhere. For Branch, we found deep-linking problems being discussed
on Stack Overflow and Hacker-News. Also, if the right person hunts you
on Product Hunt, and you get early vote-ups, you can get a lot of eyeballs
and users. Find existing communities of your users and leverage those.
When we built the Kindred app our community was moms – so we
engaged them in mom forums and on mom blogs.”
Mada Seghete, Branch
TIP 9: Leverage Existing Communities like PH/HN

"If your app isn't geo specific, you can launch your
app in a smaller market, very often for American
startups its Australia or New Zealand. You can
test and beta release in that market. Apart from
learning from a test market, you can still get
Apple's support during US launch as they like to
support during launch, and your US launch will be
a with a more stable and better product.”
Michael Dawson, Pocket Games
TIP 10: Leverage Geo-Beta for Product Release

"Videos work extremely well, the cost per install for static ads are
$3.75 and it is down to $1.75 for video ads on FB/Instagram. Videos
work.”
Kat Kitay, Buzzfeed
TIP 11: It is 2016: Use Video Ads
"Search engines are a big part of discovery, along with ASO you still
must consider SEO, for Grindr we don't have a web product, but we
do have a landing page and we optimize it.”
Quan Duong, Grindr
TIP 12: Don’t Forget SEO for Apps

1 2
has app
Example: SEO
Tracks installs and increase conversion
HOTELTONIGHT

https://branch.io/attachment/case-studies/hoteltonight.pdf
lift on install to purchase rate
just by adding deep linking
Example – SEO
Tracks installs and increase conversion
18%
HOTELTONIGHT

"When we started out on mobile, we started web to mobile interstitials and
they didn't perform too well. We had very high bounce rates. We relaunched
them to come only during certain events that we identified as MOBILE
MOMENTS - actions or events that are better on mobile than web. We found
success, in fact our most successful interstitial was during the "listing"
experience, driving 30% of our web to mobile installs. We must find these
MOBILE MOMENTS while converting users from web to mobile.”
Sash Catanzarite, Tradesy
TIP 13: Define ‘Mobile Moments’ for Web to App

1 2 3
Example: Web to App Conversions
Drive high quality installs and purchases from mobile web
JET
Deep link to same
content in app

"One of the main shifts we saw was - lets say you
search the restaurant Gary Danko on Google on
your mobile. First option for a mobile web banner
prompting to download the Yelp app was ‘Download
Yelp’ because mobile experience is better than web.
Second option we tried was ‘Download Yelp’
because we have so much info on Gary Danko, X no.
of reviews , Y no. of photo etc. That shift i.e.
providing more context lead to much higher
downloads.”
Sep Norouzi, Yelp
TIP 14: Provide Context to Drive Downloads

"Incentivized installs, lots of people have used it and spend millions
on it, but these users the worst and useless. You are just throwing
money away. And incentivized installs are dying.”
Philip La, Figure 1
TIP 15: Don’t Do Incentivized Installs
"The advice is to not pay for Installs, but buy active users and not
lose all the money. Unless you have metrics to define active users
and measure conversions, don't buy."
Edith Yeung, Dolphin Browser, Partner
500 Start-ups Mobile Collective

Andy Carvell’s Mobile Growth Stack Revised: https://mg.app.link/dSejkrrIav
Andrew Chen on Mobile Retention: https://mg.app.link/xrs1sjuIav
Rahul Vohra on App Virality: https://mg.app.link/TaEItvwIav
Localytics: 8 Mobile App Metrics that Matter: https://mg.app.link/9XdkelyIav
What User Retention Hides: https://mg.app.link/P8ecwUzIav
Round up of Mobile Analytics Tools: https://mg.app.link/mjbl2qBIav
Quora Discussion on best mobile tools: https://mg.app.link/pwaz2XCIav
Quora Discussion between founders of Segment.io and mParticle:
https://mg.app.link/iDj1qgEIav
Resource: 8 Must-Read List on Mobile Growth

Source: mParticle
Resource: Round of App SDKs

Resource: 2016 Mobile Growth Stack
Acquisition
Channels ASO
PR / Social
Media
Paid Marketing
Organic
Growth
Partnerships
Content
Marketing
Referrals
Mobile
Website/Website
Email Lists SEO
Metrics/
Analytics
App Store
Analytics
Campaign
Measurement
Install
Attribution
Event tracking
Attribution Linked
Cohorts
Content
Analytics
Attribution Linked
Cohorts
User Analytics
Email
Analytics
Keyword
performance
Activation
Channels
In App
Notifications
Push Email
On-Boarding
Tutorial
Community
Engagement
User Support
Deep-
Linking
Retargeting
Metrics/
Analytics
User
segmentation
A/B Testing
Activation Email
Analytics
Conversion
funnels
Deep-link
Attribution
& Analytics
Campaign
Measurement
Retention
Channels Push
Drip Emails /
Newsletters
Personalization
Lifecycle
Marketing
Cross-Platform
Linkages
Marketing
Automation
Offers/
Discounts
Deep-Linking
Metrics/
Analytics
A/B Testing
Drip
Campaign
Analytics
Event Tracking
Funnels/
Cohorts
Performance
Analysis (Battery,
space, speed etc.)
Churn
Segment
LTVs
Deep-link
Attribution &
Analytics
Referral
Channels Text
Email Contact
List
Blogs /
Multimedia
Content
Widgets/Embeds
Metrics/
Analytics
Clicks and
Conversions
Invites sent &
accepted
Shares and
Conversions
Source: The Mobile Growth Stack

ACTIVATION
“Installed my app, but not using it.”
“I lose them at the sign-up.”

The Activation Tool Kit
KEY PROBLEM
a. Defining an “Activated User” for an app requires a lot of data analysis and studying user behavior
Channels
In App
Notifications
Push Email
On-Boarding
Tutorial
Community
Engagement
User Support Deep-Linking Retargeting
Metrics/
Analytics
User
segmentation
A/B Testing
Activation
Email Analytics
Heat Maps
Event
Tracking
Conversion
funnels
User
Analytics
Time to Resolve
Deep-link
Attribution &
Analytics
Campaign
Measurement
Tools
Amplitude Loacalytics Appboy Appcues Amplitude LeanPlum Amplitude Freshdesk Branch AdRoll
Apptentative Mixpanel Mail clients Appsee Appboy Appsee Adjust HappyFox Tune AppAnnie
Adjust Apptimize Localytics UXCam Tune Localytics Apsalar Zendesk Appsflyer Adjust
Tune Appboy Mixpanel Appboy Apsalar Appboy Kochava Intercom.io Adjust Tune

"Most services try to make the signup flow as painless as possible.
That’s a terrible idea. You have more attention than you ever will have
again from that user. So teach them what your product is really about
– consider the onboard flow a ‘learn flow’. Slow down, it’s ok to
explain your product. But don’t just tell your users how your product
works, get them to engage with it right away.”
TIP 16: Take Time With Onboarding
Josh Elman, GreyLock Partners

"I think attention span is a huge thing with mobile, if it takes
a few seconds to load, people are on another app.”
TIP 17: Work on App Performance
Philip La, Figure 1
Metrics to track
a. App crash rate: keep it below 2% and lower it as app matures.
b. API latency: Approx. 1 second response time is a good standard to follow
c. End to end application latency: Again, approx. 1 second response time is a good standard to
follow

"From my twitter days, we found a 30%
increase in user conversion when we
prefilled a username or Twitter handle for
them.”
TIP 18: Pre-fill User Data
Justin Zhu, Iterable
30%+

"We think about onboarding as part of a larger user journey and we try to
have onboarding flow nicely from beginning, to after onboarding (we have
callouts walk you through different features post preference screens), to
what we refer to as your “first re-engagement”, we don’t immediately send
a welcome email since you’re necessarily already on our app, and instead
wait a few hours, so that we have a chance to get you to come back.”
TIP 19: Think About User Journey as a Whole
Ethan Smith, Yummly

"Creating the right onboarding flow is incredibly
important. If you don’t create the right first impression
and give the user what he’s looking for he will close the
app right away and never open it again. With deep links
you can personalize the first app experience and give
new users an individual welcome, automatically apply
any promotional offers and bring them to the content
they came for without any friction.”
Mike Molinet, Branch
TIP 20: Personalize Onboarding With Context

"The onboarding experience early on is really critical. Don’t think of all your
users in the same way, instead tailor their onboarding experience. Some
users will know your product fairly well, others don’t know what to expect
when they download your app. Maybe don’t ask these people right at front to
give you all their information. Let them experience your product first. Branch
Metrics for example gives you the possibility to contextualize the onboarding
experience based on where the users come from.”
TIP 21: Customize User Onboarding

USED BY:
Example: Existing User Information for Onboarding
Engage new users with custom welcome
78%
conversion to signup

Example:
Fun Onboarding
First-touch UX
Blackbox by Ryan McLeod // @warpling

"We realized that users who have a ‘promo
code’ are three times more likely to convert
into paying users. As a consequence, we were
giving out a promo code to every user who
installed the app, so they could try out all the
premium features and understand the value
we were creating before we even asked them
to pay.”
Bayram Annakov, App in the Air
TIP 22: Leverage Geo-Beta for Product Release
Source: andrewchen.co
65% users leave you on day 1
and 95% by Day 7

” One of the things you overlook is the app is in your users pocket or hands. That
is a communication channel & you have an opportunity to talk to your users.
Especially in early days when 100 or 1000 users are using your app, you should
allow for users to talk to you & vice versa. That’s your easiest way to build a
community, its not going to happen on Twitter and Facebook, users are too lazy
to switch channels. But when they are in the app, make it easy for them to talk to
you. At the beginning, their community is YOU, bootstrap your community and as
you grow expand your strategy. Talk to your users before they land up on app
store with a bad review.”
Robi Ganguly, Apptentive
TIP 23: Talk to Users Within the App

”We wanted to increase sign-ups, and our theory was instead of asking people for
email, password etc., we made a demo mode, where you can experience the app,
immerse yourself in the experience and feel the product. We thought this would
be really successful, but this killed conversion in a very bad way. We had graphs
going southwards. We nixed that idea, we learnt from that, that users are okay
giving some data and effort but want to use the app/product for real and see
real value.”
Lindsay Rothman, Freshbooks
TIP 24: Don’t Build a Generic demo Mode

Resource: Mobile Trends 2016
• 2.5 Billion smartphone users, grew 21% in 2015; China, India and USA are top 3 markets.
• Users spend 4-5 hours spent on mobile; 80% of time spent within 3 apps.
• Average user uses ~12 apps per day and ~33 apps in a month.
• 1 Billion+ android phones, 230 million iPhones. iOS users spend 7X more than android on
respective stores.
• Mobile Advertising is in its early days; only 12% of total ad spends goes to mobile, while 25%
of user time is spent on mobile. It is expected to be a $100 billion market in the next 5 years.
• Messenger apps are massive with Whatsapp (1B+), Facebook messenger (800M+), & WeChat
(~700M) being the biggest platforms.
• Mobile Drives 35% of all eCommerce Transactions.
• Mobile Deep Linking doubles user retention over 30 days.
Source: Mary Meeker Internet Report 2016, Branch Blogs, Criteo State of Mobile Commerce Report, Mobile Marketing Magazine

Mobile Marketing Statistics 2016: https://mg.app.link/ft5I4HHIav
Greylock Partners: Mobile Growth Stack: https://mg.app.link/ZEHOG7IIav
The Growth Story of Musical.ly: https://mg.app.link/69uHCAKIav
Mobile Growth Meet-up videos from SV & beyond: https://mg.app.link/6FabZPMIav
The Metrics a16z looks at for M-commerce: https://mg.app.link/ZYWwD8NIav
Mobile Cheat Sheet for Internet Report 2016: https://mg.app.link/orS1vfQIav
The 10 point ASO check-list: https://mg.app.link/TTjmEGRIav
16 Metrics that matter for Mobile Product Managers:
https://mg.app.link/06jzRgTIav
Resource: 8 More ‘Must-Reads’ on Mobile Growth

RETENTION
“After 3 months, I lose all my users.”
“Why are they not coming back?”

Retention is the Foundation of Mobile Growth
Source: Appsflyer
Compounding effect of Retention is massive
a. Increasing retention from 5% to 20%, we can
see user growth jump by 10X
b. If we manage retention of 60% (up from 5%),
users grow by 350X

The Retention Tool Kit
KEY PROBLEM: Most apps and developers under-invest in retention and engagement.
Channels Push
Drip Emails /
Newsletters
Personalization
Lifecycle
Marketing
Cross-Platform
Linkages
Marketing
Automation
App
Performance
Retargeting
Offers/
Discounts
Deep-Linking
Metrics/
Analytics
A/B Testing
Drip Campaign
Analytics
Event Tracking
Funnels /
Cohorts
Performance
Analysis
(Battery, space,
speed etc.)
Churn Segment LTVs
Deep-link
Attribution &
Analytics
Tools
Optimizely Marketo Amplitude Amplitude Appcues Kahuna Crashlytics AdRoll Amplitude Branch
Apptimize
Branch Email
Journeys
Appsee Adjust Localytics MoEngage Pulse Tapad Localytics
Appboy Responsys CleverTap Tune Amplitude Apptentative Apteligent TapCommerce Apsalar
Localytics MailChimp LeanPlum Amplitude UXcam Appboy New Relic Tapjoy

"The importance of first 3 days cannot be
overstated, apps win/lose the user retention
battle at this stage. We have gone through
tons of mobile growth charts, and time and
again the trend to notice is difference between
a successful and not a successful app comes
down to the first 3 days of the app usage.”
TIP 25: First 3 Days Retention is the Key
Everyone loses 4-5%.Difference b/w top apps
& others
After the first 3 days, the top Apps and
the others follow the same trajectory.
But the first 3 days of higher retention,
leads to 131x growthMike Molinet, Branch

”Retention is a big number for us and monitor our retention curve very closely,
after launching several apps, we found push notifications to be very effective and
first week after install is really key in educating users about your product.
Experimenting with handwritten notifications…as a content company we have
something new to talk about everyday.”
Kat Kitay, Buzzfeed
TIP 26: Educate Users About Your Product Week 1

”Don’t aggressively acquire users if you can’t retain them. You are also potentially
burning some of the most enthusiastic people about your product. Someone sees
your ad and thinks that’s the product they have been waiting for, downloads it
and it’s not the experience they have been looking for…and then they just leave.
The chance that they come back is slim to none.”
Vanessa Larco, Box
TIP 27: Always Prioritize Retention Over Acquisition

“Email is great, just reminding customer what Jet.com stocks, or it is
football season, works really well and gets them back. Email is our
best engagement channel so far.”
Lauren Picasso, Jet.com
TIP 28: Emails Really Work
"Our best engagement channel is emails…every email is personalized.
Yummly is basically like Pandora or Netflix but for food. Taking through an
extensive set-up, we have a lot of information, we send them personalized
email. That's our biggest driver of retention."
Brian Witlin, Yummly

USED BY:
Example – Email to App
65%
sessions from email when deep linking
to app vs. sending to mobile web
Make app email marketing seamless

”If your are not an ecommerce company which makes money on each
conversion, its difficult to justify costs of expensive tools. One of the easiest ways
to A/B test is to use your Email MVP, we use sendwithus, a service that is really
great. This helps us to split-test emails, and a lot of learning we learn from here
we apply to the product...We tested a weekly digest with playlists based on their
on-site listening habits, this weekly digest did 70% better than our previous
newsletters. This eventually led us to launch a feed in our 3.0 version, which was
super successful.”
Andrea Slobodien, 8Tracks
TIP 29: Emails Can be Used as an MVP Tool

”The single most important thing for games early on is the quality of users &
building a density of quality users. After getting to a critical mass you can start to
focus on the drivers of virality and the target audiences.”
Josh Lu, Zynga
TIP 30: Get Quality Users, it Matters

”We make every single notification personal, so they are either about content you
posted or it is recommended content based on the stuff you posted on Pinterest.
Be careful with general notifications that you send out to thousands of users and
make sure every notification is personal, based on the data you have about your
users. We treat every notification as an experiment and measure whether they
increase the retention of our users or just waste their attention.”
Casey Winters, Pinterest
TIP 31: Personalize Push Notifications

”Email and push are the best engagement channels. Don’t
overuse push notifications, but also don’t be afraid to use it,
most users love it, some don’t and they will turn it off.”
April Alexander, Redfin
TIP 32: Don’t be Afraid to Use Push

”When I was at Shopkick, we were a retail rewards app. Geo-fenced
notifications were a huge help in reminding users to open the app
when they were near the store. It improved our metrics by double
digits once we launched them. It took us time to fix GPS inaccuracies
and battery performance, but it was worth it.”
John Egan, Pinterest
TIP 33: Using Geo-Fenced Notifications

”We switched CDN providers, and the benefit was reduced response time and this
improved user experience, we saw a lift in both retention and engagement.”
Quan Duong, Grindr
TIP 34: App Performance Matters

”Users have to get addicted to your app – not to the entire
experience but to something in your app. Some feature, something
to hook on to that they do over and over again. When you don’t take
away every single barrier that lets them exactly do that, you will end
up chasing the next feature that is going to create growth – and that
never works. Having tons of features usually doesn’t create growth.”
Andrew Fernandez, Rent the Runway
TIP 35: Users Get Hooked on to Features, Not Apps

”Balancing A/B testing with resources / time constraints, there are so many ways
to make A/B tests manageable. First of all, learn to validate ideas more quickly.
Live tests are just one means of validation. You can also test types of content,
types of personalization, and even layouts, through email or push, user
interviews, or by digging into past data around similar features you may have
built. None of these require dev time. I also like to spend a lot of time looking
through random metrics just to see if any gems jump out at me. SQL is really fast
to learn and you get a lot of bang for buck.”
Andrea Slobodien, 8Tracks
TIP 36: Keep A/B Testing Simple and Fast

“We are not looking at cost per install, but cost per booking , and
we look at users who move the needle on our key metrics.”
Audrey Tsang, Hotel Tonight
TIP 37: Define Engagement Metrics
"Metrics, we have quite a few but on the listener side we have “listening time” as
a key metric – it is a compound metric that helps interpret (a) the quality of
content on the platform and (b) relevance to the user (related to discovery) and (c)
engagement. We arrived at it after countless debates."
Sridhar Ravichandran, SoundCloud

Resource: Growth Modeling Template
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Growth Chart
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Growth Chart
<50,000 weekly users (@10%) ~ 1M+ weekly users (@40%)
Download the growth modeling excel
a. Run your own growth modeling experiments
b. Understand what metrics will contribute the biggest delta
https://mg.app.link/rW99c1VIavDOWNLOAD NOW
What happens in 6 months, if you increase retention from 10% to 40%

REFERRAL
“If they ain’t talking, you ain’t growing.”
“How do you I make my app viral?”

App Virality
User A
engages in app
User A
shares app
User B
clicks on link
User B
downloads app
User B
engages in app
User B
shares app
Double viral loop
1
2
3
4
5

The Retention Tool Kit
KEY PROBLEM: A lot of referral events happen outside your app, making measurement difficult
Channels Text Email Contact List Content Sharing Promo Codes Word of Mouth
Blogs / Multimedia
Content
Widgets/Embeds
Metrics/
Analytics
Clicks and
Conversions
Invites sent &
accepted
Shares and
Conversions
Tools
Twilio MailChimp SumoMe
Branch
DeepLinks
Existing Tools HootSuite In-house
Branch DeepLinks SendGrid
Social Networks
Plugins
Referral
Saasquatch
Topsy
NexMo SendWithUs
Branch Content
Sharing
Extole Mentions
Salesforce
Marketing Cloud
Branch Email
Journey
Twitter Kit (Fabric) Friendbuy Nanigans

"Most companies get caught up in what I call ‘infectious virality’ – the kind of
virality where you encourage your users to bring their friends so the experience
is better for both. But there’s two other types of virality that let your core users
be your evangelists: 1. ‘Word-of-Mouth Virality’ – having your users describe
their great experience to their friends. Be careful which words you use in the
product or when talking to the press because these words will impact how your
users will describe it. 2. ‘Demonstration Virality’ – having your core users share
content from your product. These shares only happen if they are authentic and
naturally happen in your product.”
TIP 38: Different Types of Virality
Josh Elman, GreyLock Partners

k = p*i*c1*c2
Where,
p: percentage of users inviting others [How many users love your app enough to evangelize]
i: no. of invites sent by each sharing user [Proxy for ‘How much they love your product’]
c1: % of people who click on that link [Measures effectiveness of your marketing message; hint: A/B test]
c2: % of people who convert on that link [Effectiveness of your landing page; hint: always use Deep-links]
Resource: Measuring K-factor (detailed)
NOTE: One should multiply referred users with retention quotient to understand long term growth

“Content that users share out, deep-linked to our app, is the best
way to refer users in.”
TIP 39: Content Sharing is a Driver of Virality
"More than an Invite button, you gotta figure out the native ways users are
sharing. Conversion from image sharing by users, is much much more
popular than the invite button. If you can find any of those natural things
people want to share and discuss things, than that’s the best way to create
referrals for your app.”
Philip La, Figure 1
Kat Kitay, Buzzfeed

"It’s not only about sharing your app but more about letting users share what
content they like or have created inside the app. At Flipboard this could be an
interesting article they read or a magazine they have created. Think about
their motivations and tie it back to what makes your product unique. This is
where Branch can be really powerful by letting users share contextual links to
one specific piece of content they like inside your app.”
TIP 40: Give Users Something They Love to Share

"Text messages have the highest conversion rate. While the volume of
shares on Facebook is higher, the eventual conversion of a text invitation
to install the app is much higher.”
Bayram Annakov, App in the Air
TIP 41: Text Messages Work Better Than FB Shares
Use Deep Linking and Deep Views to
maximize conversions from text

"Growing through inviting/sharing,
means we know who invited the new
user. If we personalize their landing
pages and in-app onboarding, we can
maximize conversions.”
TIP 42: Give Users Something They Love to Share

TIP 43: Create Shareable Content Outside Your App
Create a YouTube channel
with UGC
Creating shareable blog
content
Creating shareable video
content
Create Things People Love to Share

TIP 44: Create Viral Loops
"A lot of our growth is driven by our organic viral loops via creators as well as
listener/discovery based virality, so the channels that drive growth are the
same as where creators and listeners hang out, which is basically everywhere
on the internet (FB/Twitter/Embeds/SEO/Tumblr etc.). The variations between
the channels are quite drastic when an influential creator drops a track that
goes viral, which leads to interesting effects on acquisition/retention and
others, but largely speaking it is a game of optimizing for conversion and
reducing friction across all the channels that refer back to SC debates."
Sridhar Ravichandran, SoundCloud

TIP 45: Referral Best Practices
It’s better to get something than a discount on something.
Give an Incentive
If you can only reward one, reward the new user.
Two-sided are Best
Make it incredibly easy for users to share.
One-step Sharing is Easiest
People share when it makes them look good.
Appeal to Ego
Strong emotions like anger can drive a lot more clicks than happy emotions.
Negative emotions only drive clicks, not shares.
Use Emotion

Resource: Referral Modeling Template
<30,000 weekly users (@2 friends) ~ 6M+ weekly users (@8 friends)
Download the growth modeling excel
a. Run your own referral based growth modeling
b. Understand what metrics will contribute the biggest delta.
https://mg.app.link/rW99c1VIavDOWNLOAD NOW
What happens in 6 months, if each user invites 8 instead of 2 friends
0
1000000
2000000
3000000
4000000
5000000
6000000
7000000
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Growth Chart
0
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10000
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20000
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Growth Chart

Resource: 2016 Mobile Growth Stack
Acquisition
Channels ASO
PR / Social
Media
Paid Marketing
Organic
Growth
Partnerships
Content
Marketing
Referrals
Mobile
Website/Websit
e
Email Lists SEO
Metrics/
Analytics
App Store
Analytics
Campaign
Measurement
Install
Attribution
Event tracking
Attribution Linked
Cohorts
Content
Analytics
Attribution
Linked Cohorts
User Analytics
Email
Analytics
Keyword
performance
Activation
Channels
In App
Notifications
Push Email
On-Boarding
Tutorial
UI/UX
Personalizatio
n
Community
Engagement
User Support
Deep-
Linking
Retargeting
Metrics/
Analytics
User
segmentation
A/B Testing
Activation Email
Analytics
Conversion
funnels
Deep-link
Attribution
& Analytics
Campaign
Measurement
Retention
Channels Push
Drip Emails /
Newsletters
Personalization
Lifecycle
Marketing
Cross-Platform
Linkages
Marketing
Automation
Offers/
Discounts
Deep-Linking
Metrics/
Analytics
A/B Testing
Drip
Campaign
Analytics
Event Tracking
Funnels/
Cohorts
Performance
Analysis (Battery,
space, speed etc.)
Churn
Segment
LTVs
Deep-link
Attribution &
Analytics
Referral
Channels Text
Email Contact
List
Blogs /
Multimedia
Content
Widgets/Embeds
Metrics/
Analytics
Clicks and
Conversions
Invites sent &
accepted
Shares and
Conversions

A revolution is changing the rules of ecommerce.
ARE YOU GETTING LEFT BEHIND?
BETTER RESULTS
FOR
MOBILE ECOMMERCE
Rishabh Gupta • Mada Seghete • Marketing@branch.io
The 2016
Mobile Growth Handbook
Thank you!

The 2016 Mobile Growth Handbook: Best Practices, Tips, and Growth Hacks

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