Building a phone app from scratch is no easy feat but what is harder, is to build a strategy that keeps bringing you users in the long run. You should be utilizing every avenue you can find so that your app reigns supreme against your competitors.
Using paid methods like influencer marketing through companies like House of Marketers is highly effective, however, there are free strategies to increase app downloads that your internal teams can work on.
In this article, I’ll take you through the most effective ways to boost app downloads for free.
Growth Hacking Strategies To Boost App Downloads
Building a growth hacking strategy for your mobile app is an effective way to boost app downloads without spending additional money when your budget is already tied up, and you really want to push the growth of your app.
Connect With Social Media Influencers For Unpaid Promotions
People assume that influencers will only showcase a product if they’re being paid. That’s true in many cases. This is why companies like House of Marketers help build influencer marketing campaigns that give you the best ROI. However, it’s still possible to connect with influencers to get free promotions and boost app downloads.
You will need to connect with micro or nano influencers who may not be expecting big payouts when working with brands and see what you can exchange for a promotion.
Make sure that you’re contacting influencers that have a niche audience that would be specifically interested in your app, as that also helps the influencer come up with some relevant content for their audience.
Ideas to consider when working with influencers for unpaid promotions include:
- If your app is a subscription service or even costs a lot to download, you can try to exchange a year’s free subscription for multiple promotional posts throughout the year or a single promotional post for a download of the app.
- Consider cross-promotion with the influencer; you could post a promotional video for them on your social media accounts or even showcase their review of your mobile app on your website as a use case for your app.
- Include the influencer into your affiliate marketing program and payout for app purchases only, which does mean you need to give a discount on your app, so it works better if you get ongoing payments from the user.
Build An Affiliate Marketing Program
One of the most effective methods to boost app downloads is to create an affiliate marketing program. To keep the program from costing you money, you’ll need to determine what is required for an affiliate marketer to earn money; it can’t just be free app downloads.
In most cases, you offer a percentage of the initial price of the app for any marketers that bring in users that download and purchase your app or sign up for a subscription.
You can keep the program open for anybody to join, make it a sign-up program that you approve, or simply offer the program as an incentive for specific marketers or social media influencers that you want to work with.
Both the Apple Store and Google Play Store allow you to create discount or promo codes that you can distribute as needed, so there is no need to implement costly or complex affiliate programs, especially if you are handpicking who is part of your affiliate program.
Create Social Media Posts
When businesses think about social media, they often jump to influencer marketing with companies like House of Marketers, which is highly effective in boosting your app downloads. However, at social media’s core, it’s a free service that anybody can create posts.
At a minimum, you should create social media profiles for your app across the platforms with audiences you want to attract.
So, depending on what your app does, you can select several social media platforms to sign up to and start posting daily and interacting with other accounts.
The key will be to create the types of posts that do well on each platform, rather than pushing out generic advertisements that nobody wants to engage with. So do some research on the biggest platforms to see how best to utilize them and what style of posts work.
Focus On App Store Optimization
Just like websites need Search Engine Optimization, mobile apps need App Store Optimization to boost app downloads. You can optimize your app store listing to rank better and be found easier by users searching for an app to solve their problems.
- Review the best keywords for your app and implement an optimized title and description for your listing. Consider longer tail keywords until your rankings in the app store gain ground. You can’t be a brand-new app and try to rank for “finance” instantly.
- Create localized versions of your app store listing; you will instantly rank better in countries that you have a local listing for and try to make the actual listing different and focused on each location.
You can create local listings in the same language, such as one for the US, Canada, UK, Australia, New Zealand, etc.
- Ask your users for reviews and ratings in the app store as it can boost your rankings and provide social proof to other potential users that people like your app and find it useful.
You can request reviews from your users directly through email outreach or even through in-app interaction.
- Keep your app updated on the app store, as users check the age of an app to see whether it’s going to be current or has support behind it. Look to make improvements, add minor features or changes and push the app out at least once a month if possible.
Submit Your App To Directories
An incredibly easy option to boost app downloads is to submit your app to as many app directories as you can find. You only need time to search google for directories and websites that list apps and determine if the directory complements your app.
Most directories are free, and the benefits are that any users searching the web for apps similar to yours will have a better chance of finding you and downloading your app based on the rankings each app directory can provide.
You can either search google and other search engines for things like “financial app directory” if your app is related to finance, or you could search for your competitor’s names and see which sites are listing their app.
Boost App Downloads With Growth Hacking
Utilizing growth hacking opens up opportunities to connect with new users through avenues you don’t normally explore with paid advertising and marketing; it’s an effective way to boost app downloads.
The idea behind growth hacking is simply to find creative ways to market your app without paying anything, the 5 ideas listed above should only be the start of what you can do to boost app downloads.
