January 2022 - Consumer Acquisition by Brainlabs

January 2022 Mobile App UA & Creative Roundup

Posted on January 25, 2022March 4, 2022 by Lian

January 2022 Mobile App UA & Creative Roundup

Our January 2022, Mobile App UA & Creative Roundup brings you expert guidance on the UA trends we will be watching in 2022, our latest Case Study featuring CGI for Wooga’s Switchcraft, and top-performing ad creative for dating apps on TikTok versus Facebook.

Brian Bowman, our CEO, was also a guest on data.ai’s Game Changers podcast where host Chris Uglietta and Brian discussed how to efficiently develop an A/B test ad creative in light of Apple’s IDFA tracking deprecation. Watch the first episode of the three-part series below.

UA and Creative Trends in January 2022

First-party Data to NFTs: See the UA Trends We’re Watching

Mobile app advertisers are adapting to the evolving ad ecosystem. See the impact of IDFA loss and understand the A/B testing implications of automated buying. See how mobile-first companies are improving mobile app ad trends in 2022.

[Case Study] Wooga’s Switchcraft Gets CGI Makeover

Read our Case Study to see how we developed a 30-second CGI game trailer, 50 original concepts, and over 150 videos for Switchcraft to bring high-value players to the game.

TikTok vs Facebook: Who Has The Better Dating Ads?

With the season of love upon us, dating app creative shows how persona-based creative appeals to the unique motivations of users. To understand motivation-driven advertising, check out this article!

UA Media Buying Model: Facebook, TikTok, & Google App Advertisers

Structure your media buying with proven best practices using our Media Buying Model. Any mobile app can leverage distinct UA strategies and campaign parameters to develop a robust testing harness.

Ad Concept Model: Beat Facebook Creative Fatigue

It is possible to beat Facebook creative fatigue and consistently find new winning ads. Our Ad Concept Model is designed to systematize creative development and leverage user motivations to customize ad creative in a simple, repeatable framework.

Wooga’s Switchcraft Gets CGI Makeover

Consumer Acquisition was able to provide us with fresh, breakthrough ad creative that performed to meet different goals, from installs at scale to targeting high-value players. We were truly impressed by how Consumer Acquisition took our 2D assets and brought them to life. The creative process was collaborative and Consumer Acquisition tested all types of concepts and art styles to ensure we found what worked best. For our official game trailer, Consumer Acquisition created compelling 3D assets from scratch under a very tight deadline and we are thrilled with how it turned out. Consumer Acquisition’s commitment to creative research and rigorous creative testing was evident in the excellent results. — Nathalie Wood, Marketing Manager at Wooga

To compete against Gardenscapes, Small Town Murders, or Lily’s Garden, casual games studio Wooga needed compelling ad creative for their first story-driven puzzle match-3 game, Switchcraft. With a unique painterly 2D art style, Switchcraft features a dramatic relationship-driven storyline through diverse characters and magical gameplay. Nuanced character rigging and fluid animation were required to bring their evocative art style to life alongside 3D cinematics that combined realism with comic-book aesthetics.

Through our creative partnership with Wooga, Consumer Acquisition developed a 30-second CGI game trailer, 50 original concepts, and over 150 videos. We created entirely original 3D computer animation along with motion graphics, 2D animation and FX, text animations, lighting effects, character rigging, illustrations, and character design. We developed and tested ad creative that focused on different aspects of the game including themes of love, mystery, drama, or magic. And game mechanics of match-3 puzzles, spellcasting, and narrative choices.

Read our Case Study to see how we helped Switchcraft bring high-value players to the game.

Consumer Acquisition is now a part of Brainlabs

Consumer Acquisition has been acquired by digital marketing agency Brainlabs in an exciting move to expand capabilities for both existing and future clients. In this next stage of growth for Consumer Acquisition, we are thrilled to bring Brainlabs’ strengths in SEO, paid search, and programmatic display advertising to our clients.

Brainlabs’ portfolio of clients includes Mars, Samsung, Walmart Canada, Formula 1, Adidas, Bed, Bath & Beyond, and F5. Get more details on Brainlabs core services or contact us to discuss how these new capabilities can help you reach your 2022 goals.

data.ai Game Changers Video Series

Consumer Acquisition is thrilled to have partnered with data.ai for their new Game Changers video series. Brian Bowman talked with host Chris Uglietta about IDFA impact in a 3-part series you can watch here. Get expert analysis on:

How IDFA loss is impacting traffic quality, lookalike audiences, and onboarding flow
How to efficiently develop successful ad creative in a post-IDFA world
Post-IDFA best practices for creative A/B testing for Facebook, TikTok, and Google

We Are Hiring!

Are you creative, collaborative, data-driven, and approach every day with a growth mindset? Then we want to hear from you!

We are hiring across all departments for fully-remote positions. Check out this interview with Director of User Acquisition, Ariel Neiman to learn what it’s like to work at Consumer Acquisition.

Direction: Junior Creative Director (Global – Remote)

Editing After Effects / Animator (Global – Remote)

Engineering: Product Manager (Global – Remote)

Marketing

Strategy

Creative Strategist (Global – Remote)

User Acquisition

Consumer Acquisition in the News in January 2022

VentureBeat | Brainlabs acquires social ad creative studio Consumer Acquisition

Markets Insider | Brainlabs acquires social ad creative studio Consumer Acquisition

Ad Exchanger | The Point Of Personalization; United Talent Agency Buys MediaLink

The Wise Marketer | UA Formula to Beat Facebook Creative Fatigue: Consumer Acquisition’s Ad Concept Model

More Creative Trends

Helpful Content

For more information on the UA trends we will be watching in 2022, please contact sales@consumeracquisition.com.

Hiring for User Acquisition!

Posted on January 27, 2022March 7, 2022 by Lian

Consumer Acquisition by Brainlabs is Hiring for User Acquisition!

Consumer Acquisition by Brainlabs is in an exciting growth stage and looking for world-class User Acquisition experts to join our team!

Here’s why this job is so great:

Work with world-class clients: Disney, Zynga, Rovio, NBA, Roblox, EA, Playtika, and many others
Work on many social ad platforms managing +6 budgets: Facebook, TikTok, Google, Snap & Apple Search Ads
Join a team that has been fully remote for 8 years with optional offices in these amazing cities: New York City, Austin, Toronto, London, Manchester, São Paulo, Sen Sabastian, Hong Kong, and Singapore
New product offerings such as SEO, Paid Search and Programmatic through our parent company, Brainlabs
Expansion of services to Brainlabs’ clients: Capital One, Mars, Formula 1, The Weather Company, iRobot, and many others
New job growth opportunities and global mobility with over 1,000 employees across 15 countries and rapidly growing

Don’t just take it from us! To better understand what makes us unique, we interviewed one of our very own UA rock stars.

Hear from Ariel Neiman, Director of User Acquisition, on what it’s like to work at Consumer Acquisition. Ariel has been with the company for almost 3 years and has been promoted twice to help lead the UA team’s success. Some of her favorite parts about her job include being fully remote, the coaching and support she’s received from her manager, and the big clients and brands she works with. When Ariel isn’t working, you can find her taking a new class, exploring a nearby town, or snuggling her cat.

Why work for us? Below are just some of the many benefits and perks we offer employees!

UA Team Job Openings:

Dating App Creative Trends

Posted on January 18, 2022September 21, 2022 by Lian

Whether your mobile app is fintech, fashion, or fitness, understanding user motivations is critical for a successful user acquisition campaign. With the season of love upon us, dating app ad creative perfectly illuminates how persona-based creative concepts appeal to the unique motivations of different users.

Get an analysis of high performing ad creative for top dating apps
Explore varied user motivations for dating apps
Discover dating app creative trends for TikTok compared to Facebook
Compare successful Hinge and Plenty of Fish ad creative

From long-term romance to casual connections, dating apps put matchmaking in your pocket. To see what’s bringing people together, we’ve analyzed creative trends and user motivations for dating apps, with a focus on Hinge and Plenty of Fish. Using data from Facebook Ad Library, TikTok For Business, and MobileAction, we compare what ad creative is working for dating apps right now.

As part of our creative process, our Ad Concept Model helps creative teams build on creative trends and motivations within an app category or mobile game genre to develop new concepts. Below, we’ve shared our Ad Concept Model for dating apps as a tool to explore different concepts for target user personas at the intersection of trends and user motivations. See how different user motivations directly inform creative concepts for successful dating apps ad creative.

Analyzing Dating App Creative Trends

Top competitors in the mobile app dating space include Tinder, Hinge, Skout, Clover, Match, Plenty of Fish, OKCupid, and Coffee Meets Bagel.

Competitive research reveals which creative trends are currently working best across social platforms. To identify trends, Facebook Ad Library lets marketers see every ad currently running on their ad network. TikTok For Business surfaces top-performing ads by installs, engagement, and reach. Marketers can also use Mobile Action, SensorTower, or AppAnnie competitor libraries for additional insights.

Based on information from Facebook Ad Library, TikTok For Business, and MobileAction, dating app creative trends we’ve identified include:

App Overview: Overview of the app that showcases features and user experience
App Content: Captured content and screen grabs from the app
Testimonial: Focused on a user’s review and/or experience of the app
Influencers: Utilizing influencers and/or celebs to deliver the primary message
UGC: Content a user would upload to social media regarding the app
Tips & Quizzes: Communicating features or benefits through advice or quizzes

On TikTok in the past thirty days, Hinge and Plenty of Fish have run several top-performing category ads that leverage these trends. Successful ads are measured by installs as a campaign objective.

Creative Trends on TikTok

Hinge TikTok ads almost universally use faux testimonials and UGC-style videos. This approach uses direct address toward the audience, text overlays, and looks like entirely native content. In contrast to Hinge’s UGC ads, Plenty of Fish high-performing TikTok ads focus on the app experience and features rotating dating profile photos with minimalistic UI. Captured content and screen grabs from the app help communicate the interaction process while rotating through a swath of other potential users.

Creative Trends on Facebook

Facebook and Instagram ads for Hinge reveal a different angle for their audience. These ads feature romance and long-term relationship goals through their tagline “The dating app designed to be deleted.” One high-performing Facebook ad ironically shows a profile of a person who confesses to being “weirdly attracted to people who aren’t on social media.”

Ads here also use UGC in a notably different way than respective TikTok UGC ads: messages are screenshots within a social media post to showcase the meta-commentary.

Plenty of Fish ads on Facebook and Instagram are similar to their respective TikTok ads. These ads focus on the app experience, profiles en masse, newness, locality, and the promise of “more.”

Identifying Dating App User Motivations

As consumer marketing has grown up, we’ve learned there is no perfect Pepsi, but there are perfect Pepsis for particular palates; the same goes for products in any market. Before building out a matrix for a particular set of ad concepts, we identify different motivations driving our user personas and break down those motivations by underlying values and desires. Below we’ve included motivational triggers for dating app users.

Ad creative for Hinge compared to Plenty of Fish illuminates how different concepts can appeal to different user motivations.

Users seeking love, authentic connections, and validation respond to the success messaging of Hinge, along with the high quality of the imagery, the brand promise, and the focus on one-to-one attention.

Users seeking casual connections or the excitement of discovery respond to the Plenty of Fish promise of fast onboarding (not “a million questions”), and “new singles” in the area. Even the “See More” prompt teases a surplus of profiles to access.

Creating Dating App Ad Concepts

To develop and iterate on different creative concepts, we map identified motivations to creative trends within the category. In the empty model below, each box represents a different ad creative concept, supporting nearly 40 concepts by pairing six trends with six motivations. While not all creative trends will work persuasively with each motivation, we can expand our concepts even further by targeting specific personas within each pairing. Based on personas, we develop a bespoke creative strategy targeting behaviors, triggers, and preferences.

The proposed ad concept model acts as a foundation for an iterative creative process that can be customized and extended to develop endless ad concepts for an app, website, or service. By building a scalable infrastructure for creative ideation, we provide unique lanes for creative teams and media buyers to explore ideas. The model also acts as an archive of knowledge to ensure we are always optimizing what we’ve learned.

Based on the high-performing dating app ads outlined above:

Hinge TikTok ads use the creative trend of UGC and the motivations of validation, trendiness, and excitement.
Hinge Facebook ads use the creative trends of App Content and UGC with the user motivations of love, authentic connection, brand trust, and excitement.
Plenty of Fish ads on TikTok and Facebook use the creative trend of App Content with the user motivations of casual dating, ease of use, convenience, speed, and discovery.

Media Buying Model

As a complementary tool to our Ad Concept Model, our Media Buying Model uses a similar matrixed approach to systematize best practices for user acquisition campaign development. Any mobile app can leverage a unique combination of distinct UA strategies and campaign parameters to develop a robust testing harness for ongoing mobile campaigns across social platforms.

In its most generic state, our Media Buying Model looks like the matrix below, prior to building out a mobile app user acquisition strategy. The entire matrix is tailored to a respective ad network and operating system requirements and constraints. Geographies, languages, and bid types are all modified based on the client’s needs. Each campaign is structured to meet specific goals at the intersection of strategies and parameters. For in-depth tactics by channel, including benefits and limitations for Facebook Android vs. Facebook iOS SKAN, TikTok iOS, and Android, see our full Media Buying Model here.

Want better results from UA?

Email us at sales@consumeracquisition.com.

Check out our creative work:

Creative Trends

2022 Mobile App Advertising Trends to Watch

Posted on January 4, 2022March 4, 2022 by Lian

2022 Mobile App Advertising Trends to Watch:

First-Party Data
Multi-Channel Portfolios, SDKs, DSPs, and Media Mix Modeling
Contextual, Persona-Led Advertising
Focus On the First 24 Hours
Multi-Platform Capabilities
Direct-to-Consumer and Alternative Payments
NFTs and Blockchain
Creator Ecosystems and UGC
The Metaverse

Jumping into 2022, mobile app advertisers are better prepared for the evolving advertising ecosystem than they were last year. We can now quantify the impact of IDFA loss and understand the A/B testing implications of automated buying and privacy restrictions. Based on public comments, IDFA impact is generally being accepted as the new normal, with lower-level setting and margin compression due to the complexity of targeting and measurement on iOS. Mobile app businesses are acclimating and many are growing within these new constraints. For the global mobile game market, Newzoo predicts a compound annual growth rate of +11.2 percent by 2021. Similarly, GlobalData estimates the mobile gaming industry will record a CAGR of 11% by 2030.

Based on conversations with our clients and leading industry experts, +11% CAGR is a moderate estimate. However, many speculate that emerging trends may be under-indexed and could increase market growth upwards of 20%. We are excited to see how mobile-first companies are improving and innovating in real-time to address advertising ecosystem challenges.

From first-party data to NFTs, here are the successful strategies and user acquisition trends we’ll be watching in 2022.

2022 Mobile App Advertising Trends

First-Party Data

Companies that build their own identity systems tied into behavioral dynamics and layered with contextual advertising do not need to rely on third-party visibility. For valuable first-party data, mobile app companies with the resources are wise to build ad platforms alongside or in tandem with their publishing platforms. Setting up native experiences allows for control of tracking, measurement, and analysis. Similarly, social platform-based experiences, such as games on Snap and TikTok, provide native attribution tracking and analysis.

Multi-Channel Portfolios

Companies will need to enhance their iOS acquisition portfolios beyond Facebook and Google, and expand volume from SDK Networks (Applovin, Unity, IronSource, Vungle) and DSPs. A true multi-channel approach should also include YouTube, TikTok, and Snap. As portfolios grow, complexity grows, requiring robust media mix modeling and reliable attribution analysis.

Contextual, Persona-Led Advertising

As reliance on upper-funnel campaigns increases, ad creative optimized to appeal to discreet personas is the most efficient lever for sustained profitable user acquisition. Without deterministic tracking, motivation-based, persona-led ad creative is critical to attracting high-quality top-of-funnel installs.

Focus On the First 24 Hours

To help with SKAN restrictions after install, the first 24-48 hours of app usage should identify consumers that indicate a propensity to monetize. We recommend streamlining and instrumenting your onboarding flows and events to capture these early monetization signals. With persona-led creative paired with onboarding events, the algorithms will learn what changes to make to deliver better audiences.

Multi-Platform Capabilities

Just as consumers have come to expect omnichannel shopping experiences, gamers will increasingly expect console-to-mobile flexibility and consistency. With global 5G adoption estimated to hit one billion subscriptions in 2022, mobile games can leverage higher download speeds for higher fidelity gameplay. Companies building their own identity systems can provide consistent experiences and analytics across platforms. Simultaneously taking advantage of alternative purchasing mechanisms outside of the App Store. Apple’s official App Store Review Guidelines states, “apps that operate across multiple platforms may allow users to access content, subscriptions, or features they have acquired in your app on other platforms or your web site, including consumable items in multi-platform games, provided those items are also available as in-app purchases within the app.”

Direct-to-Consumer and Alternative Payments

As the industry-shaking lawsuit of Epic Games v. Apple continues to play out in the appellate courts, developers should plan for alternative purchasing mechanisms outside of the App Store. If Apple is required to allow metadata buttons and external links for payments, developers can increase revenue by 30 percent as they eliminate App Store commissions. By offering direct-to-consumer billing options, app developers can also decrease IAP costs for users.

NFTs and Blockchain

Through non-fungible tokens (NFTs), mobile gaming companies will have a massive market opportunity. From digital plots of land to rare gear, NFTs built into core gameplay loops have the potential to drive significant in-game purchases. When tied to player motivations, NFTs can appeal to completionists, collectors, customizers, status-seekers, and strategists.

Creator Ecosystems and UGC

User-generated video continues to drive meaningful engagement on social platforms. As platforms increase interactive video capabilities, that engagement will only increase. Building out creator ecosystems that support UGC has the added value of providing first-party data through native experiences.

The Metaverse

Adjacent to and often overlapping with creator ecosystems is the Metaverse. It is a persistent, virtual, connected, social space that is emergent and speculative. Second Life was prototypical and popular contemporaries include Roblox, Minecraft, and Fortnite. Immersive environments and the communities that grow within them also present significant opportunities for monetization, user-generated content, contextual advertising, and first-party data.

Stay Ahead of Mobile App Advertising Trends

Our industry expertise comes from managing over $3.5 billion in creative and paid social spend for the world’s largest mobile apps and performance advertisers, including Glu, Roblox, Wooga, Zynga, and Skillz. Our proprietary full-stack marketing platform AdRules provides real-time business intelligence and creative research from 3.5 million video ads across social channels.

As the mobile advertising ecosystem has evolved, we have focused on being a reliable source of mobile app industry insights and trends. Our strategic analyses of IDFA loss and media buying automation, along with tactical guidance for user acquisition and creative teams, has helped advertisers remain profitable during an unprecedented era of change. Our industry expertise has earned coverage from CNBC, Forbes, SeekingAlpha, Business Insider, VentureBeat, TechCrunch, Mobile Marketing Magazine, and many more.

Email us at sales@consumeracquisition.com to discuss how we can help you stay ahead in 2022.

Wooga’s Switchcraft Case Study

Posted on January 11, 2022September 21, 2022 by Lian

Wooga Switchcraft Case Study: CGI Game Trailer and Ad Creative

No matter your budget or your IP, in the current mobile advertising ecosystem your best-performing Facebook ad has about ten weeks before creative fatigue sets in. 85-95% of new creative concepts fail to outperform your best ad and finding your next winner takes 20-50 new original concepts. In the face of IDFA loss and media buying automation, finding high-quality top-of-funnel users is critical for profitable user acquisition.

Our Ad Concept Model targets valuable users through tailored motivational drivers paired with creative trends. This process yields fresh creative concepts for ongoing testing while maintaining advertising profitability at scale. For our client Wooga, we developed over 50 new ad concepts, over 150 video ads, and the official 30-second CGI game trailer for their popular mobile game Switchcraft.

View the Wooga Switchcraft Game Trailer

Created by Consumer Acquisition by Brainlabs

Here’s how we helped bring new players to Wooga Switchcraft through thumb-stopping ad creative and a magical, cinematic game trailer.

Challenge

Casual games studio Wooga was seeking compelling ad creative for the soft launch of their first story-driven puzzle match-3 game, Switchcraft. Striving for market differentiation among competitors such as Gardenscapes, Lily’s Garden, and Small Town Murders, Wooga wanted to highlight their dramatic relationship-driven storyline, diverse characters, and magical gameplay.

Switchcraft gameplay combined match-3 puzzles, progressive narrative choices, and spellcasting minigames. Nuanced character rigging and fluid animation would be required to bring their evocative, painterly art style to life alongside 3D cinematics that combined realism with comic-book aesthetics.

Solution

Using our Ad Concept Model, we systematize creative development and UA targeting so our clients get reliable top-performing creative in the most cost-efficient and scalable way. These are the steps within the model:

Analyze competitor and creative trends to build on what’s working
Collaborate with client to identify user motivations and target personas
Create concepts at the intersection of trends and motivations
Test to learn what works and document process to ensure knowledge transfer
Optimize to do more of what works and iterate

Analyzing Creative Trends

Researching what creative is working and what isn’t across the category helps identify creative trends to build on. As a narrative-based match-3 mobile game with magical gameplay mechanics, there were many popular creative trends to build on for Switchcraft. Some Match-3 creative trends included:

Puzzles: Locks & Gates and other puzzles that challenge users to free a game character (Fishdom, Gardenscapes, Homescapes, many others)
Picker Videos: 3D or 2D situations with pickers, often resulting in disastrous fails. (Township, Sweet Escapes, Manor Cafe, many others)
Hidden Items: Videos or still images that contain hidden items the user must find. (Meow Match, June’s Journey)
Design Challenges: Tasks that must be completed within an allotted time or budget. (Design Home, Sweet Escapes)
Real Player Gameplay: Split screen featuring a player and gameplay. (Jelly Juice)
Female-Centered Vignettes: Women overcoming adversity and men behaving badly in soap opera situations. (Lily’s Garden, Choices, Vineyard Valley, My Home: Design Dreams)
Choose Your Adventure: Series of situations where you choose between two actions. (Choices, Episode)
Game Controller: Picker that mimics a game console, guiding character through levels. (Candy Crush, Hustle Castle)
Lifestyle and Gameplay: Showing lifestyle footage and gameplay that matches image (Toon Blast, Farm Hero Saga)
Gameplay + Side Character: Gameplay elements leave the screen to interact with characters (Candy Blast Mania, Candy Smash Mania)
Mixing Gameplay with Narrative: Storybook narration, Coloring book style (Bubble Witch Saga)
3D effect: Characters “floating” above gameplay (Farm Heroes Saga)
Incorporating Game to Solve a Problem: Using gameplay to find the key to escape a room (Candy Smash mania)

Some Romance and Narrative creative trends included:

Choosing what’s next from the player POV to direct narrative while interacting with the game’s characters
Game trailer/overview that showcases user experience, core objectives, and other game features
Fashion and style challenges
Using social media or texting to convey the narrative or primary message
Character focus using countdowns, origin stories
Vignettes featuring short character scenarios or stories
Achievement opportunities like level progression to unlock more of the story
Success vs. Fail gameplay contrasting experienced and amateur players

Identifying User Motivations

Creating Concepts

We map identified motivations to creative trends within the category to develop and iterate on different concepts. In the empty model below, each box represents a different ad creative concept, supporting nearly 50 concepts by pairing eight trends with six motivations. While not all creative trends will work persuasively with each motivation, we can expand our concepts even further by targeting specific personas within each pairing. Based on personas, we develop a bespoke creative strategy targeting behaviors, triggers, and preferences.

Results

Nathalie Wood, Marketing Manager at Wooga said:

“Consumer Acquisition was able to provide us with fresh, breakthrough ad creative that performed to meet different goals, from installs at scale to targeting high-value players. We were truly impressed by how Consumer Acquisition took our 2D assets and brought them to life. The creative process was collaborative and Consumer Acquisition tested all types of concepts and art styles to ensure we found what worked best. For our official game trailer, Consumer Acquisition created compelling 3D assets from scratch under a very tight deadline and we are thrilled with how it turned out. Consumer Acquisition’s commitment to creative research and rigorous creative testing was evident in the excellent results.”

Breaking out game mechanics and themes, we created and tested ad creative that focused on different aspects of the game. Individual concepts focused on themes of love, mystery, drama, or magic. Or, game mechanics of match-3 puzzles, spellcasting, and narrative choices.