In app advertising: how brands can work with traffic inside mobile applications

In app advertising has become one of the key tools for mobile advertising. Users spend more and more time in services and games, and it is important for business to find them exactly where they are already involved. For an advertiser, in app is a way to show a message inside the application and immediately get a measurable result for installations, sales or other purposes.

If you analyze, in app is the display of advertising materials inside the interface of mobile applications. A person launches a game, banking service, delivery service or music, and at the right moment he sees brand ads.

Unlike classic mobile advertising in the browser, in app advertising is based on behavior within a specific product. The application records how often the user logs in, which sections he opens, what actions he performs. Based on this data, platforms build segments and manage in app traffic, selecting relevant creatives and frequency of impressions for the audience.

Regular mobile banners in the browser depend on the history of visits, cookies and page context. Everything is different in applications: the user has already chosen a specific service and is ready to interact with it longer.

Thus, in app advertising gives the brand several advantages:

• Works at a time of high attention, when attention is not distracted
• Gives access to the audience of mobile applications, which is often more solvent
• Allows you to take into account real actions: level in the game, viewed sections, placed orders
• Is easier to be tied to analytics, where you can see what happened after the show

It is no coincidence that in the last year more and more budgets flow into in app traffic. Many brands note that this channel gives a more predictable installation cost and makes it possible to scale the results.

Different advertising formats are used inside the applications, and they make in app advertising a flexible tool.

Frequently used advertising formats

• Banner. A small block at the bottom or top of the screen. This format is suitable when the advertiser is ready to collect a lot of inexpensive impressions and gradually test the creative
• Full-screen inserts. The announcement occupies the entire screen between levels, profile screens or sections. Here in the app advertising receives maximum attention, so it is important to carefully adjust the frequency
• Rewarded video. The user watches the video and receives a bonus: game coins, additional lives, a discount or a test period. It’s more effective for the brand than a regular video, because the audience watches it voluntarily
• Native blocks. Ads look like part of the content, and ads become less visual noisy
• Interactive formats. Mini-demo version of the product right inside the game or service, where you can test the mechanics

At the same time, under one launch of an advertising campaign, brands often combine several options: one format works for coverage, another — for clicks, and the third — for installation.

The term in app traffic is understood as all impressions and clicks that come from applications. Developers connect the monetization SDK, transmit impersonal events, and advertising platforms distribute requests among dozens of games and services.

Several features of such traffic are important for the brand:

• You can focus not only on demographics, but also on real use cases
• It is possible to focus on specific actions: viewing the product screen, going to the shopping cart, installing another application
• In app traffic allows you to configure different payment models — CPM, CPC, CPI, CPA, depending on the tasks of the advertiser

When the marketing team works with performance tasks, in app traffic is often used for rapid scaling: thanks to the large number of impressions, you can quickly test hypotheses and select the "creative + segment + platform" bundle.

It is difficult to work directly with each developer, so most of the inventory is combined in app networks. These are intermediary platforms that collect impressions from hundreds of applications into a single system.

Such solutions resemble a global advertising network:

• Brands set up one campaign, and in app traffic is distributed among many applications
• There is built-in quality control and fraud protection
• You can connect different partners and compare where traffic gives the best result
• There are tools to optimize rates and display frequency

Through the in-app network, the advertiser gets access not only to local, but also to international mobile inventory, without complicating his life with separate contracts.

For in app advertising to really work, you need a clear launch scheme. A typical process includes several steps.

• Goal definition. The brand decides what is more important: installations, registrations, orders or increasing recognition. The purchase model in app traffic and KPI are selected for this
• Selection of sites and sources. It is analyzed which applications give the right audience: games, utilities, fintech, entertainment. At this stage, the partner’s experience and understanding of where traffic can be of better quality are important
• Preparation of creatives. The team is testing several visual and text options. One banner can be aimed at an economic argument, the other — at emotions, the third — at a special offer
• Setting up analytics. Tracking-SDK is implemented in the application to fix sources, post-click actions and budget efficiency
• Pilot launch. At the start of the launch, a small budget is distributed between segments to understand which in app traffic leads to more valuable actions
• Optimization. After the first results, mediabayers continue to work with the best bundles, turn off weak sources and increase the volume

This approach makes the channel manageable: the advertiser sees where exactly his in app advertising works and can consciously choose a strategy.

In the professional environment, English versions of the terms are often used: in-app traffic and in-app advertising. They emphasize that we are talking about the international market of mobile advertising, where many platforms and interfaces are initially English-language.

In the documentation and reports you can find bundles of «in-app traffic», «in-app advertising», mentions of traffic source and names of large platforms. It is important for Russian teams to read such materials confidently, because it is there that new tools and cases are described on how to make campaigns more effective.

The mobile advertising market is developing rapidly, and there are more and more offers. In order not to get lost, it makes sense to evaluate partners according to several criteria:

• Transparency of reporting and access to raw data
• Availability of its own anti-fraud system
• Experience with your product vertical
• Support for different payment models and flexibility on terms
• The opportunity to stop the campaign at any time on your part if the traffic is not satisfied

A good partner not only pours in app traffic, but helps to build a strategy, choose advertising formats and explain why this or that hypothesis worked.

The mobile services market is growing, and with it the importance of the format, which is directly related to human behavior within the application. In app advertising gives brands access to the audience at the time of maximum engagement, and in app traffic allows you to flexibly manage the scale and quality of contact.

If the company wants to get more installations, work with a loyal audience and build campaigns in which you can accurately measure the contribution of each source, you can no longer do without this channel. For those who will now learn to work with in app networks, carefully use different advertising formats and build analytics around user actions, mobile inventory will become one of the strongest drivers of growth.