Take Your Mobile Marketing to the Next Level With Liftoff’s 2023 Reports and Guides
As we look to the year ahead, the outlook seems optimistic for the mobile market. After a prolonged downturn, smartphone sales are expected to bounce back. Mobile gaming revenue is projected to increase by 4% YoY in 2024, marking a return to form after falling for the first time in over a decade. To top it all off, according to our 2024 App Marketer Survey, mobile marketers are being allocated more generous budgets to help drive user acquisition while benefiting from emerging technologies like generative AI.
Of course, there are still many challenges ahead. Competition will remain fierce as app marketers compete for consumer attention, and many questions remain over how the industry will overcome further changes to privacy requirements.
That’s why it’s just as important as ever to keep up-to-speed with the state of the industry. If you’re not sure where to begin, you’ll find essential updates and exclusive first-party data on the most significant industry developments affecting mobile game and app marketers in the insightful reports and guides we released throughout 2023:
- 2023 Mobile Ad Creative Index
- 2023 Casual Gaming Apps Report
- 2023 Midcore Gaming Apps Report
- The State of App Marketing for Subscription Apps
- 2023 Holiday Guide for E-Commerce Apps
- 2023 Guide to Supply Path Optimization
- 2024 App Marketer Survey
We’ll admit, there’s a lot here to wrap your head around, so much so that you might not know which report to tackle first. But don’t worry; we’ve summarized the key details in each report below.
2023 Mobile Ad Creative Index
Why read this: Our 2023 Mobile Ad Creative Index report has everything you need to know about the most prominent ad creative trends across five key app verticals: gaming, e-commerce, finance, entertainment, and dating & social.
Notable takeaways
The biggest takeaway here is that longer video ads have proven to be more effective than their shorter counterparts, with many mobile UA managers adding videos between 31-60 seconds long to their creative arsenal and seeing material performance gains. The report also found that playable ads remain the most cost-effective option for driving installs on gaming apps, with an average CPI of $1.31.
2023 Casual Gaming Apps Report
Why read this: Our 2023 Casual Gaming Apps Report is designed to help gaming advertisers and mobile game marketers get the best value out of their ad spend. It includes advertising cost and revenue benchmarks, an inside look at the mobile gaming genres driving the most installs, and details on all the must-know casual gaming trends (courtesy of GameRefinery).
Notable takeaways
We don’t want to spoil the full report. Still, some of the most significant findings include that simulation games offer the best deal for installs at $0.59, iOS users are three times more expensive than Android users to target for casual gaming apps, and hyper-casual games are evolving into “hybrid-casual winners.”
2023 Midcore Gaming Apps Report
Why read this: Based on over 30 billion impressions and more than 5.5 million installs, our 2023 Midcore Gaming Apps Report contains a comprehensive breakdown of essential ad cost and ROI benchmarks that mobile marketers thought they could only dream of. It also includes an overview of the highest-grossing midcore game on the US iOS market and information on the latest trends driving engagement in the midcore market.
Notable takeaways
Some of the most eye-opening findings include that October is the cheapest month to market midcore games, shooters are the most expensive midcore genre for user acquisition, and many publishers are launching external web stores for in-game purchases to get around Apple and Google’s store fees.
The State of App Marketing for Subscription Apps
Why read this: Our State of App Marketing for Subscription Apps report, created in collaboration with mobile marketing measurement platform AppsFlyer, reveals the key trends in the subscription app space.
Notable takeaways
The findings show that while user acquisition spending and non-organic installs have decreased (41% on Android and 30% on iOS), consumer spending on subscription-based apps has increased considerably in 2023 (35% on iOS, 22% on Android). Many users are now either subscribing to more services or absorbing price hikes to their existing subscriptions, providing app developers with a predictable monetization and revenue stream.
2023 Holiday Guide for E-Commerce Apps
Why read this: Our 2023 Holiday Guide for E-Commerce Apps breaks down seasonal changes in CPI and CPA across platforms and regions to help marketers get the best return on their seasonal ad spend.
Notable takeaways
Some of the most important findings include early to mid-October being the most economical time to target new users and CPA-purchase costs being more variable on iOS than Android. The guide also contains a hidden bonus from the experts at Liftoff’s Creative Studio, an overview of the best practices mobile marketers should follow over the holidays, such as gamifying seasonal promotions and sparking a personal connection with your target audience.
2023 Guide to Supply Path Optimization
Why read this: Supply Path Optimization (SPO) is a process of evaluating and reducing the number of intermediaries to offer advertisers more direct pathways to ad supply. Over the last few years, it’s become crucial to mobile marketing strategies. Even so, many advertisers still have many questions about how it works in mobile in-app advertising, and this is where our 2023 Guide to Supply Path Optimization comes in.
Notable takeaways
In this guide, we explain the basics of how SPO works in programmatic ad buying, discuss how it became so vital to advertisers in the first place, and highlight its many benefits, including reduced tech costs, enhanced performance, and improved inventory quality.
2024 App Marketer Survey
Why read this: The past year has been eventful for mobile marketers. Advancements in ML and generative AI began to have a transformative impact on ways of working, ID deprecation has continued to draw concerns, and alternative channels such as CTV and out-of-home advertising have seen an unexpected growth in popularity. With all this going on, what will the future of mobile advertising look like?
Notable takeaways
To answer that question, we surveyed mobile marketing pros from companies worldwide to get their views on the past 12 months and produce the 2024 App Marketer Survey. You should check out the full report for the complete overview. Still, key findings include 60% of marketers chasing more aggressive KPI targets (and working with more partners to reach them) and over half of respondents only using an MMP’s attribution modeling.
