What is Mobile App Analytics?

Mobile app analytics is about collecting the data required to understand the acquisition, funnel flows, user behaviour, and performance of the app.

Collecting the right data will allow the business to understand how the mobile app works, what can be done to improve its performance, acquire more users, and also improve the retention.

In this post, I will explain about the main types of mobile app analytics, and their advantages for the business:

1.  In-App Analytics
2. Performance Analytics
3.  Advertising/ Marketing Analytics

 1.     In-App Analytics:

In-App analytics is about analysing what the users are actually doing inside the app, and how they interact and engage with it.

Data that can be collected from In-App analytics, includes:

• Device Profile: type of device, manufacturer, operating system
• User Demographics: location, gender, approximate age, language, etc.
• Behavioral data/ metrics: screens viewed/exited, buttons clicked, levels completed, articles read, purchases made, time spent per page…

Advantages of In-App Analytics:

As mentioned, in-App data allows the business to understand who its users are and how they interact and engage with the app.

By knowing where the users drop off, which screens are viewed/ visited often, which button is more effective, and combining all these with the user’s demographics and device profile, In-App analytics:

• Helps optimize the user experience and improves the retention rate
• Helps maximize the user’s lifetime value
• Helps identify the reasons behind success or failure

Examples for different business questions that can be answered by In-App analytics:

• E-commerce: understanding the reasons for many installs that do not end in sales
• Gaming: understanding the reasons for not accomplishing certain levels

To conclude:

In-App analytics allows you to identify problematic areas in your app, improve conversion and retention efforts, and eventually- meet your user’s expectations.

2.     Performance Analytics:

Performance analytics is about measuring how well your app is performing- which is extremely Important.

Different studies show that users expect apps to work properly and efficiently and have little patience for under-performance- if the app will not perform fast and properly, there’s a high chance that users will not use the app again/ switch to a competitor’s app/ tell others about their poor experience.

Examples of data that can be collected from Performance analytics:

Load time, app responsiveness, app up time, crashes, errors, latencies, and more.

Advantages of Performance analytics:

• Real-time monitoring- enables the business to know exactly which users and transactions/actions are impacted from a problem once it is detected
• Pinpointing problematic patterns by slicing data (per device, operating system, region, network, etc.)- allows the business to recognize which devices, operating systems, networks, and regions are most expected to have problems, and make adjustments to ensure the app is available and performs well
• Eventually helps with increasing retention, by also prioritizing better the issues that affect the performance and user experience

3.     Advertising/ Marketing Analytics:

Marketing analytics is about having a trusted source- by both networks and advertisers, in order to rule which network should get the credit for reaching a goal (e.g. installs in CPI campaigns, or in-app actions in retargeting or CPA campaigns)

It is highly required for advertisers, as each advertiser today runs with multiple ad networks, and without the right attribution, each network could bill for a click that led to an install, regardless of whether it was the last click or not.

Examples of data that can be collected from Marketing analytics:

• Clicks, installs, opens, purchases, conversion rate, content viewed, levels reached, revenue, ARPU…
• All metrics can be reviewed per each network separately, allowing the comparison and optimization of the marketing efforts

Advantages of Advertising/Marketing analytics:

Marketing analytics allows the business to know which ad networks and publishers are driving users, and more importantly- the best type of users.

Marketing Analytics:

• Helps the business to connect user acquisition attribution to post-install events that are related to the business goals
• Increases ROI by tracking campaigns and allocating the advertising budget to the right campaigns
• Allows measuring the success of re-targeting campaigns

Summary- Main types of mobile app analytics:

For further read- I suggest reading the following article, which is about making apps profitable through mobile analytics: https://www.toptal.com/app/profitable-apps-with-mobile-analytics