If you’re like most businesses that have a mobile element, you’re familiar with the mobile advertising world. You might even have engaged a mobile advertising agency. There is no doubt that an agency can bring incredible returns on your investment. In this article, we’ll look at how to maximize your ROI when using a mobile ad company.
Mobile Advertising Companies
The first challenge is choosing the right ad partner for your business. There are many different agencies and even types of mobile advertising companies out there. So what should you look for in the top mobile ad agency? When choosing the right advertising agency, you should look at:
- Previous work
- Clients
- Awards
- Results
- Chemistry
Let’s take a look at these in a bit more detail:
Mobile Ad Company’s Previous work
Looking at what the mobile advertising agency has done in the past is your best indicator of the level of work you can expect. You should always ask to see previous work mobile advertising of the agency.
Clients
Who are the mobile ad agency’s clients? Are they recognized, well-known names? You should be able to get references and even speak to previous clients. A word of warning: if the mobile ad agency has worked with clients that aren’t consistent with your value system, this should be a red flag. A good mobile advertising agency is selective with the types of clients they work with. Big name clients are a great validator when it comes to the results you can expect.
Awards
Industry awards are a great way to validate full-service advertising companies. Recognition by outside experts can take a lot of the guesswork out of choosing the right mobile ad agency. In fact, a top mobile ad agency that has been rewarded a number of times also means that the mobile ad agency has a long track record of success.
Results
When looking at the right mobile advertising agency for you, you should ask to see results. Specific results at that. You want to see “an ROI of x%”, or a “35% increase in conversions”. Anything besides concrete results could mean that you, too, will end up without the results you seek.
Chemistry
In what will hopefully be a long and successful relationship, you want to make sure that the mobile advertising team is one that you feel comfortable working with. Do you get a good feeling from them? Do you have similar values? Are they invested in your success? All of these are questions to ask yourself before engaging the mobile advertising agency.
Advertising Services
There are a number of mobile advertising services to choose from. We’ll look at a couple of the big ones.
Mobile Marketing Strategy
Your mobile marketing strategy is the foundation upon which everything else is built, and is arguably the most important of the mobile ad services your mobile ad agency will provide. Your strategy, which should be discussed with your mobile advertising agency, is your blueprint to mobile success. 
A successful mobile marketing strategy will include the following key elements:
- Goals and the best way to achieve those goals
- Channels, including new growth channels
- Budgets
- Competitor research
- Creative strategy
- Testing and optimization
- Brand vs Performance
Achieving Your Business Goals
You’ve chosen the right mobile advertising agency. Now, you’ll want to select the mobile advertising services that will help you achieve your business goals. Your mobile advertising goals will most likely be a combination of:
- Branding and reach
- Engagement
- Performance/conversions
When discussing the mobile advertising services a mobile advertising agency can provide, the key service you’ll be looking for is expertise. That is expert skill, knowledge, and experience. The fact that they’ve done it before, and will deliver for you. It’s critical when engaging with your mobile advertising agency to be specific about what you hope to achieve. A good mobile ad agency will be able to walk you through the goals that you have, and the budget you’ll need to achieve those goals. A great recommendation is to do as much homework as you can into your user base, target audience, and previous campaigns. This will help your mobile ad partner more effectively craft your campaign. It will also save you time, money and stress down the line.
Mobile Advertising Solutions
Your mobile advertising agency can provide a number of mobile advertising solutions. These solutions will be used to achieve your goals you’ve set in conjunction with your mobile advertising agency. Key mobile advertising solutions include:
- App Store Optimization (ASO)
- Effective paid campaigns
App Store Optimization (ASO)
Particularly when it comes to mobile products such as apps, ASO is key. At some point in your funnel, your user will be visiting your app in the store. This is usually make-or-break time. Will this visitor become a loyal user? Or will they leave your page, never to return? A good mobile advertising agency understands the importance of ASO. With millions of apps out there competing for your users’ attention, it’s often ASO that sets successful apps apart. When discussing ASO with your mobile advertising agency, be ready to discuss:
- Creative assets, such as screenshots, videos and app icons
- Keywords
- Consistency
There are many dangers, pitfalls, and misconceptions when it comes to ASO. There are also many lesser-known tips and shortcuts that can launch your app’s success. When discussing ASO with your mobile advertising agency, ensure they have the experience and track record to know the difference. Remember, for ASO a lot comes down to testing and optimization. This requires patience but always pays off.
Effective paid campaigns
Paid campaigns can be extremely successful for your business. They can also quickly drain your bank account. Effective paid campaigns take into account your business goals, as well as metrics such as LTV, target CPA, and overall ROI. 
When it comes to paid campaigns, there are many variables to take into account. For example, which channels are you going to focus on? There’s Facebook and Google, but also newer channels such as Pinterest. What is your messaging? Who are you targeting your ads at? How can you break down and segregate your audiences and ensure that everyone gets the right message at the right time? Paid campaigns look simple from the outside, but truly effective campaigns have a lot going on under the hood. This is where working with the right mobile advertising agency really pays off. Both ASO and effective paid campaigns achieve the best results when they work in harmony. This means consistency in look, feel and messaging across campaigns and your app’s app store presence. For example, a Facebook ad for a game should use the same colors, logos, and message as the user is likely to see in the app store.
The Brief
Critical to success when working with your mobile advertising agency is the brief. Here are some great tips for when crafting a successful brief:
Getting Priorities Right
What is your number 1 goal? What are your secondary objectives? For example, if your goal is to increase conversions for downloads from the App Store, then an optimized App Store video is something you’ll be leveraging. If you try to use this video to speak about future in-app purchases at the same time, the focus is lost and neither goal is achieved. Making your priorities clear is the first step in crafting a successful brief. This often helps the client as much as the mobile advertising agency. It crystalizes which results are most important, and adds focus and urgency to achieving them.
Brainstorm
A good brief takes a little bit of creative thinking to stand out as extraordinary. In mobile marketing, there are plenty of technical limitations. For example, iPhone X app store screenshots need to be 1125px × 2436px. Don’t let these limitations get in the way of your own creative thinking. Brainstorm with your team, think big, and the sky’s the limit! Some of the best advertising services have come from companies not with the deepest pockets, but most creative thinking.
Give The Full Story
Working with a mobile advertising agency really is a partnership. In order to achieve the best results, it’s important to give as much relevant information to one another as possible. Things that might seem less relevant for you – such as the story about how your product came about – might be great material for your mobile advertising agency to work with, and vice versa. This goes for product features, too. The key to original, jaw dropping marketing campaigns is a deep understanding of the product (yes, including any drawbacks), and the team behind the product.
Take The Road Less Travelled
A brief is an incredible tool to do things your way. Together with your marketing agency, you have a unique opportunity to face up to your challenges with your very own approach. This can lead to some incredible creative thinking from all sides, and create positive outcomes where others have struggled. Good mobile ad agencies will support this process. A top mobile ad agency will also provide the best advertising solutions for your business.
Other Tips For Working With A Full-Service Advertising Company
We’ve gathered some general tips for working with your mobile advertising agency that can make your journey together a lot more effective (and enjoyable!).
Get On The Same Page
Abraham Lincoln famously said “Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.” A similar principle applies when working with your mobile advertising agency. 
Take the time to get to know one another, discuss your goals and expectations, and what is required from both parties to ensure success. Taking a little extra time at the outset pays dividends later down the line. Too often, expectations are not managed and are wildly different. This results in suboptimal results, and a breakdown in the relationship. A good mobile advertising agency will take the time to explain what will be done, including how and why. They will also discuss time frames, deliverables, and how you can help to achieve the goals that have been set.
Measure And Compare
When working with your mobile advertising agency, update each other often. Measure results so far and compare these to where you would like to be. If there is a dramatic change or development (from either side), be sure to keep the other side in the loop. This ensures there are no nasty surprises when you do look at results together. It also allows you to leverage opportunities that come up. For example, your app may have been featured in an app store promotion. This can be leveraged to boost key metrics, such as increasing conversions and lowering user acquisition costs.
Have Patience
Great campaigns and results do not happen overnight. Once you’ve found the right mobile advertising agency, you have to trust them to deliver results, in the timeframe that you have discussed. There’s no point in expecting miracles from day 1: the mobile marketing world just doesn’t work like that. In fact, having patience has additional benefits. A good mobile advertising agency will want to experiment with small changes and small investments in paid campaigns at first. This lets them measure, optimize, and improve. When they find the winning combination, only then will they press the accelerator to drive fantastic results. Beware of a mobile ad company that promises the world right from the beginning. It is likely that they’ll burn through your budget to show quick results, and then not have the resources required to make a real impact when it matters. Just like in other areas of business and different industries, where a full-service advertising agency or premium advertising agency is used, trying to rush the process can often backfire.
Don’t Be Scared To Experiment
With mobile marketing, even the smallest changes can have a massive impact. The colors on a logo, or even the name of an app, for example, can be the difference between good results, and great ones. Don’t be afraid to experiment. You never know what might work, and if done correctly, the results will be impressive.
Achieving Success With Your Mobile Ad Agency
Hopefully, these helpful tips and pointers will help you get maximum value from your relationship with your mobile advertising agency. At Moburst, having worked with multiple clients across all industries sizes, we’ve seen first-hand the power of a great client-agency relationship. With clients like Google, eBay and Samsung; and being awarded The Best Mobile Marketing Agency for 2019, we’re passionate about our clients’ success. Get in touch with us to discuss your business goals, and how we can leverage our mobile advertising expertise to achieve them.
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