In World of Marketing, Analytics Software is King

When it comes to tracking marketing efforts, analytics softwares are crucial tools for being able to measure success. Even Facebook has integrated it's own analytics software to aid its users in measuring the more difficult to track social media realm.

Take the mobile app world for example. There are two types of key software that measure different and important metrics.

1. External Performance - These softwares track and aggregate important external information such as downloads, sales, reviews and ratings.

This type of data can easily be used to analyze the effectiveness of marketing activities. Do some marketing, see how it effects downloads.

2. Internal Performance - These softwares track and aggregate data from user interaction with the app such as time spent using app, number of times app is used, most used app function etc.

This type of data can be used to understand the best features of an app without even having to ask users. These features can then be focused on in marketing campaigns to make them more effective.

External Performance Example:

In my work with a local mobile app company we were able to significantly and sustainably alter the sales of one particular app.

At point 1 we released a dual iPad/iPhone build that combined both apps into one that was compatible with both the iPad and iPhone. Combining downloads had a positive effect on rankings, pushing us to the the number one spot on the App Store for both devices for the keyword 'Statistics'.

At point 2 (2 days later) we sent out an Apple specific press release (PRMac.com) targeting iPhone and iPad app consumers, promoting the fact that we had the the number one statistics app on the App Store.

While it's impossible to determine exactly how much of this maintained increase came from being number 1 for both devices for that keyword and how much came from the press release, we do know from the internal PR analytics that our App Store link has been clicked on hundreds of times and the release itself has been viewed 18,000 times, thereby making it likely that the PR played a significant role in driving these increased sales.

The PR only cost $19 and an app that was averaging $6 per day now averages $26 per day.