Mobile app analytics
The use of mobile devices is still on the rise and more and more developers are starting to deal with mobile app analytics.
Entries and data from mobile applications can be divided into two categories.
In-app analytics
The first one is in-app analytics – i.e. information about user behaviour in the app. Most often, this involves measuring user behaviour using events in dedicated systems (Google Analytics 4 – formerly Google Analytics for Firebase, Mixpanel) or your own data warehouse.
A kind of offshoot of in-app analytics are tools for recording users’ screens, among which the Smartlook stands out.
In-app analytics can provide data on which users are using which parts of the app, which features are crucial for users, and which ones they are not using at all. It is possible to evaluate how the onboarding process works or what items users use virtual currencies for. Simply put – any interaction in the app can be recorded as an event and further evaluated.
By knowing these interactions, you can segment app users, build audiences and refine your marketing activities or prioritise the development of individual parts of your app.
Campaign analytics
The second category is campaign analytics, where you are primarily interested in attribution of conversion actions and costs. This is far more complex on mobile devices than it is for web analytics.
Currently, there is virtually no one-size-fits-all solution that can solve all the diverse marketing channels and advertising systems. From a marketer’s point of view, the logical request – “I want to see all campaigns from which a user has downloaded an app or purchased an item in an app” – is often an unsolvable and expensive nut to crack.
Our common answer is to focus on the data from the system that is used (most often) and ideally use the associated analytics tool. This follows the logic that this entity that you are paying for your advertising should have an interest in figuring out measurement as well.
- So if you’re putting maximum budget into Facebook, we recommend running the Facebook SDK and its analytics part in the app.
- If you are investing the most in Google Ads, we recommend focusing on a proper implementation of Google Analytics 4.
- If you send emails frequently, using Dynamic Links is advisable.
If all of the above fails and you’re still not satisfied with your data, you can try third-party attribution partners like Apps Flyer. But the question is how accurate the data will be in the future as mobile tracking requirements get progressively stricter, and how much data there will be.
Do you need help with mobile analytics for your app? Contact us.