App Store and app intelligence is a complicated, data-rich field with only a few players. Apptopia has recently surged in prominence with major partnerships with Bloomberg, Spotify, Facebook, Uber, Sony, Baidu, and more – Not to mention, AdColony!
We asked Jessica Demmer, Apptopia’s Director of Demand Generation, a little more about the company, the state of the industry, and what makes Boston-based Apptopia stand out amongst the app intelligence crowd.
Why did Apptopia enter the mobile space in the first place?
Apptopia was founded on the belief that the mobile app community requires transparency to level the playing field and make way for innovation and industry advancements. Back in 2015 when Apptopia broke into app intelligence, there was a lot of mystery about what works and why. Without reliable app economy intelligence, everyone is just guessing. Today we help companies of all sizes understand the market, benchmark their performance, and generate sales.
What services does Apptopia provide to mobile publishers and/or advertisers?
Apptopia helps companies grow by giving them access to mobile competitive intelligence. Specifically, we analyze key data points for every app in existence across both the iOS App Store and Google Play store (7M+ apps). Our clients access this information through our web tool, which provides actionable insights to help drive sales, marketing, product, and mobile investment strategies.
Services
What does Apptopia do to make life easier for mobile publishers and/or advertisers?
Publisher clients work with us to track their competitors’ mobile footprint — performance metrics, app updates, and even advertising activity. They can leverage these mobile signals to benchmark their own performance, analyze their market share, decide which apps to build, and discover where their users are spending their time and money.
For advertisers and SDK clients, we help them uncover high-quality leads and scale their pipeline. With our web tool, they can see who’s working with their competitors and who matches their ideal customer profile. With access to contact information for over 700,000 publishers, they can generate leads when they need them and get notified of new leads every day.
Why is it important for publishers and/or advertisers to utilize an app or store intelligence service?
Every day, your competition is making decisions about what to build, where to market, and how to monetize. They’re not sitting still and neither should you. Apptopia sees what they are doing and can help you leverage that information to make better and smarter business decisions.
What is the number one example of your tools/services enabling mobile publisher and/or advertiser success?
We recently spoke with a publisher client that informed us that Apptopia helped double their revenue in just a few months. Prior to working with us, they weren’t sure what app features or advertisements would generate the largest ROI. Now, we’ve taken the guesswork out of all of their development and marketing efforts by providing access to data that reveals what works best in each market. Using our Ad Intelligence and App Insights tools, they’ve made more informed business decisions, doubling their revenue, and increasing their apps’ users by 50 percent.
The Industry
Where do you see mobile heading in the short term (2-3 years) and long term (5 years and longer)?
Mobile marketers should get creepier with their targeted ads – I honestly love that. We live in a world where advertisements are never going to go away, so I would much rather see ads that could be useful for me. Last year, for example, I purchased a Hanukkah gift from an ad I saw on Instagram because it was a fit. As we collect more data, ads will become increasingly targeted and more valuable for the consumer – maybe even enjoyable.
In the long term, I think we’re headed toward a situation where mobile data will influence advertisements outside of our phones. We have data on millions of people via device data – where they are, what they’re doing, what they like – so you can run ads anywhere. This could mean driving by a billboard that is specifically designed for the persona that exists on that highway.
How do you see the shift from traditional forms of entertainment and utility (TV and desktop usage) to a more mobile-focused world impacting companies that use your services?
With traditional forms of entertainment, you typically have to invest more into the experience. If you’re watching TV, you have to set up, sit on the couch, and commit your time to stay in that one place. Whereas the barrier to entry for mobile entertainment is significantly smaller. You can watch a show or play a game anywhere, at any time.
This is good and bad for entertainment entities like Cartoon Network. Good because mobile gives more access to their consumers, expanding their total addressable market. However, it’s bad because this also means that there’s a need for more of a hook, or reason to continue engaging. As easy as it is for you to start interacting with Cartoon Network on mobile, you can just as easily stop interacting with them.
As more and more traditional entertainment companies move to mobile, they will have to think about how to communicate their value proposition in a shorter period of time. This means learning how to entertain viewers in smaller windows and potentially producing shorter-forms of content.
What industry trend or development are you most excited about in the near-term, and why?
Not having to interact with humans (where it’s not necessary) as much and having more options to optimize my time. Apps like Chick-fil-A, for example, offer a dine-in mobile ordering feature, which removes the time-suck of standing in line as well as the potential for a cashier to misunderstand the order.
Booksy is one of my other favorite examples of an app that allows you to use your time more judiciously. It’s essentially a marketplace for different professionals like barbers or masseuses. You can find new service providers without needing to deeply experiment, and your results are designed to fit your availability.
Company Culture
How big is your team, and how would you describe them?
With offices in Boston and Kyiv, we’re about 45 people now and growing. We’re very tech-focused; about half of our team consists of engineers and data scientists. Since we’re a smaller company, it’s definitely a relaxed environment and being an employee here has a familial feel to it. Even though we’re professionals, we always think of ourselves and our customers as humans first. We want to work with great people and we think others feel the same way. While we have a great product, we put an emphasis on being flexible and great to work with.
Keeping up with Apptopia
Apptopia has an official Twitter at @Apptopia and co-founders CEO Eliran Sapir and COO Jonathan Kay tweet from @eliransapir and @jonathanckay respectively. If you’re into data, VP Insights & Alliances Adam Blacker shares his thoughts at @adamblacker25.
The Apptopia blog is also full of market insights and more. Check it out! Follow Apptopia to keep up with all their news, thought leadership, and events!
Join the Conversation
Ready to work with Apptopia and AdColony? Tweet us at @AdColony. For the latest AdColony mobile news and updates, follow @AdColony on Twitter, like us on Facebook, or connect on Linkedin.
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