User Acquisition and Retention Strategies for Mobile-Only Companies in Competitive Markets
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Marcel Baltes International Marketing at HotelTonight
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HotelTonight – value proposition & opportunity
Hand-selected hotels at great prices on your mobile device up to 7 days in advance
SAW MOBILE OPPORTUNITY EARLY
Growth in mobile hotel bookings
Spark
Build
Launch
Growth in Mobile Hotel Bookings
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First Line of Code:
Sept 25, 2010
Launch: a sprint to the starting line
Live:
Dec 18, 2010
§ 3 cities
§ 15 hotels
§ no extranet
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§ Changing booking behavior to mobile looking for quality hotels at affordable prices
§ We help users book easily,
great hotels at great prices on demand
HotelTonight creates a win-win situation
HOTELS USERS
§ Average annual hotel occupancy rate is 60%
§ We help Russian hotels sell
otherwise unsold rooms
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Offline Web Mobile
Carlson Wagonlit
Travel
Vision: to build the dominant mobile travel co
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All hotels
Curation is key to mobile
The best hotels
The best values,
right now,
for you
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A Superior Product: 3 taps & a swipe to book!
We make booking simple and seriously easy.
1 Browse 2 Book 3 Stay
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13 million downloads worldwide
500 destinations
15.000 hotels
Highest-rated booking app
HotelTonight in numbers
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• 70.000 downloads before launch
• 80 curated hotels in Moscow and St. Petersburg
• Coming soon: Sochi, Kazan, Kaliningrad, Yaroslavl, Suzdal
HotelTonight in Russia
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User Acquisition: channels
Awareness
Acquisition
Booking
Retention
PR/Brand/Local Performance Partnerships
CRM
§ PR
§ TV/Radio
§ Offline campaigns
§ Viral Marketing
§ Influencer marketing
§ Online/offline app reviews
§ Local promos/stunts (online and offline)
§ Contests (photo/video, blog posts, etc.)
§ SMM
§ SEM
§ Ad networks
§ Direct CPI deals
§ ASO
§ SEO
§ App burst
§ Display
§ Referral program
§ Coupons
§ Retargeting
§ Push
§ Push notifications
§ In-app messages
§ Partnerships with:
- Airline companies
- Car rental companies
- Car sharing companies
- Taxi companies
- Dating apps
- Payment systems
- etc.
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User Acquisition: model
Other Marketing KPIs
Acquisition – CPI Acquisition – Installs Retargeting – CPC Retargeting – Room Nights Sessions WAU / MAU NPS App Store Rating App Store Ranking Open rate (Email) Awareness & Affinity ROI
ROAS =GBV ×Mar×ROIgoalXdays
Adspend7 days: XX%* 14 days: XX%* 30 days: XX%*
*ROIgoal set to meet 100% ROAS after X months
RNs
Bookers
Registrants
Installs
LOS
First time bookers Repeat bookers
Ratio
CR
CR
CR
Sessions MAU
Referred Installs K-factor Organic Installs J-factor
Performance Marketing
CPI
CR
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User acquisition: challenges for mobile-only
Challenges
§ High competition: - In app stores
- High CPIs on ad networks (especially in Travel segment)
§ Reaching high intent users: - Difficult to acquire users on transactional basis
- Cannot shift loyal users from web to app
- Search indexing is still in the early days
- Cannot leverage acquisition cost with SEO traffic
- Difficult to compete with mobile web/desktop competitors on SEM
Approach
§ Non-Marketing: - Product, Sales, Customer Service = ASO +
Virality
§ Test all existing channels: - Finding niches throughout all channels that
are ROI positive
§ Optimizing conversion funnel: - Deferred deep-linking
- Referral program & promo-codes
§ In-house Performance Marketing: - Continuous testing & optimization
- In-house creative design
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User acquisition: test all existing channels
Performance (trackable channels) Organic (non-trackable channels)
Total installs / bookings
§ Ad networks
§ Direct CPI deals
§ SMM
§ PR
§ TV / Radio
§ Offline campaign
- Use of targeted coupons to track installs / bookings
- Isolated campaigns in test markets (TV in France, Radio in Italy) to reattribute organic installs
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User acquisition: optimizing conversion funnel I
Problem
Mobile WEB
Clicks
Sessions
Purchases
Mobile APP
Clicks
App installs
Sessions
Purchases
Approach: deferred deep-linking
Difficult to compete on SEM with other players that have mobile web / desktop, because of longer
conversion funnel
…to shorten conversion funnel!
§ SEM with deep-links: Example Keyword: “hotel app for Paris” Deeplink: /marketid=559
-> opens app in Paris after install
§ Facebook with deep-links: Example Post with promo-code Deeplink: /code=MBLT15
-> open app with promo-code pre-populated in app
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User acquisition: optimizing conversion funnel II
Approach: referral program Approach: promo-codes
§ Key to success:
- Incentivize both referrer and referred (win-win)
- Prominent place in the app (own tab!)
- “Gamification” of referrals
§ Goal: increase K-Factor:
- K-factor = invites x CR
- Decrease effective cost per booker on performance channels
- Important to account for it
§ Key to success:
- Advanced targeting possibilities to avoid leakage (by city/region, user country, currency, redemption/booking/check-in period, number of nights, etc.)
§ Goal: drive top of funnel without cannibalization:
- Target opportunities that drive incremental transactions
- Measure effect on channel conversion rate
CR w/ code x AOV >= CR w/o code x AOV
- Make sure no deal hunters are acquired (adverse selection)
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User acquisition: in-house performance marketing
§ Front-load: - Launch as many publishers and ad
networks as possible
- Result: publishers can be cut off to increase ROI by still increasing volume
§ Find early indicators of performance: - 7/14/30 days ROAS cohorts - project
LTV based on historical data
- Install to session conversion
Approach: continuous testing Ad network A Ad network B Ad network X ...
Pub 1 Pub 2 Pub X ... Pub 1 Pub 2 Pub X ... Pub 1 Pub 2 Pub X ...
Pub 1 Pub 2 Pub X ... Pub 1 Pub 2 Pub X ... Pub 1 Pub 2 Pub X ...
Pub 1 NEW NEW ... NEW NEW NEW ... NEW Pub 2 NEW ...
Cutoff at X installs and pause to see 7 day ROAS
Pub 1 NEW NEW NEW NEW NEW NEW Pub 2 NEW
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Retention: challenges for mobile-only
Challenges
§ Low frequency of usage: - Hotels are not booked every day (not
fitness app) - High seasonality (not UBER)
§ Identify right moment: - Difficult to understand right situation
for engagement - Limited knowledge about identity
(do not collect a lot of information of user – to keep process lean)
§ Limited retargeting possibilities: - Limited to mobile web and in-app
Approach
§ Targeted CRM communications: - Segment as much as possible to
engage the right people - Goal: Aligning external with internal
triggers - Event, lifecycle and ad-hoc
campaigns
§ Opt-in push notifications: - Working well: push notifications that
are requested
§ Search & display retargeting: - Deep-linking from ads, also SEM
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User retention: opt-in push notifications
§ Alert features: - Price alert
- Hotel alert
- etc.
§ Result – high relevance - Low uninstall rate
- Low opt-out rate
- High engagement
Approach: users request push