Last week we had an amazing webinar with Kamil Janiszewski, Chief Revenue Officer & Co-founder at Listonic. We discussed, among other things, How to Develop & Monetize an App like Listonic and turn it into one of the most popular and profitable mobile shopping apps in the world.
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Here’s the full webinar on “How to Monetize a Shopping List App Worldwide”:
This webinar was hosted by Wing Poon, VP Marketing at Appodeal.
Listonic is a Shopping List App, available from over 50 countries, with over 1,5 mill. MAU (monthly active users). Every month, millions of people improve their shopping experiences thanks to Listonic.
Over the years, the app has grown a lot. At the very beginning, it was mostly used by geeks & early adopters, but, update after update, they become more popular. Now, their core-target are families with newborn children who have to adapt and organize to new routines. And Listonic helps to face their new schedules with tips and useful shopping tools.
The interview was mostly focused on Listonic’s monetization strategy. As Kamil says, Listonic gets “almost 90% of their ad revenue from banners”. This may come as a surprise for some app & game developers, even more on these days, where the whole industry only talks about rewarded videos & playable ads. But there is still plenty of space for all types of ads, and Listonic is an excellent example of a top app that thrives from a well-developed ad monetization strategy, strictly based on banners & native ads.
Kamil also told us about product management, user workflows, the ups and downs of their company, and even localization. Did you know that a top-grossing app, such as Listonic, needed up to three attempts to launch Listonic in the international market with success?
In the video description (on YouTube), you will find the timecodes of all the topics discussed during the webinar.
Here are the top insights from Kamil Janiszewski, that we encourage you to read:
1. Locate your App with Engaged Native Speakers
Sometimes, indie developers tend to use cheap translation tools and services due to a lack of time or budget. The final translation can be detrimental to the success of your app, and Listonic knows about that.
For a long time, Listonic was only available in Poland. However, the team put a lot of work and energy into making a sound localization of their app. One of the top lessons they learned is that “good translations for 40 languages are not about getting a translation agency and translate. It doesn’t work like that”, says Kamil. “If you do it with an agency, you’ll probably get mediocre translations. You have to work with native people, and it would be even better if those people use your app and know it well.”
2. Don’t Neglect your ASO (App Store Optimization)
Back then, when Listonic launched its app in the global markets, ASO (App Store Optimization) had a significant impact on your game’s success. As Kamil remembers, “the knowledge out there wasn’t public.”
Today the ASO ecosystem has evolved, and it’s easier to make a sound ASO strategy, but still, “It’s a tough job to do it well. You have to test things for yourself and talk to people who do it with big brands”. Listonic did it that way, and they still do. A/B testing all your ASO efforts is the key to make it work.
3. Are you planning to Launch an App? Analyze Everything!
When you launch an app, you want to get to 1 million users. It’s hard for some indie developers to set realistic goals when launching an app.
Listonic started with simple tools, such as Spreadsheets, to perform their market analysis. It took them a lot of time back then to list all the product categories inside their app. Kamil and his team asked themselves all sorts of questions, such as “how many downloads the main players do? Are the players strong or not? Do they use in-app purchases or ads?”.
Listonic looked at their metrics to find the answers. Once they interpreted the data, they were able to define their product goals. Listonic also did several benchmarks of the competition to define their user interface. Testing their prototypes with the users was the way to go before launching anything in the app stores.
4. Always A/B Test any upcoming Changes
As Kamil perfectly expressed during the webinar, “If you are very, very lucky, then you make an application, and it works, and it grows, and you’re happy.” But reality doesn’t always go your way, and “usually developers have to do a lot of changes and a/b tests in the application, in communication, in the way you acquire the users.”
If you’re not sure that a specific feature or an incoming change in your next version is going to improve your application, then A/B test it. There are plenty of tools to help you test your app. Even in your Appodeal dashboard, you will find an excellent feature to segment your user base & test your monetization strategy. As Kamil told us, “It’s a game of a/b tests.”
5. Find a good Ad Mediation Platform
“If you plan to monetize in several countries and probably will, you must find a good Ad Mediation Platform that fits your needs.”
One of the things experienced by Listonic is that “95% of the most popular ad networks in a country won’t make that much money” without an ad monetization platform. As Kamil says, “it’s worth to integrate a good mediation platform, like Appodeal”
We also asked Kamil to tell us what makes a Good Mediation Platform. From his point of view, “Customer Support is the key”.
One of the things that Listonic values most from the Appodeal Ad Mediation platform is that “Sometimes a guy from Appodeal ping us on Skype and tells us: look guys something is happening here, let’s fix or improve it. It’s awesome to partner with someone that cares for your business as you would”.
So, app developers should consider integrating their preferred ad monetization platform as soon as possible, and watching their revenue grow.
Do you want Appodeal to take care of your games and applications, just like we do with Listonic? Then sign up today and integrate our SDK!
