Top 8 Ways To Monetize Your Mobile Application

With the popularity of Smartphones, the popularity and business of mobile applications have also increased commendably. There are so many mobile application development companies in the market, which launch diversified mobile applications in the market to reach different segments of the audience. There are also a few businesses which launch the mobile application with the help of a mobile app development company to convert their innovative ideas into money making mine. However, it is too difficult to convert a mobile application into a money making business tool. The simple reason is the flood of applications with almost similar features. Even if someone launches a unique app poor marketing in the beginning might not gain the early users and then, within a few weeks, competitors launch almost similar or may be the best mobile application. This is why it is important to use multiple ways to monetize your application. At the same time, to make money out of your mobile application, you would be also required to be very strategic. This article will share a few top and effective ways to monetize your app to create a source of income.

In-App Advertising

One of the most widely used ways of monetizing a mobile application is the “In-App Advertising”. As there is fierce competition in the mobile market, it is difficult to earn desired revenue by making an app paid because consumers are less willing to pay and keep on looking for the free available options. Here, the In-App Advertising works as a savior for the businessman who wants to monetize his mobile app. However, be very careful in the selection of the advertisement type. The main agenda of your mobile application should be to give the best user experience and keep the mobile app engaging. If you will irritate them with the annoying in-app ads, they are more likely to switch to your competitors. Five different types of in-app ads are briefed below.

1. Interstitial In-App Ads

This type of ad is also known as full screen ads. Generally, this ad appears in between the natural pauses. For example, when a user moves between different screens or menus, the interstitial aka full screen ad would appear. As this type of ad never interrupts the ongoing user experience, it is more likely to generate higher revenue compared to other types of in-app ads.

2. Capture Forms In-App Ads

This type of ad is willing to capture the email ID and other contact details of the app user. It offers different allurements to intrigue users to share their details. The gaming mobile applications use this type of ads at major extent.

3. Advanced Overlay In-App Ads

This ad is a blend of the interstitial and capture in-app ads. The major difference is that this type of in-app ad are more interactive compared to the simple images which is part of capture form in-app ads.

4. Banner Ads

As the name suggests, these are the ads in a banner form, which used to appear in the top or bottom of the actual mobile application screen. This type of in-app ad may distract the users and that’s why be careful when selecting this app. Too much of distraction may encourage your users to stop using your mobile application. The exercise mobile app can use this type of in-app ad as it requires less screen attention of the users. The such as Endomodo is an example of mobile app which uses the banner ad.

5. Notification In-App Ads

As the name suggests, this type of ad creates a push notification in the device of the user. This type of ad makes it more visible to the users and also captures quick attention of the user. However, this type of in-app ad can be very much annoying at times for the users. So be conscious about the consequences before opting for this type of in-app ads. 

Build Strong App Code

This is the best revenue generation tactic amongst all. Create a clean and strong mobile application code. There are many mobile app development companies or the business owners who would like to use your mobile app code as the base of their mobile app. They would like to save time in coding the same modules which you are having. If you have developed a good app with the clean and standard coding, then you may sell your mobile app code. There are a few sites which allow people to buy and sell the mobile applications with the source code. Apptopia is one of as such popular app marketplace to buy and sell the source code of a mobile application.  If you want to go down this route, it is essential that you test your software. There are many companies that specializes in software testing services.

Another monetization option from strong mobile application code is to sell the code for re-skinning your app. You may also sell the white label mobile application and make extra bucks. 

Data Driven Marketing

Your mobile application is the best tool for collecting the behavioral data. Add some good analytics and statistic collecting mechanisms. Using these mechanisms, you can get richer data, which you can analyze and use to create your marketing plan. In fact, there are lots of research and data collection companies, who would be interested in genuine user behavioral statistics. You can sell these data to them and earn a hefty amount of money. 

Free and Paid Version

This is also one of the best options to monetize your mobile application. You may give the free version of your application to the users with limited features. If your customers are interested in the additional features, then they have to pay for it. This type of model is mostly used in the game apps. A simple game is free and to uncover a few levels or to buy a few special weapons, the users have to pay. Another strategy with the same monetization model is that give free app to your consumers with a predefined time period. For example, the app would be free for 3 months and then they have to pay for it.

In-App Purchase

This is a mobile application monetization option used by the specific types of mobile apps. It can’t be used by all type of apps. The mCommerce app or media apps are the perfect example of the mobile app which can monetize their apps with the in-app purchase option.

 

Different Subscription Packages

Your mobile application might be catering different types of users. You may segment your audience based on their traits and then come up with different types of subscription packages. For example, if you have a gaming mobile application, then you might have two different users. One who never buys any weapon and another who never skip to buy any newly launched weapon. Here, to encourage the free users to buy something, you can put a package with a special discount for first time buyers. While for regular buyers, you may launch a special package of whole year where they may get all the weapons and some free extra gaming levels for a whole year. The Economist is one of the perfect examples who used this app monetization model. They have launched three different subscription models for their news readers. One is for web version; second is for the print version and the third is for both web and print version.

Email Subscriptions

Your mobile application must have a signup form in order to access your application. This will help you to collect the genuine email IDs of your users. These email IDs will help you to build a great list of emails which can be used in the marketing as well as money making. How? Well, the common fact is people rarely change their email addresses. So you are getting a list of genuine users who are going to use their email ID for ages. You may run the effective email marketing campaigns to engage with your consumers by sending them emails of regular updates of your application. You may also send the emails of coupon codes which will bring the audience to your mobile application back if they are not using it regularly. There can be also other strategic implementation of this emailing list. For example, you may redirect your app users to your website or other app so you may use the cross selling business strategy because your mobile application is just another arm of your Brand Chair. If your mobile application gets popular, you may also sell the Email data. However, if this idea is part of your monetization strategy, then, you have to make sure to take the consent of the user in the user agreement form of the mobile application.

 

SMS Marketing

It is another effective marketing tool for the mobile application. As per the study made by Localysts, 20% of users never came back after using an app once. To grab these users back to your mobile app, integrate a mechanism somewhere in the app to collect their phone numbers. You may run the SMS marketing campaign to promote new features of your application; share discount codes, coupon codes, etc. via SMS. It would be quick for your users to read and react on the SMS compared to other marketing tools.

These are top 8 ways to monetize your mobile application. There are also a few more ways, such as looking for a partner, adding strong content marketing, etc. You may use one or more channels briefed here to make money out of your mobile application.