How to Make Your Mobile Go Viral: 9-Point to Follow
Is it easy to make your app famous, popular? No, definitely not. Still, there are powerful factors (if executed properly) which work like a magic to make your app go viral.
The mobile app market is booming ever since the advent of smartphones as an integral part of peoples’ daily life. Whether it is playing games, listening to music, booking services, shopping or building connections, it is all possible with a single tap on the smartphone, thanks to the surplus mobile apps available. Users spend on an average more than three hours on their smartphones and the majority of it is spent on mobile apps.
According to a study by Statista, there were 2.8 million apps on Google Play Store and 2.2 million apps on Apple’s App Store as of March 2017. This means there is immense clutter in the mobile app market and it is hard to get your mobile app noticed among others. Hence, to stand out in this clutter, you need to create something unique and exceptional and make it viral. Building an outstanding mobile app and getting it to spread virally takes proper planning and strategizing.
To help you make your mobile app go viral, here is a checklist that you need to follow while creating and marketing your app.
#1 Research the target audience
For effective marketing of your mobile app, you need to thoroughly research the target audience and their needs and interests. This will help you in creating relevant content that your target audience would be most likely to engage with. Be active in communities and forums to find out where your potential users are, what type of apps they already use and what their demands are, to create relevant personas. When you define personas, you will be able to create suitable content to obtain maximum reach and engagement.
#2 Create captivating content
Content is the key to attract users and keep them engaged. Effective captivating content can get viral through word of mouth. Populate your mobile app with effective curated content and build content strategies to market your app on various platforms. When users find content that helps them in some way, inspires them or changes their mood, they are more likely to share it with others. Content that evokes emotions of amusement and excitement, or shares unique information often get shared more.
#3 Add a wow-factor
Your app needs to have a valuable feature or a wow-factor that attracts people. Your app marketing strategy must include visually appealing content and gamification that will engage users and entice them to download and use your app. Incentivize people to share your app by gifting them a unique experience. Pokemon GO is a great example of gamification in apps.
By combining gamification elements with real-life experience, the app developers managed to achieve something unreal, which lured more users into using the app.
#4 Show social proof
People often tend to trust suggestions and reviews of their friends or peers more than what the app shows. When they see that someone known to them is using the app, they are more likely to try the app. Hence, showing the proof that people known to them are using the app is a great strategy to get them to use it. Facebook Messenger uses this method by showing the names and profile pictures of the users’ friends who use the app, to encourage them to download it.
#5 Optimize the app store
To make sure you reach your target audience, your app needs to rank in the app stores. Both Google Play Store and Apple’s App Store use a certain algorithm to prioritize app search results based on app ranking factors. Right from the app title to the keywords, everything determines your app’s ranking on the app store. Make sure the following elements are in place:
- App Title: Make it highly focused, readable and self-explanatory
- App Description: Write a crisp yet effective description that points out what problems your app solves
- Keywords: Target the right keywords for both the title as well as the description
- Icons: Design your app icon keeping in mind that it is your app’s face and needs to reflect a unique brand story and essence
- App Screenshots: Focus on highlighting your app’s most effective features and functions
- App Specifications: Highlight your unique app specifications and make sure you keep updating them time to time
#6 Make it user-friendly
Your mobile app needs to be extremely effortless to use, for your users to continue using it. Right from downloading the app to sharing it with others, make it a friendly and easy experience for the users. Great UI design and user-friendly features are the keys to keeping your users glued to your app.
#7 Use Social Media to Create Buzz
When your app is ready to launch, determine the social media platforms that you want to use to reach your target audience and determine a tone of voice for putting across your message. Develop a social media strategy and reach your users on as many platforms as possible such as Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Quora, Twitter, etc. Integrate visual trends such as AR, VR, and gamification to create captivating content for social media marketing. The popular gaming app Angry Birds does effective social media marketing by creating funny and engaging videos for its YouTube channel.
The videos are funny and quirky, which provoke the users to download the app and try it for themselves and get people excited and curious about your app.
#8 Retarget interested users
You can get more people to download your app by monitoring their online behavior. If someone has visited your website or follows your blog, there are chances that they might download your app. Hence, you need to target these users separately. Add the Download App button on your Facebook page so that those who visit or follow your Facebook page can download your app. Also, make use of targeted Facebook ads to retarget the interested users.
#9 Reward the users
Encourage users to refer and share your app on their social networks by rewarding them. Giving in-app rewards, discounts, and gifts to your users will motivate them to share your app with friends and peers. Incorporate a referral policy for your app and reward the users each time they get a friend to use your app. Experiment with different ways to encourage users to share and invite friends to your app.
Wrapping Up
Make sure the objective of your app is very clear and it has something meaningful to share, to make it viral. There is no set strategy or rule to get your app to be viral among people. Keep experimenting with new strategies and ideas to keep your app always active and booming in the marketplace.