Android vs iOS: Features and Secrets of Successful Affiliate Marketing
Android and iOS are two of the world’s most popular mobile operating systems and their fans do not stop arguing about which platform is more convenient and productive. Publishers and developers, in turn, continue to grasp the subtleties of working with these systems to find out which one generates more profit, is easier to use and gives the faster payouts.
Very often it is necessary to find it out on the go, which is inconvenient and risky for successful business management. That’s why we have prepared an overview of the main features of each of these operating systems in terms of mobile marketing.
Devices
A variety of devices running on Android gives publishers more opportunities for campaign segmentation. Moreover, Google encourages this by offering a selection of the target device and category of users for which the application is designed.
On the other hand, it is a narrow list of iOS devices that allows publishers to test and optimize the traffic in the process in a much faster and easier way.
Geo
To date, Android maintains its leading position in the number of users in the world. However, if we consider the individual country, there can be some surprising data. For example, in China, there is no official Play Market, which is why the market was under a complete iOS monopoly for several years. Recently it was suddenly bypassed in popularity by YunOS platform installed on Meizu smartphones.
Paying capacity
According to market research, the number of downloads and application installs in Play Market exceeds App Store performance for about one-third, but the average cost of one install is about 20% less. This is partly due to the difference of custom audiences: while there’s a wide variety of Android devices categories, Apple devices are in a high price range and their users are more solvent.
Also, iOS users perform in-app-purchases more often. 74% of mobile applications revenue accounts for iOS and 20% for Android. This means that iOS users spend almost 3.5 more times on paid apps, compared to Android users.
Fraud
Android’s open platform provides the opportunity to get more traffic and look for publishers directly through the DevKit; on the other hand, there’s some negative as well, because most of the fraud traffic is generated from Android devices. Closed iOS system solves the problem of fraud more or less, but it creates certain problems for publishers in turns of user data analysis. Opportunities for user data research and it’s further use on iOS are severely hampered.
Burst campaigns
To promote an application to the top it is important to understand the store operating algorithms across platforms. Apple App Store shows the applications that users are often looking for in the first place. The number and quality of the reviews and the number of downloads for a certain period of time is also taken into account. Android Play Market draws attention to the number of reviews and downloads of the top applications as well, but other than that looks at usability and the number of uninstalls.
This difference allows us to say that in order to advance on Android it is better to choose a campaign designed for a long term, supported by high-quality advertising and user acquisition strategies.
Without sufficient experience, it is difficult to predict what kind of platform will bring more profit for a particular application in advance of the launch of an advertising campaign. By the way, our managers are always ready to tell partners, which OS is better to start working with, taking into account the preceding factors and the experience of our media buyers team.
Tapgerine successfully works with all operating systems, but the main part of installs comes from Android. 68% of traffic is generated by Google OS, 32% by iOS. The leading geo of the first half of 2016 was India, Russia and the United States, where the share of installs on Android accounted for 93%, 62%, and 60%, respectively. CPI traffic from iOS devices prevailed in European countries: 52% in Germany and 60% — in France.
Successful advertising campaigns on Android, as well as on iOS, should take many factors into account: some geo features and target audience characteristics to the developer’s reputation and political events in particular regions. Publishers need to carefully analyze the data for each application and choose the most appropriate promotion strategy considering the specifics of the chosen platform.
Hopefully, our pieces of advice will help you to raise campaigns’ conversions. Our team is always happy to recommend you the best working strategy for Android and iOS.
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