Optimizing User Acquisition: Strategies for High-Quality Installs at Lower CPI

Understanding the Current Landscape of App User Acquisition

The global mobile advertising market is expected to reach over $400 billion by 2025, but average CPIs vary dramatically across regions, platforms, and verticals. What worked even a year ago is now outdated.

Today’s app marketers must go beyond basic install volume metrics. Instead, metrics like retention rate, lifetime value (LTV), and engagement are the new north stars. Your goal? Not just installs, but high-quality app installs, users who stay, engage, and eventually convert.

Redefining “Quality” in User Acquisition

Let’s be clear, high-quality installs aren’t just users who download your app. They are the users who:

• Complete your onboarding funnel
• Engage regularly
• Make in-app purchases or generate ad revenue
• Align with your ideal customer personal

Optimizing for quality starts with defining what it looks like for your app. If you’re monetizing via offerwalls or subscriptions, your quality user will behave differently from one in an ad-supported casual game.

PubScale’s own UA platform, GROW, helps publishers tap into a vast network of verified traffic sources, ensuring quality installs with deeper post-install engagement.

Leveraging Offerwalls for High-Intent Conversions

Offerwalls have emerged as a powerful UA channel, especially for gaming, fintech, and utility apps. By allowing users to earn in-app rewards for completing actions (such as installing a partner app), offerwalls generate high-intent installs at significantly lower CPIs than traditional networks.

Unlike passive impressions, users interacting with offerwalls are incentivized, motivated, and often already familiar with similar app ecosystems.

• Pro Tip: Platforms like PubScale Offerwall enable refined targeting and fraud protection, making it easier to reduce cost per install (CPI) while ensuring genuine user actions.

App Store Optimization (ASO): Your First Line of Defense

ASO remains the most cost-effective mobile app marketing tactic. Think of it as SEO for the App Store or Google Play.

To improve discoverability and organic installs:

• Optimize your title and keyword field with high-volume, relevant search terms.
• Use compelling screenshots and videos to boost conversion rates.
• A/B test your app icon and descriptions regularly.

A strong ASO strategy reduces your reliance on paid channels and consistently brings in users with high search intent, lowering overall CPI over time.

Scaling with Programmatic & RTB Channels

Real-time bidding (RTB) and programmatic advertising provide sophisticated targeting capabilities. By tapping into DSPs (demand-side platforms), you can fine-tune your campaigns based on:

• Device type and OS version
• Behavioral data
• In-app actions
• Geo-targeting

Advanced UA solutions like PubScale GROW integrate with over 200+ offerwalls and ad networks, helping advertisers scale installs across premium inventory without ballooning CPI.

• Bonus: Programmatic also helps prevent ad fatigue through dynamic creative optimization (DCO), ensuring each impression is personalized and performance-driven.

Creative Optimization: Designing for Clicks & Conversions

Creative still reigns supreme. Whether you're running interstitials, native ads, or rewarded video formats, high-performing ad creatives can dramatically reduce CPI.

Here’s what to focus on:

• Strong CTAs: Be clear and action-oriented.
• Localized content: Customize creatives for specific regions or cultures.
• Short-form videos: Use 15-second snackable videos with hooks in the first 3 seconds.
• Interactive formats: Playables and gamified creatives perform well in gaming apps.

Running multivariate creative tests (A/B/C) weekly can result in CPI drops of up to 30%, especially when combined with PubScale’s fraud-free and AI-optimized UA solutions.

Targeted User Acquisition Campaigns Based on LTV

If CPI is your cost metric, LTV (lifetime value) is your revenue driver.

To ensure you're not just acquiring cheaply but profitably:

• Segment your audience based on post-install actions
• Focus on lookalike audiences who mimic high-LTV cohorts
• Run retargeting campaigns for dormant users to increase LTV and engagement

Using predictive analytics and machine learning models, GROW helps map high-LTV user behavior and refines targeting criteria, optimizing spend for outcomes, not just installs.

Localizing Campaigns for Emerging Markets

Emerging regions like India, LATAM, and MENA offer millions of potential users but require customized approaches.

Tactics include:

• Language localization in creatives and app metadata
• Cultural sensitivity in visuals and CTAs
• Lower device requirement optimizations for low-end Android devices

Since average CPIs in these regions are lower, you can scale aggressively while still acquiring high-quality app installs, especially if you use gamified ad formats like offerwalls and playables.

Fraud Prevention: Guarding Against Invalid Traffic

Low CPI can come at a high cost if your campaigns attract fake users or bots. Invest in fraud detection tools and platforms that offer:

• Device fingerprinting
• Click-to-install time analysis
• Post-install behavior monitoring

PubScale integrates fraud filters across its UA and monetization products, ensuring every dollar you spend brings real users, not fraud.

Cross-Channel UA Strategy: The Omnichannel Approach

One of the best user acquisition strategies for apps today is diversification.

Your UA plan should include:

• Social platforms (Meta, TikTok, X)
• DSPs and ad exchanges
• Offerwalls and influencer platforms
• Organic through ASO and SEO-driven web content

An omnichannel strategy not only reduces CPI via broader competition and optimization but also creates a safety net in case one source underperforms.

Continuous Optimization and Iteration

UA is not a one-time setup; it’s a continuous loop of data, insights, and adaptation.

Regularly monitor:

• CPI vs. LTV ratios
• Channel-specific ROAS
• Install-to-event funnel drop-offs

Tools like PubScale GROW offer granular dashboards, real-time analytics, and MMP integrations, enabling precise performance tuning.