If your strategy is to run all your marketing through a single channel, such as the Meta platform, influencer partnerships, or App Store Optimization (ASO), we need to chat. Not only is this high-risk, but it’s also unsustainable and therefore a recipe for failure to grow.
With privacy changes creating uncertainty around apps’ attribution, rapid shifts in algorithms, abrupt changes in user behaviour, and unpredictable app store rankings, putting your everything on one channel would be like trying to build your home on sand. Thus, there is no question for app-first teams that diversification of marketing is critical.
If you are working to successfully scale a new app or to reignite an app with plateauing user & revenue growth, then this blog is for you. If you are app-first, this blog will provide an insight into how to build an intelligent, durable, growth engine for your app that is not subject to changes made by the platform supporting your app or inelastic to algorithm changes. Finally, if you need to know where your app’s revenue actually originates from, beyond just surface-level, shiny metrics, Apptrove will be there to tell you exactly what you need to hear.
What is Diversification Marketing?
Diversification marketing refers to the process of advertising through multiple channels as opposed to using only one performing method to acquire customers. For mobile apps, diversification means looking further than just Meta or Google ads and developing a more comprehensive and spontaneous approach that incorporates both paid and organic, owned and earned media.
Do not confuse diversification channels with trying to chase the shiny things. It is important to assess how each channel mix fits your goals and objectives and creates a route to meet your audience and KPIs.
If a hyper-casual gaming developer is planning to create and co-create content with influencers, they might find creating polished TikTok content to benefit them. A fintech developer may be better off defining their customer acquisition strategy through content partnerships, creating a funnel for educational content through SEO, and looking at opportunities using Connected TV.
A well-defined and executed diversification marketing strategy provides a marketer with decreased risk, higher ROAS, and greater lifetime value. This strategy allows app marketers to have some form of resiliency against any negative impact from changes within the channel they have used. Therefore, if Meta rose their CPM suddenly or Apple imposes another level of privacy restrictions, everyone will have to be prepared with an alternative plan.
The Importance of Diversification Marketing for App Teams
Gone are the days when marketing was linear, and app users took predictable journeys. A channel might drive great installs one day, then tank by tomorrow due to an algorithm change or privacy update. If you rely too heavily upon one source for mobile user acquisition (UA), then you are at the mercy of things you have little to no control over. This is when diversification marketing becomes your safety net. More importantly, it provides you with the lever of sustained scaling.
In fact, adopting three or more marketing channels has led to higher returns on ad spend for 73% of brands, showing the effectiveness of a diversified channel approach. By engaging in balanced top-of-funnel (ToFu) sources, and bottom-of-funnel (BoFu) sources, while dynamically allocating budgets, you are also building optionality.
This flexibility gives you more options to stop unproductive campaigns, or scale things that work, without shutting off your entire growth engine. And, as app teams begin their move from vanity metrics to deep performance, diversification marketing can be a mechanism for discovering, and scaling true incrementality.
7 Steps to Master Diversification Marketing for Your App
To reap the rewards of using a diversification marketing strategy, app teams must perform more than just surface-level trial and error. There is a methodical strategy that is carefully created and based on factual data, and done on an ongoing, adaptive methodology that can change as you mature as an app team and also as you evolve as an audience and therefore a marketplace. Below are 7 steps that you will be able to use to help you create a great diversification marketing strategy for growth and long-term viability:
1. Audit Your Existing Channel Dependence
Before you can leap to diversify, it’s important to understand where you stand. You need to ensure that you’ve completed a channel audit, like where your installs are coming from, or if you are relying too heavily on organics from a single app store.
Apptrove can help marketing professionals understand these preferences using both attribution and engagement metrics on the same dashboard. Once you have identified your most dependent channels, you can identify where you should be focusing your diversification efforts, be it additional paid channels, influencer sponsorships, educational resources for onboarding with higher retention rates, etc.
2. Build Diversification Around User Intent, Not Just Channels
The best diversification marketing strategies are not about having a presence on all the platforms, but rather addressing the user at each stage of their journey. This means you need to segment your channel mix by intent: what the user is looking for when they see your ad, or have some type of interaction with your brand.
At the top of the funnel, you may use channels like influencer UGC or Connected TV that might literally “walk” the user to download your app. In the middle of the funnel, you might use contextual ad placements and app store keyword campaigns to drive consideration for your app. And then at the bottom, you can use retargeting or referral programs to circle back. When you diversify based on this intent map rather than just adding channels for the sake of adding scale, you will not only have better clarity on attribution, but you will have more qualified users, and have a growth engine built to optimize real outcomes.
3. Don’t Sleep on Underused and Emerging Channels
Diversification marketing is not only about adding another performance marketing channel, but also about pursuing underutilized formats and partnerships. For example, in-app advertising is not just about monetization; you could advertise on ad-exchanges where your app is being advertised inside of other apps.
Referral loops still provide huge quantities of high intent low cost users who convert much better than cold traffic. Preloads are impactful for regional growth and offline scaling, even if they do require capital upfront. Even CTV is beginning to be viewed in a performance way, and cost-per-install is becoming increasingly competitive. The main thing is to methodically test new channels and allow the data to inform your decision-making process, rather than gut feel.
4. Conduct Tests During Agile Sprints Instead of Big-Bang Rollouts
Diversification does not mean to diversify too heavily. It is advisable to do experimentation based on sprints within those channels. Rather than trying to onboard five new channels at once, try onboarding one or two channels with their own KPIs. Conduct a 30-day test sprint for each channel and measure them against each other historically to see how they stack up in their install-to-subscription flows.
You must maintain the integrity of the creative strategy and carefully consider retention from Day 1 through Day 7; therefore, you must be ready to iterate. Your goal is not to guess what works; rather, you want to develop a repeatable model that allows for testing and scaling, giving you the ability to make real-time budget reallocations based on evidence. These are the core characteristics that will set you apart competitively in your overall marketing efforts and thus create a sustainable competitive advantage for you!
5. Measurement Will Make or Break Your Diversification Marketing Play
If you are not able to accurately track your success, or you have a last-click attribution approach or use separate dashboards from your different ad partners, you’re only seeing a small part of the overall picture. Once you have surpassed a single-channel strategy, you will be in the land of fractured measurement. If your attribution model is still last-click, or you are dependent on siloed dashboards from each of your ad partners, you’re only seeing a fraction of the overall picture.
You deserve an all-in-one view of attribution, behavior, and monetization, backed by privacy-first models like SKAN, cohort-level reporting, and predictive funneling. Apptrove allows you to look past installs and analyze real outcomes such as trial starts, in-app spends, and churn prevention across every marketing source. This type of visibility helps ensure your diversification marketing is profitable.
6. Creative Needs to Match Channel Language
All channels have individual dialects of their own. Ads created in TikTok style will not convert when placed in an already fixed placement in the App Store. Static banners will not work where an interactive format is now the norm. Diversifying your marketing efforts is both a user acquisition strategy as well as a creative operations task. Each new advertising channel tested will require localizing messages, changing formats, and re-evaluating calls to action.
Same campaign objective will require different hooks and visuals on different channels. Don’t create your ad copy with a one-size-fits-all approach, and instead utilize a modular approach to create template pieces that are easy to modify. Additionally, measure downstream metrics such as trial conversions, lifetime value, and uninstalls; rather than just click-through rates.
7. Incrementality: The KPI That Actually Matters
When you scale, you will have to focus on value rather than volume. Not every install is incremental, and not every user journey is linear. Incrementality testing will help explain what your new channels are actually contributing to your growth structure, instead of basing it on simply what they advise. This could include geo-holdout tests, cohort-based analysis, and campaign-by-campaign lift studies.
Incrementality testing will help you identify real incremental, unproductive impact and ignore the channels that have high appearing performance because they are converting from organics and providing a minimal amount of new incremental growth. Additionally, the slow ramp channels that appear to be underperforming may be attracting first-time users who remain longer and monetise more. Apptrove will provide you with the barriers you have in place to understand and access these incremental takeaways to enable you to scale with confidence.
The Time Has Come for Every App Marketer to Try Diversification Marketing
Channel fatigue, platform saturation, and policy changes are real threats in this app economy. Diversification marketing offers not only safety but a road map for getting bigger. It is your method of generating new revenue and therefore generating higher quality users, without additional expenditure, and provides a means to continue to adapt as the next update or algorithm change occurs, to never again be surprised. As app marketers adopt a multi-source, high-measurement strategy, success will go to those that have the best, reusable, de-risked, and agile playbooks, rather than just the largest budgets.
Are you ready to see how a more diversified growth strategy could look for your app? Join Apptrove and take the first steps in mapping out your next channel move!
Frequently Asked Questions
1. What is diversification marketing in mobile app growth?
Diversification marketing refers to expanding your app marketing strategy across multiple channels and platforms to reduce dependence on any one source and improve stability, scalability, and user quality.
2. Why is diversification important for app marketers?
It helps de-risk UA strategies, improves user retention, enhances attribution accuracy, and opens up new growth opportunities, especially in privacy-first environments.
3. How do I know if I need to diversify?
If more than 60% of your installs or revenue come from one channel, you’re likely overexposed and could benefit from diversification.
4. How do I measure success across diversified channels?
Track install-to-event metrics (like trial starts, purchases), monitor retention, and use incrementality testing to assess real impact.
