The Mobile App Metrics You Need to Take Into Account

If you launched a mobile application during the past several years, you understand the importance of metrics and keeping track of them. However, with the alphabet soup of acronyms and technical terms you deal with daily, you may be lost trying to account for the crucial metrics. 

These essential metrics can make or break your performance on the Google Play Store, Apple’s App Store, and your customer base. A better grasp of mobile app metrics enables you to leverage an app to its fullest potential.

So which metrics do you need to take into account? Let’s break it down. 

Daily active and monthly active users

Daily active users (DAU) and monthly active users (MAU) are a priority to you as an app developer. Your mobile app’s DAU and MAU metrics might assist you in determining the interest and practicality of your app to users.

While MAU provides unique user information over 30 days, the DAU measures daily individual users. These two data sets will allow you to see the growth of your app’s user base over time. 

Both numbers should be on an upward trajectory. Otherwise, you may use push notifications to entice customers to return. These figures can also show you the days and times of the week your app’s users are most active, which you can utilize to develop targeted campaigns.

These metrics are essential for mobile app campaigns.

Retention rate

Retention rate is a marketing term that you should research. Even though not all your users will use your app frequently, you never know when they might need you.

Marketers may value retention over other metrics because retention creates customer loyalty and revenue opportunities. 

A monthly, quarterly or annual analysis of retention rates allows you as an app developer to break down what is clicking with your user base. 

Acquisition rate

Several metrics exist to help detail an app acquisition rate – number of downloads in a specific period, cost per install, customer lifetime value, and average revenue per user. 

These metrics will allow you to take a long-term look at your user base to locate trends and potential revenue opportunities. On the flip side, these metrics can also tell you if you are spending too much money on campaigns or if a marketing push fell flat. 

Acquiring new users is an inexact science, but it can be understood if you have credible metrics at your disposal. 

Average session length

It is easy to open your metrics software and look at measurements like app downloads, page views, and app views. However, you would be missing out on a crucial metric that can tell you about app usage: average session length.

As its name says, this metric measures the average length of time a user has a session on your app. 

Average session length is not a general app metric. Depending on your business line, it may not even apply to your app. But keeping a close eye on this metric will at least tell you if your app maintains a level of interest thanks to its content. 

Churn rate

Churn rate may not sound like a pleasant metric, but it is one to monitor throughout the lifespan of your app. The churn rate shows you the number of uninstalls for your app or users downgrading a service. 

Monitor your churn rates during marketing campaigns to see if users find the campaign more annoying or controversial than helpful. Watching this metric during app updates can also tell if an update was successful. 

But what about app downloads?

You will often hear boasts of the number of app downloads for competitor apps. Sure, it is a nice number to hear – especially if it is in the thousands or millions – but do understand there are some things to keep in mind with app downloads.

App downloads are never a good indicator of app usefulness or popularity. Sure, 200,000 people might download your app every month, but what happens when only a handful of those users purchase an item or service it? 

Take app downloads with a grain of salt, and make sure your marketing department is aware. 

Wrap up

User metrics can lead to headaches if you do not know what to seek. Luckily, with the proper research, you can find anything about your user base and thus improve your customer service.

Among the many app metrics, you will want to pick the ones valuable to your business or the types of users you are trying to acquire. If you have a marketing department, scheduling a meeting with them will get everyone on the same page regarding these increasingly valuable metrics. 

The good news is that several methods exist to track this data, including spreadsheets and dashboards. Whatever you choose, you can find a way to make the data profitable and work for you.