The happiest hours at MWC Barcelona 2019

The happiest hours at MWC Barcelona 2019

by | Mar 4, 2019 | Events

What’s the best place to discuss business related to mobiles? Barcelona, of course! MWC Barcelona took place this past week and as the city is still full of the conference goers, we’re still super hyped about what an amazing event it was.

So, gathering together more than 100,000 people in 8 enormous halls is no joke. Now, picture all those halls filled with leading-edge technology and the latest innovation the tech industry has to offer…quite difficult to imagine right? Well, almost everything that there is to know about the tech industry today and in the future was laid out during the four days of MWC Barcelona.

This year the theme was “Intelligent Connectivity”, a term that is generally used to talk about high-speed 5G networks, Internet of Things, Artificial Intelligence and big data. It was chosen as we’re starting a new era consisting of highly personalized and contextualized experiences available to people exactly when they want it. There were also 8 separate core themes that each belonged to a separate hall –  Connectivity, AI, Industry 4.0, Immersive Content, Disruptive Innovation, Digital Wellness, Digital Trust, and The Future.

As we’ve come to expect, the event once again unveiled super innovative and futuristic tech products. In addition to the electric cars shown by the likes of Audi and Mercedes, many mobile giants, such as Nokia, LG, Sony, Samsung, Oppo, Xiaomi among other were introducing their new models. Unarguably, Huawei generated the most buzz with its new foldable phone that has a wide screen that can be folded together like a piece of paper. Robots run by AI were also trending and in the center of many product demos, for example, people could dance and all the robots on the stand were imitating the person’s movements.

The whole Appmediation sales team was in attendance and similarily to last year we shared a booth with our sister company Adcash. It was a busy event and we had a great opportunity to network with many big industry players and meet our partners. In addition, we were very happy as we got to meet up with some of our clients, such as Djinnworks, HeroCraft and Orbis3.

We hosted a happy hour in our booth during the first two days of MWC. This time we served Spanish tapas with wine and as a special addition, Vana Tallinn, an Estonian spirit brand, sponsored our event. Those two days were a great start to the event and turned into a booth party. We’re glad so many people had time to stop by and discuss some business with us.

2019 has many other events in store and we will share more details in the near future. To keep yourself posted, follow us on social media and you’ll find out more info soon:

Update: SDK 2.0 is now available

Update: SDK 2.0 is now available

by | Jan 14, 2019 | Uncategorized

We are glad to announce that our SDK 2.0 version is now live! The team has worked hard on the new version to create something new and better for the app developers. After carefully evaluating what we wish to update, we are now also offering solutions that our clients have asked for. The goal behind this new single light-weight SDK version is to make app monetization even easier!

The update is available for iOS, Android and Unity. It is important to keep in mind that the updates are slightly different for all three operating systems.

Good news for all publishers! We have just integrated with Baidu, which means that our publishers now have exclusive access to the Chinese market making our platform’s coverage even wider. Another new partner network is IronSource – a firm that probably needs no introduction as it is one of the biggest networks in the world.

 

iOS updates

The new SDK version for iOS has the biggest amount of changes. Firstly, the network adaptor has been customized, so the integration is now much easier and time-saving, especially when the publishers might be working with other Appmediation partners. It allows to combine the networks in a simpler way. We also have a manual and automatic Cocoapods support, so the publishers can choose to use that tool for library installation if they feel like it’s more comfortable.

There are two major internal SDK performance improvements for iOS. Firstly, the publishers don’t need to manually link the libraries anymore, we have removed the manual work via Module Maps. SWIFT integration has made the Appmediation seamless while saving time and having higher internal performance, which means less coding – yay! There’s also been an improvement for the initialization controls, offering explicit support inside the code, making it possible to choose ad formats and networks and is highly customizable and configurable. This update solves the inconsistency between dashboard reporting and user expectation. It was requested by our customers and is now available!

Now the iOS publishers can check the full integration just by writing a single line with our freshly launched automatic integration testing function. It will analyze whether everything (networks, libraries, etc) is working from the integration point of view. This update was created to make the testing process easier and save the publishers’ time. It shows information about each network SDK level, each network adaptor level, and the network adaptor and library compatibility.

 

Android updates

Internal SDK performance improvements for Android are a little different. Our developers have made big changes to make the boot-up faster which offers a better ad experience for the user since the app will open up faster. In addition, we now have parallel initialization for all of the partner networks and we’ve improved the initialization controls by offering explicit support for ad formats.

The new SDK for Android has added an extra function for better visibility and integration. Those functions check whether the ad is shown or not, so the publisher can check the current situation and, if needed, take action to solve those issues. Since 90% of the issues a publisher might have are related to integration, a new integration testing function was created to solve these problems. It analyzes and shows information about each network SDK level, each network adaptor level, network adaptor and library compatibility, and general configuration – permissions, manifest file and automatic dependency check.

The Android documentation section has moved from our website to a more developer-friendly space here. The new documentation site offers better user experience, makes integration faster and clearer.

 

Unity updates

In regards of Unity, the new update gives access to the newly integrated demand networks, Baidu and IronSource and providing even better coverage for the users through that.

 

This SDK 2.0 update was done to provide a better service for all of our users, nevertheless the OS that they’re using. Appmediation always tries to take the clients’ ideas and feedback into account to create as user-friendly and efficient service as possible.

 

Any additional questions?

If you wish to know more about the SDK update or have general questions about our platform, then please contact us.

If you’re in need of a monetization partner then we’d love to hear from you. We’re here to help you maximize your app revenue.

Register your app & start earning!

 

If you wish to stay updated with our latest news then keep an eye on our social media:
Recap of October’s mobile industry events

Recap of October’s mobile industry events

by | Nov 8, 2018 | Events

Our team has been busy flying all around the world this October. We have attended three big mobile industry events – Casual Connect Eastern Europe in Serbia, White Nights conference in Moscow and Game Connection Europe in Paris.

Each of those three events was special in their own terms, which is why we’ve decided to do a general overview of all of the event’s highlights.

First up was Casual Connect Eastern Europe in Serbia’s beautiful capital Belgrade. The event was organized to match the game industry’s creativity with new media, innovation and investment. Many up-and-coming mobile developers were present there and we really enjoyed the modern tech culture that greeted us there with many cutting-edge gaming solutions.

The event was full of developers, including many major players and indie developers. Our Business Development Manager, Linh Le Phuong, had her hands full for all three days. Most of the developers were looking for investors to scale up their games, whilst still considering to self-publish their games due to the high cut that the publishing agencies take. We met many developers who were looking to expand their games to China, who noted that they find it difficult to enter this market.

In addition to that, we had many successful meetings with new and existing clients. We got to talk about our platform and give monetization tips to our publishers.

Mid-October our Managing Director, Sushant Patil and our Business Development Manager, Victoria Bessonova attended White Nights Moscow. The event gathered together all the biggest players in Russia and featured speakers from companies like Facebook, Appodeal and Twitch. In addition to the glitz and glamour that filled the conference hall and the networking parties, the event itself was also booming of industry specialists.

Our team attended various sessions from Unity, Facebook and Google speakers, as well as talks that discussed the Chinese and Latam markets. They proved to be very informative about where the industry is heading and gave us new ideas on how to improve our platform even further. We had meetings with many of our industry-leading partner networks to strengthen our partnerships and to learn about the updates they are planning to do in the future.

In addition to the app developers and different platform representatives, there were also many game developers for PS4 and PC present who do not have any applications at the moment. Again, we came across a big interest in the Asian markets. The attendees were extremely interested to know the specifics about that area’s average eCPMs and well-performing geos. Another trend we picked up on from the developers was the wish to have a tech support in the local language of the app and the developing companies ability to resolve issues more easily.

We found many interesting new contacts and would recommend the event to everyone who wishes to acquire Russian customers – White Nights is the perfect place for it!

The last week of October led us to the city of lights! Paris hosted Game Connection Europe – a conference that is the best known as “the deal making event” and our VP of Sales, Clemence Etienne represented our team there. This event is meant for developers, publishers, distributors and service providers, with that said the attendees’ list is very diverse. The overall mix included companies offering development, different gaming related niche services and developers. Most of the attending developers were focusing more on Console, PC and Steam rather than on gaming apps.

Since the event is very professional and business oriented it is important to book meetings with people you wish to meet, as otherwise, you might not have a chance due to the pre-booked agendas. So, make sure that you plan and book your meetings beforehand! We were highly excited to meet our demand partners and we had a long and fruitful talk with the Mintegral team – we were very happy to see you!

Game Connection is definitely one of the events that’s very useful to attend for any gaming related companies who wish to meet and do business with other key players. We are looking very much looking forward to their next event in San Fransisco in March 2019.

Exciting things are coming – the upcoming year will entail many different events all around the globe. Keep an eye on our social media to know where to catch our team next!
The bigger and better Pocket Gamer Connects Helsinki 2018

The bigger and better Pocket Gamer Connects Helsinki 2018

by | Sep 24, 2018 | Events

Two weeks ago we had the pleasure to visit the beautiful coastal capital of Finland – Helsinki! Pocket Gamer Connects conference was in town and held their biggest Helsinki event ever with Steel Media as the main sponsor. If you weren’t there then you don’t have to worry, we’ll be covering all the essentials in this post!

Since our company is still new, we are trying to do our best to have a presence at all the important industry events. PGC Helsinki was thus no different. The event had four rooms that hosted 12 tracks and more than 120 speakers, totaling up to 1,325 delegates from more than 600 companies that represented 49 countries.

The speakers covered many different topics throughout those 2 days from monetizer and developer toolkit tracks to game changers: hypercasual, trade trends, East meets West, blockchain basics, live ops landscape and more. The event was truly diverse and although mobile gaming still remains at the heart of the event there were many representatives from different fields such as blockchain games/platforms, PC, VR, AR, and handheld gaming consoles.

Day 1 included Unity’s monetizer track where they shared ad monetization tips from both ad networks’ and publishers’ side. Slava Taraskin and Jocelyn Shief from Unity Ads educated the publishers about how to grow their IAP revenue and increase retention through a live game performance optimization.

Big gaming studios (Playstack, Pixowl, Hatch, Creative Mobile, and HYPRMX) shared their experiences with ad optimization technologies and discussed both their failures and lessons learned. One common point that they brought out was the use of third-party mediation platforms. Claiming that mediation is great because:

  • there’s no need to reinvent the wheel
  • it meets the publishers’ needs and is easy to manage
  • allows publishers to focus on developing their games

Talking about the event highlights, the focus was very clearly on developers, both indie developers and medium to big app companies and in-app service providers. The event had lots of different engaging activities throughout the days. One of the highlights was definitely short mentoring sessions held by various game industry leaders who shared their valuable insights and expertise.

 

We had the opportunity to meet with our network partners and our current customers. Our team also introduced our product to new and potential developers.

To sum it all up, the atmosphere was perfect for sharing and gaining knowledge, doing business, networking and having fun with new and interesting people. 

 

What’s happening next?

The next event that the Appmediation team will visit is already next week in Belgrade. Use your chance and meet up with us at Casual Connect Serbia on October 1-3!

If you wish to inquire about our events or have general questions about our platform, then please contact us.

Top Tips for Successful App Monetization

Top Tips for Successful App Monetization

by | Jul 30, 2018 | Tips

As more and more mobile solutions become available daily, there isn’t much you can’t do on a mobile device nowadays. So, it’s no surprise that when we look around us there are so many people who are constantly on their phones, tapping away. Thus, we decided to make a post about top tips for successful monetization, to make app publishers’ lives a little easier.

The mobile ads industry is growing at a rapid speed, and honestly, seeing how people get most of their primary information from that one tiny device, clearly, mobile advertising is not something to be overlooked. The time that people spend on apps is only increasing. eMarketer states that over 20% of all media time and 85% of mobile time is spent in-app, which is why the advertisers should take notice and spend much more time placing their ads on mobiles.

According to Forbes, mobile advertising will drive 75% of all digital spend this year, and that’s in the U.S alone. Imagine then how big the global percentage would be. Adweek shows that the trend is dominant in China as well, where the digital ad spend is 80/20 in favor of mobile ads and is set to increase in the following years.

As it is now clear how and why mobile advertising is important for advertisers, it is equally important for app publishers. Especially so, because the app economy will double by 2020 and the global revenue will reach the outstanding $101 billion according to MonetizePros. Since the majority of the apps are launched to generate revenue yet are still free apps, the developers need to find solutions on how to make revenue. Monetization through advertisements is a very effective way to generate it. Now is the part where the question “why?” appears. Well, advertising eliminates the cost barrier, thus the users don’t have to pay per download and are more likely to download your app, while you earn money from their activities within the app.

It is important to set up a monetization plan and to choose the best monetization model for your app, as that’s the crucial factor depending on which the app is either successful or not. The smart and time-saving solution is to use an app monetization platform, that way you can also reduce your operational costs. How does it work? The platform deals with the mediation of their platform and the top ad networks while optimizing your ads at the same time. This way you can focus on making your product better and at the same time earn revenue from the ads at the same time by letting the mediation platform do all the heavy lifting.

 

Here’s how you can monetize your app efficiently:

 

#1 Work across global partners

The industry is packed with many in-app players yet you should always opt for the best ones (i.e Admob, Facebook, Applovin, etc.) in order to gain the best metrics.

 

#2 Choose the right ad formats for your app users

Mobile users are spending most of their smartphone time in-app, which significantly exceeds the time spent in mobile browsers. That’s exactly why it is very important to choose the right and engaging ad format for your users. Banner, interstitial, video and rewarded video ads cover 95% of the global spending on in-app advertising. Appmediation offers all those top ad formats and provides consultancy to the app developers by positioning the right format inside their app.

 

#3 Generate higher engagement with interactive video and rewarded video ads 

Video and rewarded video ads are the best monetization methods and deliver significantly higher performance than other ad formats. As the advertisements should be user-centric and display engaging content, video ads are proven to be the best way to do that. These formats help to increase user retention metrics, high user engagement rate and on average deliver 5-20 times higher performance.

 

#4 Display your ads in a sustainable way

Make sure to display your ads in a way that they are integrated within your app flow and don’t influence the user experience in a negative way. It’s one of the most crucial points to follow, as intrusive ads that are not relevant to users can bring down the user experience.

 

#5 Using the right optimization levers

Choose a platform that provides extra options like prediction model, control waterfall model, bid floors to provide transparency and flexibility in optimizing performance. For example, Appmediation has an industry-leading optimization technology that chooses the most suitable ads for your audience while matching your inventory with the highest bidding network and thus maximizing your revenue. You save on resources while our technology takes care of the rest and without interrupting the user experience.

 

#6 Choose a platform that cares about their users 

The users are in the center of the mobile industry, which is why the users’ ad experience is one of the most important aspects. If you are able to deliver the best UX, it increases (1) your chance to retain users for a long time, (2) your ARPU (Average Revenue Per User) and gives you higher visibility in the app stores.

 

All in all, it is important to remember that when you’re monetizing your app then in addition to setting up your revenue goals, you also factor in the user experience and approach the strategy with having the app user in mind.

 

Any additional questions?

If you wish to inquire about the app monetization or have general questions about our platform, then please contact us.

If you’re in need of a monetization partner then we’d love to hear from you. We’re here to help you maximize your app revenue.

Register your app & start earning!