How SoundCloud decreased CPI by 39% with custom product pages

Challenge

The SoundCloud team was looking for new ways to lower their cost-per-install (CPI) and increase conversion rates to improve the efficiency of their ongoing Apple Search Ads campaigns.

The team at SoundCloud was aware that in order to solve challenges to their paid marketing efforts and maximize Apple Search Ads’ impact they needed to play on the existing synergies between ASO and Apple Search Ads.

Soundcloud turned to AppTweak to identify any “low hanging fruits” opportunities that would help them score a first win and demonstrate the impact of custom product pages before scaling from there.

Solution

AppTweak identified that a good way to start testing custom product pages is in competitor campaigns. Leveraging custom product pages in competitor campaigns helps you capitalize on high-intent users by emphasizing your app’s differentiators exactly when they’re considering their options.

1. Mining SoundCloud’s customer reviews to identify opportunities 

To start, AppTweak’s App Growth Consultants mined SoundCloud’s customer reviews and carried out a sentiment analysis.

By digging into customers’ reviews, AppTweak’s team identified that users were particularly enjoying the possibility of having unlimited skips, as well as the presence of fewer ads compared to key competitors in the app stores.

These reviews proved that SoundCloud had a major competitive advantage, which could be used to power its competitor campaigns for success. 

2. Optimizing creatives to increase conversion rates 

Upon identifying this competitive advantage from users’ reviews, the AppTweak team designed a new set of app store screenshots that clearly highlighted the benefits of SoundCloud’s more generous free-tier service.

AppTweak’s designers reflected on how to visually capture the action of skipping from track to track while keeping the focus on SoundCloud’s large music catalog. The AppTweak team eventually opted to use a carousel view of playlist covers split across two screens and updated the captions to highlight the unlimited skips feature. Small adjustments were made to improve the readability of the captions in the assets.

3. Implementing custom product pages to increase relevancy 

This new creative was then leveraged to create custom product pages to be used in the Apple Search Ads campaigns targeting competitor brand names.

Results

SoundCloud achieved a 58% increase in conversion rate for their Apple Search Ads campaign, while also reducing their cost-per-install by 39%, leading to significant budget savings.