We continue to work with top managers and experts from the gaming industry (and related fields) to summarize the results of 2024. Up next is an interview with Daniil Vostorgov, Product Owner at AppMetrica.
How did the year turn out for the service? What achievements would you like to highlight?
For AppMetrica, 2024 was eventful and productive. By the end of it, we have over 11,000 companies from the gaming industry, e-commerce, finance, telecom, and other sectors working with us in more than 50 countries worldwide. The number of applications using AppMetrica exceeded 60,000 this year. Additionally, in 2024, we crossed an impressive milestone, tracking over 100 million app installations daily, which is a 70% increase compared to 2023.
Among the most significant product updates this year are, firstly, the improved integration with Yandex's advertising services. Now, partners of RSYA and Adfox can quickly access AppMetrica's analytics and comprehensively evaluate the impact of advertising on key app metrics and revenue. Secondly, integration with third-party tracking systems. This allows us to provide clients with the opportunity to import attribution data from other SDKs (like AppsFlyer, Adjust, Kochava, Tenjin, Airbridge, and Singular) and consolidate it in AppMetrica. This is especially important for companies working across different markets or transitioning from one analytics system to another. This way, they can have a complete picture of their product and marketing strategies' effectiveness.
Such integrations are one of our key areas of development because clients have a demand for creating a single window to analyze data from different analytics systems. And we are making it happen.
How has the analytics market changed over the year?
The market has become more demanding for data accuracy. Acquiring traffic has become more challenging, and attracting new users more expensive. Many app developers have begun to focus on working with their current audience, aiming to increase loyalty and engagement, as this directly affects the effectiveness of their marketing campaigns and products. Now, it is especially crucial for businesses to understand user behavior, so their expectations of analytics tools are growing.
The role of proactive analytics is increasing. Previously, teams would analyze data themselves, searching for problems and anomalies. Now, they expect signals about significant metric changes from the analytics system. For example, information about indicators like revenue drop or user churn. That is why this year we launched a new tool called "Insights." With it, one can monitor the dynamics of key app metrics (Time Spent, Sticky Factor, ARPPU, ARPWAU, etc.) and receive notifications about changes directly in the interface.
Moreover, the interest in machine learning and artificial intelligence tools is growing. Companies are looking for ways to automate data analysis and obtain predictive models for forecasting user behavior. For instance, AppMetrica is already implementing LTV predictions. They help identify users with potentially the highest long-term value, optimize advertising for them, and ultimately maximize the return on investment in promotion. There are also churn predictions, which:
- help identify users who are likely to leave the app;
- try to retain them, for example, by sending push notifications directly from AppMetrica.
Overall, analytics systems are expected to be more user-friendly and transparent, and we strive to respond to these trends.
Has the practice of working with gaming companies changed? How and in what way?
We've long paid significant attention to the specific needs of mobile game developers. We have the ability to segment the audience by various parameters: country, app version, use of specific game mechanics, achieving certain levels, etc., to more accurately classify users and improve the gaming experience.
This year, we've focused on making AppMetrica the central platform for monetization analytics of gaming applications and providing developers with a complete range of proprietary and market solutions in one window through integrations with industry-specific services. Therefore, our first step was to expand the capabilities of advertising revenue analytics. We simplified the process of transferring ad revenue data from AppMetrica to advertising platforms (Yandex Direct, IronSource, or Applovin), added new metrics and groupings, and made reports more understandable and convenient. For instance, developers can now analyze user behavior through profile attributes—name, gender, age, accumulated points in the game, or gaming experience. The new "grouping by installation sources" feature helps identify which channels bring the most paying and engaged players. This is especially relevant for apps with ad monetization.
Plus, we are currently preparing for integration with AppHud—a service that helps track in-app purchases and subscriptions. It is well-known in the gaming industry and actively used by developers for monetization management. With it, AppMetrica will be able to combine data on purchases, subscriptions, and advertising monetization, analyze them comprehensively, and find the optimal balance.
What strengthening or emergence of trends in gaming analytics do you expect in 2025?
A trend will be precisely the search for a balance between ad revenue and in-game purchases. It's already gaining momentum. Previously, complex games earned from in-game purchases, while simpler ones combined them with advertising. But now these patterns are blurring. Studios are experimenting with different monetization ratios within different games: from equal proportions between advertising and purchases to a clear dominance of one method. For example, according to our data, just in the past year, hyper-casual and hybrid-casual games, which previously earned mostly from advertising, have increased their IAP share from 10% to 30%, and in some cases up to 35-40%.
In other words, game app owners strive to find the model that will allow them to maximize revenue without compromising the user experience. This requires a deeper analysis of user behavior and their reactions to different monetization forms, as excessive advertising could lead to user churn just as excessive in-game purchases could. Their lack, on the other hand, leads to a decrease in potential profits. Therefore, it's a very significant and intriguing question—where is the golden mean? Analytical tools will play a crucial role in solving this, allowing monitoring of various strategies' impact on audience retention and engagement.
What are the company's plans for the coming year?
We plan to continue developing the platform towards comprehensive analytics and combined monetization. A particular focus will be on automatic insights and proactive analytics, so that our clients can quickly respond to key metric changes and receive recommendations for optimizing them in real time. And, of course, we will work on simplifying the interface and improving ease of use, so both large companies and small teams can effectively utilize our tools.