10 Crucial Mobile Marketing Trends and Predictions for 2024

Myroslav Protsan

The marketing world is currently a raging storm, and keeping an eye on mobile marketing trends and predictions is almost a losing game. In the face of a global economic downturn, high ROI accountability, negative trends in consumer spending, and a tight marketing budget, one can quickly lose track of relevant trends and bend to the fear of missing out. 

But don’t fret — last year, all the marketing trends and predictions we mentioned came true. Now is the perfect time to dust off our crystal balls and start predicting important mobile app marketing trends for the next marketing year.

We've carefully separated valuable insights from industry noise and have data to back them up. Here, you’ll discover the dynamics and peculiarities of app user behavior as well as how to future-proof your marketing efforts for 2024 and beyond. Let’s get down to brass tacks!

What Was the App User’s Behavior This Year: Latest Mobile Marketing Stats

The best marketing advice of all time is to pay attention to user behavior with the keenness of a hawk. This answers the questions of how your users behave, what they like and dislike, their buying motivations, and how they interact with your mobile app. It’s unsurprising that top trending mobile marketing stats circle back to user behavior. Without further ado, we’re calling dibs on the following mobile app marketing trends that were on the rise in 2023 and will be even more relevant for the year 2024:

Trend #1: Prioritizing User Retention is a Must

Customer retention involving strategies to spark repeat purchases hasn't gone out of style. App marketing trends in 2023 foresaw soaring app customer acquisition costs and reduced marketing budget, which will spill over to 2024. Per Gartner’s CMO Spend and Strategy 2023 Survey, about 75% of marketers say they’ve been tasked with doing more with less.

Prioritizing user retention has been a strategy we at Reteno have been vocal about. Our senior marketer, Alex Danchenko, says, “2023 forced many marketers to face vanity metrics and grow-at-all-costs strategy while ignoring their onboarding and retention process. And the result? The end-user experience goes to ruins, churn rate hits an all-time high, and revenue hits rock bottom.” 

Bethan Vincent, managing partner at Open Velocity, adds, “Retention. Retention. Retention and activation. Acquiring users is getting harder due to rising CPCs/competition, so businesses have to be really clear on their retention strategy to make sure they don't have leaky bucket syndrome. Most ignore this until it's too late.”

Takeaway statistics: 

 Verdict

Top mobile marketing trends suggest that utilizing useful user retention strategies is a non-negotiable for 2024 app marketing.  

Trend #2: App Marketing Optimization Will be Even More Important

App marketing optimization, including app store optimization (ASO) and voice search optimization (VSO), will maintain a seat on the trends mobile marketing table. According to Statista data for 2023, about 70% of mobile users find new apps via search. In fact, a whoopping 65% of all app installs occur immediately after a search.

Statistics also reveal that there are over 3.5 million apps and nearly 2 million apps in Google Play Store and Apple Play Store, respectively, by the end of Q1 in 2023. This spells tougher playing grounds for achieving and holding high app rankings.

Trending Apps on Google Play Store

Also, with the increased use of voice assistants like Alexa and Siri, adopting upstream optimization strategies for voice search will give your app a competitive edge for the 2024 marketing year. 

Key Takeaways

  • Voice assistant usage is estimated to reach 8.4 billion by 2024.
  • Over one billion voice searches take place each month.
  • Voice search shopping is estimated to reach $40 billion by 2024.

Verdict

By optimizing mobile apps for natural language and long-tail keywords, mobile app businesses can reach more potential customers and rank higher in App Stores. Mobile apps ignoring ASO and VSO in 2024 are leaving their revenue in metaphorical handcuffs.

Trend #3: All Eyes on App Customer Journey

As we look to 2024, one of the most important mobile app trends to consider is optimizing your customer journey. App customer journeys can vary between apps and are often informed by the app’s category and monetization model. Picture this: a gaming app with 10 levels will have a different customer journey from a body fitness app that offers in-app workout sessions for purchase. 

A good customer journey centers on your target audience's pain points and needs. The “spray and pray” marketing strategy won’t win in the 2024 bullish app world. Instead of guessing what your audience wants, collect customer data and use analytics tools to reveal their desires and behaviors. By understanding your audience’s pain points, you can create a data-driven approach for delivering a great customer experience that resonates long after purchase. 

Spotify, with its exceptional app user journey, shows us that its marketers pay attention to trends in mobile marketing. Here’s a pictorial illustration.

Trend #4: Demographic Data is Going Obsolete

Ever heard of valuegraphics? It’s an upcoming marketing trend based on highlighting what customers are really passionate about and not just drawing conclusions from their demographic data alone.

“App marketing works by trade by barter where your product delivers value to consumers, and they reward you by making a purchase,” says Natalya Ustymenko, Head of Marketing (Reteno). “Value-psycho-demographic data answers all the relevant questions and helps app businesses to establish credibility and position their brands,” she adds. 

2024 will see more ecommerce and B2C businesses analyzing complex data that unravels the what, why, and how of user behavior tracking. 

Trend #5: Actionable Over Vanity-Based Key Performance Indicators

A vanity metric in ecommerce and B2C looks good but can be misleading or, at best, provides no insight. You shouldn’t be looking at such metrics as free trial users and the number of total users. In 2024, product-led marketers keeping an eye on actionable metrics that drive conversion will win.

Alex Danchenko, Co-founder at Reteno, says “Vanity metrics give you a myopic view of app performance, like from the outside looking in. It’s simple and lacks substance. For instance, a 500,000/mo app impression doesn’t mean anything if it’s not converting and getting you leads. Know what you’re getting into and make sure you have processes for measuring CTAs, ASO, marketing funnel, email sequences, and omnichannel campaigns.” 

Trend #6: Personalization is King

According to Google, 90% of marketing experts say personalization significantly increases business profitability. Customers don’t want to feel like a number or just another smart marketing move — they want to feel important. This is where personalization comes in as a mobile marketing future trend to prioritize.

AI-based product recommendation systems help to identify trends and patterns in user behavior and generate personalized recommendations for each user. Taking personalization seriously means providing a great consumer experience with ultra-relevant and relatable messaging.

Tnuck Personalized Product Recommendations

Trend #7: AI is Inevitable

Come 2024, AI solutions will continue to rise. One would argue that artificial intelligence has been around for years, but only after ChatGPT went wild and caused a stir AI can no longer be ignored. AI in marketing, such as mobile marketing automation tools, can streamline the onboarding to sales processes by using deep data to create highly personalized product recommendations. Its capabilities, as you can tell, are limitless.

Trend #8: Aligned App Marketing and Sales Teams Will Win

The silos between marketing and sales teams are a long-standing problem in the marketing world. Keeping a cohesive marketing and sales team is necessary for revenue generation in 2024.

Oleg Lesov, Chief Product Officer at Reteno, chimes in that “ having a misaligned sales and marketing team that functions in isolation puts the business at a disadvantage. A huge percentage of app marketing leads abandon their carts without converting due to failure to nurture consumer connections. If both teams were on the same page, there would be no room for marketing leaks, and efforts wouldn't go to waste.” 

Trend #9: Brand Storytelling Will Remain a Best Practice for Apps

Brand storytelling and positioning are some of the most important mobile marketing trends to implement for product-led growth in 2024. During our interview with Emina Demini-Watson, Head of Digital Marketing at Vixen Digital, she said that businesses have little marketing dollars to spend now more than ever, making the need for brand storytelling and product-led growth urgent. 

In her words, “PLG is a must, not a nice to have. Too many [marketers] still don't provide the UX needed and don't understand what it is or how to do it. User expectations have never been higher. They expect the same seamless experience they see in leading categories of products across all categories. Changes the way you should think about competition.”

This involves using stories, user-generated content, dynamic content, social proof, visual content, data-driven narratives, customer testimonials, and more to tell compelling stories about your brand. 

Lisa Apolinski, nicknamed US’ digital content futurist, says “Becoming an authority in your area of expertise is not a get-rich-quick scheme. Working on your authority takes a longer approach, like a slow burn, but once the digital embers light, that position will last a long time.”

Trend #10: More Brands Will Try Out Emerging Marketing Opportunities 

In 2024, more app brands will go where their customers hang out, like Netflix and in-app advertising. An Adweek survey reveals that TikTok prompted 36% of Gen Zs and 15% of all adults to buy products they learned about on the social platform. Even then, going haywire with the platforms can be hurtful. Personalization, geo-specific targeting, and a deep understanding of potential users are a must.

How to Prepare Your App for Mobile Marketing Trends in 2024?

Here are short tips on how to prepare your app for mobile marketing trends in 2024:

  1. Make a great first impression by optimizing the user onboarding process.
  2. Collect and deeply analyze user data for insights into customer behavior in a mobile app.
  3. Target users via omnichannel marketing campaigns like mobile push notifications, email marketing, in-app messages, SMS, and AI product recommendations.
  4. Make sure your app store optimization is next-level good. Pay attention to product user flow and the location of deep links. Also, follow ASO best practices to optimize your app for organic traffic.
  5. Trigger idle or new features to improve app user experience.
  6. Make shopping fun with gamifications, rewards, loyalty incentives, and referral programs.
  7. Use value-psycho-demographic data to determine what your target audience really cares about.
  8. Always go back to the drawing board to A/B test your retention strategy.
  9. Your App Store marketing ad should include long-tail keywords and keyphrases optimized for voice search. 
  10. Don’t be distracted by vanity metrics. 
  11. Play the long authority game with brand positioning and product-led growth.
  12. Identify gaps and opportunities using app competitor analysis tools.
  13. Don’t ignore social ecommerce opportunities like TikTok.
  14. Use good user retention platforms to reap mobile marketing best practices such as omnichannel marketing campaigns, AI-based product recommendations, user activity tracking, deep customer segmentation, etc.

To Sum Up

As we prepare for yet another marketing cycle, it’s important to future-proof your app with data-driven mobile marketing trends and predictions for 2024. All facts and data points indicate that prioritizing value and user experience is a must for app success. If your mobile marketing efforts still result in abandoned carts and poor revenue, it’s time to get your app to pass the vibe check with Reteno. Sign up today for an all-round mobile marketing trend implementation!

By the way, today we receive lots of requests regarding Iterable alternatives. To simplify your work, we've composed a simple table with the Reteno vs. Iterable comparison. We hope this will help you make the right decision;)

Myroslav Protsan

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May 25, 2023

Alex Danchenko

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May 1, 2023

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