Going global with AdMob

One of the main challenges developers face on a daily basis is creating and acting on their internationalization strategy. Basically, how can you enter your successful app into new markets, be discovered by new users, and expand app audience across borders? Sometimes there can be challenges along the way to going global, but Google offers several tools, including AdMob, that can help you analyze and prepare a strategy to expand and succeed across the globe.

 

Step 1: Analyze and understand

The first step is to analyze your app in AdMob. Before knowing where to go with your app, you need to know more about the users you already have. To understand where in the world your users are located, add the Country dimension to your AdMob Network report or Mediation report. You’ll be able to see which regions are contributing to the selected metric.

To view data for a different metric, select it from the right side of your report table. Learn more. 

You will use the country dimension to identify two useful sets of information:

• Top countries: You can check the top countries where your app is already being used and use that information to reinforce your app’s standing in those locations. For example, if your app is popular in China but you haven’t localized it into Chinese, you could look into translating your app to gain even more users.
• Top new markets: You can identify your top potential new markets by understanding various factors such as eCPMs, potential app downloads, country population, internet penetration, etc. Always keep in mind whether your app would match the culture of the country as well.

Step 2: Localize

Now that you know where you want to go with your app, learn more about your potential markets. Knowing about the markets you want to move into—the languages they speak, their traditions and culture, and their app preferences—can point you in the right direction, as can learning more about top market insights. You will also need to get your app description and content localized. Various services are available for localizing and translating your app, such as Google Translate and the Google App Translation Service.

After translation comes experimentation with your Google Play Store listing. Your app store listing is where you exhibit your apps and is a chance to grab users’ attention. You can use Google Play A/B testing to try out different graphics and logos, texts, and descriptions to see which ones are more appealing in each country or market and drive more downloads.

Step 3: Promote and optimize

Once you’ve identified your new markets and your app’s localized, it’s time to start promoting your apps using Google Ads through AdMob. You have two different options for promoting your apps:

• Paid campaigns: Create paid ad campaigns to promote your apps in other developers' apps. You will be charged for paid campaigns, and you have the chance to choose the country and audience you want to target. It’s a great way to enter a new market. 
• House ad campaigns: If one of your apps is already successful in an international market, you can use house ad campaigns as a way of entering that market via that app. Create a house ad campaign to promote your apps using your own inventory for free. Plus, during AdMob mediation, you can traffic house ads alongside other ad sources.

Entering new countries and markets also means the opportunity to use different ad networks, different eCPMs, etc. When you go global, you can leverage the full potential of AdMob through the AdMob mediation country targeting settings. This is useful because some networks perform better in certain parts of the world. For example, you might get a higher eCPM when a particular ad network serves a request in Japan. Your app could benefit from setting a separate eCPM value for Japanese ad requests handled by this network.

Complete the following steps to set different eCPM values for different countries.

1. Click Mediation in the sidebar.
2. Select the mediation group you want to change. 
3. In the Location section, select one of the following:
   1. All countries and territories: Select this option to target all countries and territories.
   2. Include countries and territories: Search for the countries and territories you’d like this mediation group to target. 
   3. Exclude countries and territories: Select this option to exclude countries and territories.

 

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