Advertising Technology Blog

E-commerce app installs fell 14% but sessions rose 2% in 2025, showing a shift toward engagement. The new Adjust report highlights AI, personalization, and web-to-app flows as key growth drivers, with LATAM and APAC leading install growth.

AI assistants are becoming integral to daily routines, with ChatGPT users averaging 13 monthly sessions, rivaling platforms like X and Reddit. While Google remains dominant for information seeking (18 days/month), ChatGPT's use cases are diversifying, with lifestyle and entertainment prompts rising from 22% to 35% of total in one year. Work and education still account for 60% of prompts, but growth in niche categories signals expanding consumer comfort. For ad ops, this indicates opportunities for targeted campaigns across varied use cases and the importance of integrating AI into digital strategies.

The article argues that mobile apps are crucial for business growth, with 96% of consumers owning smartphones and mobile commerce accounting for nearly 70% of retail e-commerce. It highlights strategies like intuitive UX, AR features, loyalty programs, and app-exclusive discounts to boost retention and acquisition. Brands like Starbucks, McDonald's, and Nike successfully leverage apps for customer engagement and first-party data collection. Mobile ad spend in the US is expected to reach $228 billion in 2025, emphasizing the need for app-centric marketing. Retail media networks also offer new revenue streams through targeted advertising.

AI is revolutionizing advertising by automating creative production, enabling real-time personalization, and optimizing bidding and targeting. AI-driven tools allow rapid generation of diverse ad variations and efficient cross-channel delivery. Predictive bidding models analyze data to allocate budgets dynamically, maximizing ROI. Ethical considerations like data privacy and algorithmic transparency are crucial. Advertisers can leverage platforms like Mintegral for AI-powered creative studios and tools like Playturbo for rapid iteration and testing.

Liftoff's PEPr program accelerates ad performance by rapidly testing and scaling high-impact ideas from frontline teams. Key wins include Hourly Pacing for a sports-betting app, achieving 3x higher CTR, 5x better ITI, and 30%+ CPA improvement, now adopted across verticals. A High Value User experiment showed potential to double budgets while maintaining KPIs. PEPr bridges operational insights and product development, delivering measurable lifts in CPI, ROAS, and conversion rates for customers.

Hero Wars demonstrates how mature mobile games can sustain growth through strategic live event expansion, including monetization-focused events, Battle Pass evolution, and IP collaborations. Key innovations like the Lara Croft crossover, Legends Draft PvP mode, Tournament of Titan Power, and Seer's Game drove player engagement and revenue. Tower 2.0 revamp improved core experience. For ad ops, these tactics highlight the importance of diverse event calendars, premium currency sinks, and targeted bundles to maximize LTV and DAU.

Brazil's on-demand app market offers significant growth opportunities, with non-gaming app installs up 9% YoY and food delivery market reaching $37.9B. Advertisers can leverage simple, localized creatives for user acquisition and retargeting strategies to boost LTV. Mintegral provides full-funnel solutions for scaling in this high-growth region.

Moloco's In-App Bidding SDK achieved Google AdMob and Ad Manager certification, expanding its reach to four major platforms. With ~500 publisher integrations, including Voodoo and CrazyMaple, the SDK showed key improvements: bid error rates dropped from ~40% to under 1% on iOS, rewarded video skip-timer boosted ROAS by 8%, and smarter caching increased share of voice by up to 10%. The fully self-serve platform offers direct access to ~$2B in advertiser demand, enabling publishers to maximize revenue without intermediary fees.

Rewarded play apps boost engagement and retention through features like streaks, leaderboards, and social feeds, while monetizing via subscriptions and microtransactions. These strategies create habit-forming experiences that drive user loyalty and revenue, offering ad ops leaders a model for integrating rewards with user motivation and community building.

Mobile marketing automation is critical for scaling ROAS by enabling real-time, data-driven campaign optimization. Key strategies include setting automation rules for bid/budget adjustments based on performance thresholds, implementing anomaly detection to prevent wasted spend, and using smart alerts for timely budget reallocation. A case study from Melsoft Games shows that automation allowed testing hundreds more creatives without extra time or cost. For ad ops leaders, the takeaway is that automation reduces manual bottlenecks, improves reaction speed, and directly boosts ROAS when integrated with attribution and analytics tools.

Mobile game downloads hit a 5-year low, but casual games see high revenue potential on iOS with 47% D30 ROAS vs. 15% on Android. Hypercasual and puzzle games drive half of installs. Audio ads, temporary ad removal, and customizable IAPs are emerging monetization trends. Ad ops should prioritize iOS for ROAS, leverage non-gaming app inventory, and consider hybrid puzzle genres for broad reach.

Top horse games on iOS in Q2 2025 showed varied trends. Rival Stars had steady revenue, Star Stable peaked in downloads, while Horse Riding Tales saw revenue growth but slight user decline.

AI is now mainstream, with ChatGPT reaching 1B downloads and user prompts expanding beyond work into lifestyle categories like Health & Wellness. Apps across verticals (Health, Finance, Education) must integrate niche AI features or risk replacement. Competitors can leverage AI ad spend trends and App Store optimization to capture casual audiences.

Global in-app revenue from short drama apps reached ~$700M in Q1 2025, nearly 4x YoY. ReelShort and DramaBox lead, but newcomers like DramaWave surged via localised ads and TikTok. Latin America and Southeast Asia drove download growth. For ad ops, targeting emerging markets and leveraging video ads on social platforms are key.

Tinder, Badoo, and Kismia saw revenue growth in Ukraine's Q2 2025 dating app market. Badoo dominated in active users, while Kismia had highest download spikes. Bumble remained stable but smallest in metrics.

In Q2 2025, Turkey's iOS sports games saw top performers: Goal Battle peaked at $32K revenue and 143K downloads; eFootball earned $175K with 883K users; EA Sports FC hit $85K; Head Ball 2 had stable $15K; 8 Ball Pool averaged $10K revenue.

Mintegral launches IAP ROAS optimization for precise in-app purchase targeting. The feature supports D0 and D7 windows, AI-powered bidding, and hybrid goals. Results show improved user acquisition scale and ROAS. Setup requires data integration, realistic goals, and careful optimization during learning phases (5-7 days for D0, 15-20 for D7). Best practices include limiting ROAS target changes to twice weekly with ±10% adjustments.

Japan's app market shows strong growth in gaming (3% install rise, card and casino up 27% and 138%), finance (50% install increase), and entertainment (14% install surge). ATT opt-in rises to 21.4%, with gaming leading at 31%. The report emphasizes data-driven strategies for acquisition and engagement.

AppsFlyer's Model Context Protocol (MCP) lets marketers query real-time marketing data via natural language in LLMs like Claude or ChatGPT, bypassing dashboards and data teams. It converts prompts into API calls to access attribution, analytics, audiences, and more, enabling instant insights and AI-powered workflows. For ad ops, this means faster decision-making, reduced dependency on engineering, and scalable autonomous agents for campaign optimization, audience management, and link governance.

AI is revolutionizing programmatic ads in gaming by automating bidding and creative distribution, enabling data-driven budget allocation and improved efficiency. Machine learning requires a learning phase; starting small and scaling up optimizes spend. Success metrics vary per developer, focusing on installs, ROAS, or conversions. AI augments, not replaces, human oversight, allowing teams to focus on strategy. Mintegral offers high-quality traffic and open internet reach for effective programmatic campaigns.