Google UAC as a Source of Traffic for Mobile Applications

Earlier, in order for an application to become popular among users, it was simply necessary to create a unique program that has no analogs and connects the client and service; today this is no longer enough. The number of applications in the app stores has reached unprecedented heights: 2.6 million in Google Play and almost 4.5 million in the Apple App Store (Statista).

The WakeApp team decided to help novice marketers, partners, and specialists in the mobile app promotion market to keep abreast of the latest trends in GEOS and traffic sources and promotion features in them. This time we would like to introduce our readers to an equally well-known traffic source and a tool that specializes in the promotion of mobile applications - Google UAC.

The Google Universal App Campaign (UAC) is a traffic source that specializes in promoting mobile apps on Google services, YouTube, Google Play, and Google Display Network partner sites.

Facts about Google UAC

• Google UAC was created in 2015.
• Promotion takes place on four platforms at once: YouTube, Google Play, in search, and through Google Display Network. UAC independently selects places for screenings at all venues.
• YouTube is one of the top traffic sources in Google UAC. Its audience is 2.9 billion active users per month and more than 100 million per day in 100+ countries around the world. Thanks to this, advertising on video hosting generates huge volumes of traffic of relevant users for the needs of brands.
• More than 50% of installations are made by users through advertising on UAC.
• The adaptive Google UAC promotion algorithm is unique and does not require the media buyer to be involved in the process. The system requires a minimum of settings.
• Google UAC demonstrates incredible audience reach due to the search engine registering about 50 million search queries daily and indexing more than 8 billion web pages. If we take into account the fact that advertising is broadcast on several sites at the same time, then the total audience of an advertising campaign can reach several billion users.

The peculiarity of launching an advertising campaign through Google UAC is the absence of its targeted settings.

How can a marketer use Google UAC?

Google UAC is suitable for promoting off-the-shelf apps of partner networks and direct advertisers. As a product of Google Corporation, UAC is directly related to the policy of the advertising network. Apps available for promotion must pass moderation without fail and be added to the Play Store and App Store.

Thus, applications of such market representatives as gambling, betting, dating, and other gray and illegal applications are not available for promotion in UAC.

The moderation algorithm checks all applications before uploading them to the market, so you need to make sure that the promoted content complies with the rules.

Advantages of Google UAC:

• Wide audience reach
• Low competition
• Loyal moderation system
• Easy advertising campaign setup
• Wide range of ad formats and promotional materials available
• Automatic optimization

It takes time to set up a machine algorithm for optimizing advertising campaigns. Google UAC lacks the ability to set up flexible targeting. Therefore, it takes some time for the program to identify the target audience for a specific application by testing creatives and headlines, which slows down the entire promotion process.

Disadvantages of Google UAC:

• Lack of flexible targeting settings
• Minimal influence of a media buyer on an advertising campaign
• Lack of reporting
• The success of an advertising campaign directly depends on the speed of the machine learning its optimization system
• The participation of the media buyer in the optimization of the advertising campaign is minimized

With the ever-increasing competition in the mobile app market and the inability to accurately define the target audience and fine-tune targeting when working with Google UAC, the primary task of the marketer is to find new ways to influence online market algorithms.

Features of setting up an advertising campaign in Google UAC

Unlike Google contextual advertising, ads in Google UAC are automatically generated after creatives and titles are loaded by the media buyer. The system independently selects the best design options and the format of the advertising offer, based on a preliminary analysis of user behavior. Thus, users see only those ads that the system has rated as the most profitable and effective with the highest conversion probability.

Individual automatic launch of advertising campaigns allows you to avoid premature blocking by the system. Each subsequent ad group is different from the previous one, provided that the basic targeting settings are maintained.

Those who have not worked with Google UAC before will have to get used to the instability of traffic in this source. Experienced media buyers advise dividing large advertising campaigns into many small ones with dozens or hundreds of ads and a minimal advertising budget. This allows the UAC algorithm to hold qualities

The effectiveness of working with UAC largely depends on the quality of Google advertising account farming and the application itself. Accounts with high trust on the part of the system achieve a larger spend in a short time. The application trust level is generated automatically at the time of moderation and publication in the Store.

It is worth increasing the budget for the campaign gradually. A sharp increase to $10,000 can lead to account blocking due to suspicious activity.

UAC offers several creative design options:

• Text
• Video
• Image

According to statistics, video creatives convert better than others, which is why the Google platform itself recommends this format for promotion.

General advertising campaign settings in Google UAC:

• Target action
• Platform: Android or iOS
• Budget and rate
• Language
• Advertising campaign hours
• Header
• Image

Google UAC programmatic training allows you to increase the relevancy of your ads. The system will independently select titles, images, videos, and HTML5 from the list of downloaded ones.

If you do not specify any, the algorithm will collect them from the data found in the Play Store. The Google UAC ad generation algorithm works similarly to Google's responsive search ads. The only difference is the sites where the ads are published. Google Ads UAC ads are displayed not only in search results but also in Google Play, YouTube, and Google Display Network.

In order for the promoted application to be noticed, it needs to be fixed in the search results and tops of thematic collections. Despite the paucity of Google UAC settings, it is more than realistic to succeed in promoting applications with its help.  

How does Google UAC work in WakeApp?

Google UAC is one of the 30+ sources our media buyers use to promote their WakeApp apps.

For more than 8 years at WakeApp, we have been using this traffic source for the convenience of our clients, whose goal is to attract a young and, at the same time, solvent audience.

Google UAC is an effective tool for promoting brands with a small budget. The cost of a click in Google UAC is the average for the market.

About the rubric:

Every month, WakeApp will issue instructions for promotions in a particular source and GEO traffic, talking about the features of promotion, and sharing limitations and life hacks. Think of it as a mobile marketer's desktop guide.

About us:

WakeApp is an international mobile marketing agency, with over 8 years of experience in the market. It is a leader in the development and promotion of gaming and non-gaming mobile applications in e-com, video streaming, food delivery, sport, utilities, and finance verticals. Earlier in 2022, WakeApp received The Media Agency of the Year at Sigma Asia Awards, in 2021 the agency placed in 5 categories of the 13th edition of the AppsFlyer Performance Index XIII.

By Aman Gaur

Aman Gaur is a Senior Writer at MobileAppDaily (MAD). He is an IT engineer (as per academics) who turned to writing because of his flair for storytelling. He has an experience of 6+ years and has worked with multiple companies in many niches but primarily ‘Tech’. He has many interests that range from being a tech enthusiast to an admirer of international music and cinema. Currently, he is using his skills to help MAD expand and create valuable content for the platform, thereby, helping in improving overall traffic, leads, and branding of the company.