Grow your app installs with App Invites from Google
Posted by Ranjith Jayaram, Product
Manager
If you’re looking to drive usage and grow a mobile app, you’re probably testing out
referrals, recommendations, and the user onboarding experience. These product flows are
resource-intensive to design, build, and optimize. What if you could use a set of tools that
help your users share your app, and get more of the right people to download and use your app?
What if you could craft a more personalized onboarding experience in your new user’s journey?
Now in beta, App Invites let mobile app developers increase their reach, deep link
new users to custom experiences, and tap into your users’ device and Google-wide contacts as a
source to drive referrals. This is available for both iOS and Android app developers. We’re
launching with UrbanSitter, Yummly, The CW, Coinbase and Picsart apps.
Here’s what some of our early partners had to say:
- For Andrea Barrett, co-founder and VP of Product at UrbanSitter,
“App Invites gives our members the ability to easily share favorite sitters with their friends
and Google contacts. As a service targeting busy parents, our user growth thrives on social
recommendations and word-of-mouth referrals, so Google’s app invites are a natural fit for
us.”
- Sharing is an important part of TV network The
CW’s app growth strategy. “Tools that help fans of our shows recommend The CW app to
their contacts and friends are important. App Invites let’s specific users share their
favorite shows with selected friends; it's the next evolution of ‘word of mouth’. We’re
integrating App Invites into our episode sharing capabilities, so that fans can speak to each
other about the The CW app.” - Zach Mannon, Director of Digital Media at Warner Brothers
Television
- For PicsArt,
their fast growth to 250M installs has been driven by word-of-mouth. “Google’s new App Invites
will accelerate our organic growth even further, giving people the opportunity to proactively
invite their friends to join our mission of beautifying the world!" - Arusiak Kanetsyan,
Director of Content and Communication
- Yummly
integrated app invites to expand their user base and generate awareness of their app, by
allowing people to suggest the app to those who love to cook or are interested in food. “We
see this expanding beyond just inviting new users to join our app. In the future, we hope to
use this to share different meal ideas and have the opportunity to share your shopping list
with family members or even inviting friends over for dinner. With the power of Google and
personalized app invites, making a dinner everyone agrees on will never been easier." -- Brian
Witlin, Chief Operating Officer
App Invites is available on both Android and iOS. Here’s what’s in the beta toolkit:
- Use app invites for expanded reach: Tap into SMS and
email invites via your user’s phone and Google contacts.
- Make it easy for your users to send invites. We’ll recommend
their closest contacts to share your app with, and suggest a preferred method of delivery.
- Send actionable invite cards: Include an install button right in
an email invite.
- Faster Android install flows: Your new Android users can click
App Invite and download your app straight from the Play Store, bypassing the browser windows
that usually open in between.
- Create personalized onboarding flows: New users can get deep
linked into a specific onboarding experience - for example, you can offer custom discount
codes or content.
- Measure app invites using Google Analytics custom
reports.
With App Invites, our goal is to take the hard work out of building user referral and
onboarding flows and build a toolkit that works across platforms, so that you can focus on
your core app experience. Visit https://developers.google.com/app-invites/?utm_campaign=app-invites-529&utm_source=gdbc&utm_medium=blog
to get started To learn about opportunities to re-engage app users using goo.gl deep links,
check out this
post.
