Apptopia founder Jonathan Kay shows how app intelligence data can be used to identify key international markets and drive strategic growth. In this presentation, he focuses in on the APAC opportunity for mobile apps.

1. Jonathan Kay
Founder
Apptopia
Demystifying the APAC Opportunity
Using app intelligence data to drive strategic
international growth

2. Hi. My name is Jonathan.

3. Apptopia is the next generation mobile app intelligence platform. Our customers user these insights to understand
their competition, optimize their app’s performance, and efficiently grow mobile market share.
● Downloads
● In-App Purchase & Advertising Revenue
● Daily & Monthly Active Users
● # of Sessions & Avg. Session Length
● 30 Day Retention
● Cross App Usage
● SDK Intelligence
● Demographics
● Breakout Predictions
We empower the biggest companies in mobile to make data drive decisions:

4. Make APAC feel less scary
Work through strategies to
identify key international
opportunities

5. Most time spent
Most money spent
Top ad revenue apps
Top IAP revenue apps

6. 1. We Excluded
- China
- Australia
- New Zealand
- India
2. APAC Includes
- Japan
- Hong Kong
- South Korea
- Singapore
- Thailand
- Taiwan
- Vietnam
- Indonesia
- Philippines
- Malaysia
3. iOS & Google Play
- All data is based on a
combined store analysis
- No 3rd party android
stores were analyzed
Important Data Definitions

7. Why Is APAC Different?
- Lack of english characters
increases language barrier
- Large cultural & pop culture
differences.
- Focus on “groups” and word
of mouth
- Loyalty & retention

8. 57% of Top Apps in
APAC are created outside of
APAC

9. 68% of Top Grossing
Games in APAC are created
outside of APAC

10. The Enemy
An analysis of top
apps across markets
Fast Followers
Newly released
apps and what we
can learn from them
The Opportunity
A saturation analysis
by looking at supply
& demand trends
The Users
Who are your ideal
users? Where are
they? How do you
get them?
Our Agenda
Wait, what are we going to talk about for the next 30
minutes?

11. Understand
The Enemy
An analysis of the top apps

12. Strategy - Analyzing the Top
The “Top Charts” might seem standard, and obvious but if
you look at the data in aggregate, and across markets, there
are major indicators of:
● Consumer behavior
● Cultural trends
● Popular categories
● Successful game mechanics
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13. Are major successes like “Candy Crush”
successful everywhere?
Are the same game mechanics universally
interesting?
Is there a difference in key areas
of interest?

14. Where People Spend Their Money
Top Grossing Apps
Looking at the top 30 grossing apps for both
APAC and the United States, we found they had
8 in common.
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15. Where People Spend Their Money
Top Grossing Apps
Casino apps dominance of the top US
Grossing Games (making up nearly 25% of
them) does NOT translate to APAC, where
only 2 apps have reached the top 50
grossing Games.
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16. Where People Spend Their Money
Top Grossing Apps
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Role Playing games are dominating
the grossing charts in APAC making
up 10% of all grossing revenue, while
only 2.3% in the US!

17. Where People Spend Their Time
Top Free Apps

18. Where People Spend Their Time
Top Free Apps
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Need for alternative communication is key difference with
most downloaded apps in EU & APAC

19. Who Is Making The Most Advertising Revenue
Top Ad Publishers
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Racing key to ad revenue in APAC making up
over 22% of top 50 apps by ad revenue

20. Being a
Fast Follower
An analysis of the top performing newly released apps

21. Strategy - Top Newly Released Apps
Being a fast follower is essential in today's market. By analyzing newly released
apps over the last 30-60 days you can identify:
● Popular game mechanics
● Key pop culture trends
● Fast growing categories
30,000 New apps are released every month

22. What new trends are developing?
Where are people spending their time and
money?
Are the current trends consistent with
standard expectations or new?

23. Top Newly Released Apps
60%
USA Europe APAC
Games Dominates
65% 85%% of downloads
which are games
Top categories of
newly released apps
Arcade - 20%
Action - 16%
Arcade - 17%
Action - 15%
RPG - 25%
Adventure - 18%

24. ]
APAC users are looking for games with a
story, adventure, & significant investment.
US & Europe users looking for apps to
entertain them on commute to work.

25. ]
17%
of top downloaded apps in
APAC are Photo & Video

26. ]
0
of top 100 newly released apps
in APAC are Photo & Video

27. Opportunity
Analysis
A discussion on where we think the biggest opportunities lie

28. Strategy - Identifying Market Opportunities
Identifying opportunities is all about analyzing:
● Supply (current & upcoming players)
● Demand (i.e. overall volume of downloads & revenue)
● Last 30 day trends
● Avoiding giants with more money & resources
In today’s mobile app economy you can build a great app and still fail. In
order to give yourself the best chance of success you need to not only
build a great app, but the right kind of app at the right time.

29. What categories & types of apps have the
most growth potential?
Where is there a meaningful longtail?
How do I avoid competing with King,
Supercell, Zynga, etc?

30. Saturated APAC Markets (i.e. “stay away”)

31. APAC Markets With Opportunity

32. Biggest Gaming Opportunity
Apptopia Pick
RPG in Japan represents even bigger opportunity, as the top 10
RPG games make up only:
● 4.35% of IAP Revenue
● 10.2% of Downloads
APAC

33. Biggest Non-Gaming Opportunity
Apptopia Pick
Productivity is a great opportunity due to the massive long tail, and the fact that
these apps are well represented amongst the top charts in APAC...
● 14 of the top 100 most downloaded apps
● 5 of the top 100 apps with the most IAP revenue

34. Audience
Intelligence
Making sure you design the right app for the right audience

35. Culture Matters
Data can help you build the right app, but if you aren’t conscience
of key cultural differences you app will still fail. The small details
are the difference.
Non-data driven keys to success
Localization
Design
Launch Strategy
User Acquisition

36. Localize Your App
Spend the time to do it right
Localizing your app is not just about text
translation. You need to make sure buttons,
logins, and social functionality are culturally
friendly.
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QQ
WeChat
Weibo

37. Visuals & Sounds = Culture
Looks matter
While Western culture is attracted to food &
simple objects, Eastern culture is looking for
“Adventures of cute animals in fantasy worlds.”
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Western Culture
Eastern Culture

38. APAC Launch Strategy
Soft Launch Countries
Japan & South Korea have two of the highest ARPUs in the entire world. Hong
Kong & Singapore have representative, but forgiving markets to text & work
through necessary tweaks before launching full scale.
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Japan
Singapore
South KoreaHong Kong
Top APAC Countries
Singapore

39. How To Acquire Users
Word of mouth is key
Advertising can be very difficult (and expensive) in
APAC due to cultural differences. That is why these
other acquisition strategies are key:
-- Integrate social sharing & friends.
-- Give a lot to user early and build trust with retention
with user.
-- APAC users aren’t afraid to spend money, but asking
the too early could be a turn off.
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40. Thank you
Jon@apptopia.com
@JonathanCKay
http://apptopia.com