[lecture] Fireside Chat with Mitch Lowe and 유영철

Title	Fireside Chat with Mitch Lowe, App Marketing
Place	D.Camp 5F Seminar Rm C
Time	April 10, 2014 4:30PM~9:30PM
Speaker	Mitch Lowe, 유영철
Organizer	Wisdome
Focus	multi-platform service, app marketing

I.       Mitch Lowe, CEO of Quarterly

1.       Message

1)      Netflix Info

①  Business: launched in 1998 as Kiball? (Netflix’s previous name) (c.f. Amazon 1994 launch)

②  Internal rule- if business doesn’t succeed, reiterate business model renewal every 90 days

③  Stat: grew up to 40 million customers, 7 million DVD via mail before he took off the company

2)      Redbox Info

①  Business: started small with 6 kiosks->40,000 kiosks in North America in 2012

②  Pattern: 40% of DVDs are returned via different kiosks than the ones they rented out from

3)      Advices for start-ups

①  Execution is the key for success

A       Build the right team: find someone with whom you can be with long hours

B       Try zombie test to find the right partner: meaning when you get bitten by zombies, will he tell you about that fact

C       Keeping the momentum going: improve and do something about your business to keep investors and customers continuously interested

4)      Regrets

①  Didn’t fire bad people early enough

②  Got lazy in raising money (c.f. US Congress raise money every 2 weeks)- one of the key reasons why raising money is to recruit best people

③  Didn’t hire enough smart people and didn’t overpay them

2.       Q&A

1)      What factors did you consider when launching a service in different platforms; which platform to introduce first?

①  Studied cancellation rate for each platform and asked what makes users quit and how often do they quit using them

2)      For CineMatch, can you make a comment on how do you find matching movies for individuals? -> Collaborative filtering <source: link>

①  Searches the CineMatch database for people who have rated the same movie - for example, "The Return of the Jedi"

②  Determines which of those people have also rated a second movie, such as "The Matrix"

③  Calculates the statistical likelihood that people who liked "Return of the Jedi" will also like "The Matrix"

④  Continues this process to establish a pattern of correlations between subscribers' ratings of many different films

3.       Takeaway

1)      Recommendation algorithm: CineMatch

2)      For start-ups, the importance of interviewing applicants with as many employees as possible and quickly firing people if they are not a good fit with the company

II.      유영철, CEO of GameBerry 

1.       Message

1)      App marketing strategy: utilize platforms (e.g. “카카오 게임하기” ranking, “카카오 친구초청하기”), tracking rules (e.g. CPK: 카카오 연동)

2)      General strategy

①  Game app- usually peak downloads go one month and can last up to three months

②  Non-game app (e.g. utility apps)- try discount pricing

3)      Success case: Polaris (e.g. US- Facebook; JN- Twitter; KR- blogs)

①  Tried price discount

②  Paid attention to competitive apps and put marketing money when the number of those apps is going down

2.       Takeaway

1)      For mobile app marketing, trends in Korea are moving to non-incentive ad network such as AdMob or Inmobi

2)      For non-game app marketing, put budget on mobile ad platforms such as Facebook

3)      For Google Play marketing, put money incrementally such as 1 million KRW-> 5-> 10 instead of the other way around

4)      Shoot to be featured in each app marketplace to increase your revenue

5)      Take advantage of competitors’ app ranking trends (e.g. perhaps with App Annie): meaning put money in when they are going down

6)      Facebook ads provides 10~20% conversion rate on average (c.f. 1~3% on AdMob)

7)      When advertising, always put analytics and tracking tools together

8)      For CPI marketing, run a test such as 1,000 downloads first?