Yousician reaches to aspiring musicians worldwide with help from Google
How YouTube and Trueview helped Yousician to export the joy of music to global audience
case study
Video advertising
Approach
- Used YouTube to target advertising globally to English speakers using TrueView App Promotion campaigns
- Worked with Google to find best targeting methods
- Improved ad targeting with frequent testing and measurement
Goals
- Reach a global audience of English speakers interested in playing an instrument
- Use video to explain Yousician, increase brand awareness, and drive installs
- Expand Yousician’s international user base
Results
- Acquired customers in more than 50 countries with the help of YouTube advertising
- Successfully scaled campaigns to global audience
- Saw 136% more installs of app in six months with just 55% more investment
- Achieved 40 million downloads in two years
Finnish company Yousician’s goal is to find people around the world who want to play a musical instrument, and motivate them to keep practising through its innovative music education platform and mobile apps. Yousician makes learning a musical instrument wholly interactive experience via mobile and video. Therefore, the company uses YouTube and Google’s TrueView for App Promotion, gaining customers in more than 50 countries so far.
Yousician first launched its flagship product on Windows in 2014 followed by its mobile apps for Android and Apple. Working with Google on their mobile marketing strategy, Yousician reached more than 40 million downloads across both app stores in just two years, and increased installations globally by 136% in just the first six months.
TrueView for App Promotion campaigns have played a key role in achieving this success. “Our goal is to find people who are motivated to learn to play a musical instrument, and make sure they stay motivated to continue practising, and become better musicians,” says User Acquisition Manager, Miika Kenttämies. “App Promo campaigns are a great way for us to find these people when they’re most engaged – browsing their mobile devices.”
Yousician is best appreciated when seen in action, so the business makes extensive use of TrueView for App Promotion campaigns on YouTube. “Explaining how Yousician works in a static banner is far more difficult than in video,” explains Miika. “Video is a great way to explain what Yousician does in a matter of seconds, and YouTube is a great place to do that.”
With a free-to-play version of the app downloadable on both Android and iOS, Yousician’s key metric for measuring success is the uptake of its premium subscriptions. Ad targeting is improved by frequent testing and measurement of campaigns and the constant rotation of different creative versions of ads to test different mobile marketing messages.
Of course, the ads also need to be targeted to the right audience. With TrueView, Yousician can not only place their ads in the most relevant spots for their international English speaking audience in particular, but also ensure that these ads are only viewed by people who actually want to see them.
The campaign data YouTube provides has also played a key role in furthering Yousician’s international expansion, by validating their marketing tactics and improving the understanding of user behaviour. This has enabled the company to scale what is essentially a niche product to a global marketplace. “It’s crucial for an app developer to know who their audience is,” says Miika. “It isn’t just about putting an advertisement out there, it’s about putting it out to the right people.”
With 136% growth in app installs in the first six months against a cost increase of just 55%, Yousician’s approach certainly seems to be paying off. Currently, the company has customers in more than 50 countries worldwide. CEO Chris Thur is clear on YouTube’s role in Yousician’s growth: “YouTube performs very well for us. It provides an engaging experience for viewers, and has provided a great way for us to tell our story to people who are passionate about learning to play a musical instrument.”
“It’s crucial for an app developer to know who their audience is. It isn’t just about putting an advertisement out there, it’s about putting it to the right people.“ Miika Kenttämies, User Acquisition Manager, Yousician
