Unlocking the success of alternative app stores

• The Amazon App Store and the Samsung Galaxy Store each offers great potential to marketers willing to port their apps
• There is significantly less competition on almost all alternative app stores than on the big two app stores

As the walled gardens of the App Store and Google Play crack under regulatory pressure and legal battles, more developers are looking outside of these platforms for new opportunities.

We’ve already seen others exploring the space of alternative app stores, with the Epic Game store recently dropping on mobile, and Xbox also has its own mobile store incoming.

In this guest post, Mintegral’s GM of Americas Jeff Sue explores how third-party app stores such as Amazon App Store and Samsung Galaxy Store offer developers new monetisation opportunities and why developers should be encouraged to explore these platforms.

As app developers deal with intense competition and frequently changing platform guidelines, it is becoming important to find new pathways to market and monetise your app to stay afloat. 

The recent Digital Markets Act has also potentially ushered in a unique period for developers who can begin looking for users in diverse markets on other platforms.

This is because, under the DMA, “developers distributing their apps via Apple's App Store - and Google’s Play Store - should be able, free of charge, to inform their customers of alternative cheaper purchasing possibilities, steer them to those offers and allow them to make purchases.” This is where alternative app stores come in.

Among the alternative app stores available to developers, two stand out: The Amazon App Store and the Samsung Galaxy Store. Both platforms are widespread and native to devices owned by millions around the globe. Each offers great potential to marketers willing to port their apps to these stores.

Porting itself can be a challenge that has made developers wary of jumping in. There are further fears for marketing teams trying to increase downloads due to the lack of an evolved user acquisition and ad monetisation ecosystem.

However, that has all changed in recent years, with multiple marketing platforms now enabling in-app advertising for apps on the platform. With that in mind, here are three further benefits of alternative app stores that developers should know about.

High-quality users

Both Amazon and Samsung devices can boast of having high-quality users buying their devices.

An analysis of Amazon App Store's user base indicates a significant presence of middle-aged female users and millennials who are enthusiastic about casual games, mostly based in the US, Europe, and Japan.

This user group is willing to engage with ads for in-game rewards and exhibits excellent performance in different retention metrics. Nearly 64% of users on the Amazon Appstore engage in in-app purchases – significantly higher than Google Play's 36.5%. 

The Galaxy Store is popular in markets like the US, Canada, Europe, and South Korea. According to Counterpoint's latest Q1 2024 data, Samsung's market share has grown to 31% in the US and 75% in Korea.

Vast scale

The Amazon Appstore has a user base spanning over 200 countries and regions. For Samsung, the Galaxy Store has a large user base with hundreds of millions of active users in over 180 countries. Further, according to data from Statista, Amazon Fire Tablet has one of the top three market shares in developed countries like the US.

Less competition

There is significantly less competition on almost all alternative app stores than on the big two app stores. For example, as of Q3, 2022, Statista reported that just over 483,000 apps were in the Amazon App Store, compared to 1.64 million in the Apple App Store and 3.55 million on Google Play.

The Galaxy Store is also dedicated to creating a developer-friendly environment, especially for indie game creators. Their platform features a dedicated section called "Newbie Game" to help newly released titles gain more visibility and traffic.

Running successful campaigns on alternative app stores

Since becoming an advertising SDK for Amazon Fire tablet apps and Samsung apps, Mintegral has run several campaigns for high-profile developers such as SayGames and Boombit. In doing so, we have learned some best practices that work broadly across third-party app stores.

Target Tier One markets: In our experience, user acquisition and app monetisation campaigns aimed at regions such as the US, UK, Canada, Germany, and Japan yield the best results. For developers dabbling in marketing, starting your campaign by focusing on these markets can lead to higher ROI and better outcomes.

Know your genre: Considering the dominant user demographics of females and millennials, casual, solitaire, and puzzle genres tend to perform exceptionally well. These genres resonate with the user base and drive stronger engagement than other app stores, and should be the first to try these stores out.

Combine ROAS and CPI campaigns: For marketing teams, it’s important to know that while Target ROAS campaigns acquire users that the algorithm predicts as valuable, CPI campaigns can reach different ad sources on top. From here, optimisation can be done to feed the algorithm with users you want to target, thereby increasing the reach.

Get this third-party started

Both the Amazon App Store and Samsung Galaxy Store present a great opportunity for developers to introduce their apps to a new audience. Though porting might seem difficult at first, the ease of doing so has only improved over time. Further, the audiences on these platforms could unlock great growth.

If you’ve not looked at it before or in the past couple of years, now is the time to investigate.

                                                                   Edited by Paige Cook