Although Australians are less housebound this year, engagement with entertainment apps has continued to rise, according to the latest Australian Mobile App Report.
However, new app installs declined, registering just a 2% increase in 2022 from pre-pandemic levels in 2019 as consumers were still rolling out new apps.
The growth figure was 8% in 2020 when lockdowns began.
“We’re still seeing double-digit year-on-year growth in this area in Australia — and entertainment and shopping are the key battlegrounds,” said Bobbie Gersbach-Smith, Planning Director of APAC at M&C Saatchi Performance, which compiled the report’s App Monitors Branch and data.ai (formerly App Annie).
The daily time Australians spent on general apps in the second quarter of 2022 was over 4.9 hours, which is 30% of the waking hours they spend on mobile apps.
That was a 40% growth, which is on par with Singapore and outpacing growth in the US, Japan, UK and Germany.
The age group of 16 to 34 year olds was the highest with more than three hours a day. But the number was larger for entertainment, which the report ranks as the third largest category.
Gaming was most in demand, accounting for a third of app downloads in Australia (reflecting the global market), followed by tools.
After entertainment came shopping, photo & video, health & fitness, social affairs & finance.
Jesika Dalal, Branch’s Marketing Director for APAC and MEA, said of Entertainment’s faster engagement rate, “It’s growing month by month. Australians still have an appetite for video and audio app entertainment, although we’ve returned to normal.
“This is being driven significantly by the younger generation, the 18-34 year olds who are actually flocking to streaming platforms.”
Dalal pointed out that the average Australian time per day spent on mobile apps is 4.9 hours, “if you look at the entertainment perspective, Australians spend an average of 11 hours per month consuming live streaming, music and OTT apps.
“Streaming apps have a very engaged user base.
“However, the battlefield is shifting from bulk user acquisition to user retention.”
But retaining users of entertainment apps is a big challenge for mobile marketers.
The report showed that users tried many of the latest entertainment apps, but nearly 75 percent of installs were lost in the first three days.
This fell further to almost 82 percent within 30 days.
To offset this, it has been suggested that marketers increase their ROI (return on investment) during the critical first 3-7 days by focusing on good user experience.
It did this by personalizing user experiences and removing redundancies in user interactions, pinpointing touchpoints and creating connected, cohesive ways with deep-linking for users to interact with the app, regardless of channel, on which platform or what device they are on.
Another best practice was to make product interaction easy to build trust and likeability.
