We’re back this week with more advertising insights. This week we’re sharing updates of Twitter’s performance on mobile, the benefits of using social media advertising in the auto industry, and why you should pay attention to post-install engagement activities in evaluating ROI.

The growth of social media and mobile device usage means consumers now have the ability to find what they want, when they want it. This gives brands from all industries the opportunity to reach out and attract consumers, before a consumer makes a purchase. According to Crowdtap, automotive brands can benefit from the newly connected customer. In fact, they would almost be at a disadvantage if they don’t provide information and support to their customers via social media. 87% of consumers research potential car purchases on social media before buying (Crowdtap). In addition, 67% of car buyers purchased a car they found on social media. 

There are many benefits of pursuing social advertising for brands in the automotive industry. LinkedIn is a wonderful platform to provide information to high net worth individuals with the financial means to buy new cars. In a recent study by Business Intelligence, we see that LinkedIn has a higher percentage of users with a college degree (38%) and more US adults as users than other popular platforms. Twitter is the best place to advertise to consumers based on if they are talking about buying a car or having an interest in certain brands. Finally, Facebook is by far the largest social platform, with over 1.4 billion users as of March 2015, and is the first place consumers go to talk with friends and family about auto brands they like or experiences with auto brands they’ve had. Advertising on social platforms helps you increase brand awareness and purchase intent for auto sales.

One way that both auto brands and other industries use advertising is driving app installs. Liftoff released its Q1 2015 Liftoff Mobile App Engagement Index that shows a new approach advertisers should take in evaluating metrics for their mobile app campaigns. Traditionally, advertisers measure mobile engagement success based on cost per install (CPI), but don’t focus on what happens after the install. Marketers should look past CPI to evaluate post-install engagement activities that produce real business value, including making a purchase or reservation, registering, or sharing content using Mobile Measurement Partners (MMPs). These are user actions that turn into real business results. In this report, you can see post-install event costs and install-to-action conversions based on app category. For example, in the travel industry, Liftoff found that it costs $6.00 to install, but $14.39 to register and $42.19 to make a reservation. Social.com is a proud to work with MMPs like adjust, Apsalar, and Kochava and encourages advertisers to look at downstream revenue within apps.

Twitter recently reported growing its active user count grew 18% (reaching 302 million monthly active users (MAUs)) from Q4 of 2014 to Q1 of 2015, according to a report by Statista. Where are the majority of these users using the platform? The answer is simple: On mobile devices. 80% of Twitter’s users access the platform via a mobile device. If you frequent our advertising insights blog posts, this probably isn’t a surprise given the many statistics show mobile dominates today’s digital landscape. Twitter’s continuous growth in mobile users shows an opportunity for advertisers who want to reach consumers who engage with content and topics that interests them in real time. Advertisers should consider how to feature their ads where their customers are spending most of their time, and that’s on mobile devices.

To learn more about social advertising and how social.com helps customers find success, click here to download our SGN case study.