The App Audience

Tracking and analyzing audience metrics for iPhone and smartphone apps is still in the learning and development phase.

By Chandra Johnson-Greene
Monday, November 9, 2009

Magazines are becoming increasingly adept at producing and releasing iPhone and other smartphone apps, which can broaden and strengthen their relationship with their readers. The next link in the chain, aside from monetizing the app, is tracking and analyzing audience metrics—but this may be easier said than done. For one thing, access to metrics is limited.

Rodale is one of the publishers leading the pack when it comes to creating a presence on the iPhone. Men’s Health and Prevention both have three iPhone apps while Runner’s World and Women’s Health each have one. More apps, both free and paid, are currently in development.

Although the company declined to offer specific performance figures, Women’s Health’s “Workouts” app has appeared in the top 10 in the health and fitness channel on the iPhone app store. Over 60,000 downloads have been recorded for Men’s Health’s “Workouts” app and the Runner’s World “Shoe Shop” app has received “tens of thousands” of downloads, according to Sean Nolan, VP, online operations and external online marketing, Rodale.

Nolan says the numbers “speak to the power of branding” in apps, but because Apple doesn’t share any specific information with publishers about the people that are downloading these apps, such as names and email addresses, it’s hard to analyze and market specifically to them. “[Magazine publishers] are used to detailed, granular analytics,” he told AD. “We know a lot about our audience, what they’re engaged in and what they’re not engaged in. It’s totally different when it comes to mobile apps because we don’t know.”

Nolan says that’s okay, however, because publishers don’t have any specific information on the people that buy their titles on the newsstand either. The goal is to work with the information that they do have, which is how many people have looked at and downloaded the app on a weekly basis. “The question we have to ask ourselves is what are we going to build into the app that communicates what’s being reported?’”

Another concern when attempting to track audiences on smartphone apps is the fact that some of them are made to work offline as well as online. “This is especially true with the iTouch, which is experiencing a lot of growth,” Nolan says. “With the iTouch you’re not always connected, so we’re not going to get any reporting on those sessions.”

That doesn’t mean all is lost. Runner’s World’s Nike-sponsored shoe store app is a prime example. Because it’s connected to an online tool, developers are able to track what shoes users were looking at. “They had to engage with some level of connectivity, so we were able to get some data,” Nolan says. “What we saw is that people liked the app and used it often. That validated our approach to the development of the app.”

The bottom line, Nolan says, is that magazine publishers are still figuring it all out. “There are so many tension points,” he says. “Plus, there’s not a clear, third-party tool set like the Web has in companies like Omniture. Right now, it’s just about being in the game and having apps out there in order to establish best practices.”