Author: John Koetsier

John Koetsier is a journalist and analyst. He's a senior contributor at Forbes and hosts our Growth Masterminds podcast as well as the TechFirst podcast. At Singular, he serves as VP, Insights.

Just use 1 ad network? 15 reasons why you still need an MMP

Do you need an MMP if you just use one ad network? There’s more than a few mobile marketers and new app publishers that think so.

At first glance, it’s pretty understandable: there’s limited confusion, there’s only 1 ad partner to integrate, there’s no need to de-dupe attributions between multiple partners, and there’s the simplicity of just dealing with 1 partner, 1 dashboard, and 1 system.

Naturally, if you have 5 ad partners, or use 10 ad networks, you need an MMP. And we’ve discovered that more ad partners are generally better: using more ad networks is highly correlated with lower CPI, higher ROI, and higher retention.

But do you need an MMP for just 1 or 2? Or 3?

In a word, yes. (And it can be entirely free, by the way.)

I chatted with Owen Farmer, who’s been publishing apps since the age of 14, about why. Hit play and keep scrolling …

You need an MMP for more data

Farmer is the founder of Word Power, a vocabulary app that he started as a teen. He kicked off marketing with just one ad channel: Apple Ads. But he soon learned that the data Apple provided wasn’t really enough:

“There’s some people in the industry who advise against using an MMP in the beginning, which to be honest, blows my mind,” he told me. 

“Apple Search Ads only tells you what happens up to the download, but it doesn’t tell you how many people install, how many people start a trial, or how many of those trials convert,” he added. “Having that data is essential. And if we’d been flying blind using just cost per download as our primary KPI, we’d be well underoptimized.”

A key thing you need is to see how different keywords perform in terms of user behavior after the click and after the install.

So Farmer uses Singular to measure all of his campaigns and sees far beyond the install event. And that’s exactly what most apps, even early ones, need.

But there’s more, much more

It’s pretty easy to kick off marketing with 1 partner, and then expand. Maybe you start with Meta or Google, but TikTok looks so tempting for a bit of influencer marketing juiciness.

With an MMP, adding partners is incredibly easy. And now you’ve got 1 place to look, not 2 or 3, and if there are conflicting claims, you can de-dupe them.

But there are plenty of reasons you still need an MMP even if you just use 1 ad partner:

  1. See more of the user journey
    As Farmer noted above, you need to see the whole user or customer journey, including what happens post-install. An MMP like Singular gives you that activity, that engagement data, any purchases, and more.
  2. Get holistic cohorts and LTV analysis
    When you get purchases and engagement data, you get cohort analytics that tell you which campaigns were profitable long term. Now you’ve got LTV and can make smarter marketing, bidding, budgeting, and optimization decisions.
  3. Measure organics
    Meta isn’t going to measure organics for you. But based on your vertical, organics can be a major source of installs and revenue. That’s SEO, that’s web, that’s AI recommendations on ChatGPT, that’s social, and more …
  4. Measure owned media
    Depending on your vertical, skills, size, and interests, you’re likely to have owned marketing channels including your website, social media, email and maybe even real-world or out-of-home options. With Singular you’ve got weblinks, deeplinks, QR codes, and much more, all with analytics hooked up to them.
  5. Better attribution with Unified Measurement
    As hard as it may be to believe, Meta regularly under-reports its own effectiveness. View-through and brand awareness that results in later activity account for most of that, while some probably is just due to the fact that no 1 measurement methodology is perfectly accurate. So Singular’s Unified Measurement that looks at many different datapoints including SKAN, store data, first-party data, and more, shows you a more accurate picture. (Importantly, Unified Measurement also shows you all the component datapoints that add up to its decision, giving you valuable insights from multiple perspectives.
  6. Fraud protection
    Yes, fraud exists. What used to be FAN (Facebook Audience Network) and is now MAN (Meta Audience Network and GDN (Google Display Network and AdMob bring in advertising on millions of publishers’ sites and apps, and guess what: not everyone is an angel. Singular’s fraud protection looks at 51 different parameters to judge the safety and reliability of reported clicks, installs, and conversions.
  7. AI-powered creative analytics
    It’s no secret that we just dropped Creative IQ, which gives you a creative-to-ROI visual gallery to instantly spot winners and losers. In the case of some fairly black box platforms that mix-and-match your creative elements on the fly, Singular also reports effectiveness data that you literally can’t see on the platform. Which means you get more data in Singular than in their dashboards … not to mention the data governance that helps you keep track of all your creative and campaigns easily.
  8. Deeper, more granular data access
    For some programs, like Meta’s AMM or Google’s ICM, you simply can’t get additional granular data any other way than via an MMP. Meta and Google rely on MMP’s like Singular to safeguard the data and ensure that it’s used safely and properly. This is huge, because now you have privacy-safe access to data that gives you 2020-like powers, similar to when IDFAs were easily accessible.
  9. Future-proofing for growth
    When building a startup, it’s a good idea to set up the foundations of future growth, as long as you can do so without over-indexing on things you don’t know for sure that you’ll need. Setting up an MMP — perhaps on the free tier — is a good way to future-proof for growth. As you grow, you won’t always just have 1 or 2 ad partners, and with Singular, it’s super-easy to add new partners with a few clicks.
  10. AI assistance
    Singular recently released MCP integration for major LLMs, and marketers are already asking Claude for deep insights on their marketing data. ChatGPT is around the corner. This is a super-simple conversational way to get all the data and insights you need to grow.
  11. Alerts & notifications
    Have you overspent on a campaign when you’ve put in guardrails against it? I have. When campaigns break parameters, Singular can provide alerts and notifications.
  12. Record of bids and budgets
    Singular captures and stores all campaign execution information such as historical bid changes, creatives trafficked, and more, establishing a system of record. When you want to know why something happened or changed in your marketing results, you have a place to look.
  13. Deep linking, smart links, and measurement
    You want a great user experience as people come into your app from multiple places. Firebase is shutting down its Dynamic Links solution next month, so you’re going to need a deeplinking solution. Singular’s is built in, and best in the industry. And yes … it even works for branded QR codes.
  14. Web banners
    Need smart banners for your website (mobile or desktop) that incorporate website-to-app measurement and work with your publishing solution? Done.
  15. Better reporting tools and interface
    Ever need to share reports? Manipulate or customize a dashboard? Do simple pivots with your data? Use custom dimensions that align with your KPIs that you know drive revenue? It’s all in your Singular MMP dashboard.

That’s 15 reasons why you need an MMP, even if you’re just starting out. And even if you have precisely $0 budget for it.

Custom KPIs can be super helpful

I know I buried it in #15 above, but custom KPIs unlock huge opportunities.

UA all-star Hannah Parvaz calls it your north star metric. It’s the 1 key thing that if you hit it, you know you’re going to get revenue, be cash-flow positive, and make money. It takes some time and deep understanding of your app and users and their journey to know, but once you know it, you can optimize all your marketing campaigns around it.

As she told me recently:

“This is a metric that represents both what the customer wants — they’re getting value, so they’re coming back — and it also represents what the business wants: they want that usage. So your North Star metric, it’s really important that you’re balancing both of these.”

For Farmer, as a bootstrapped founder without millions in VC funding, his north star metric is oriented around early profitability.

“Day 14 ROAS is our main success metric because we’re a seven-day free trial … as a leading indicator, we’re always looking at cost per trial.”

A key reason you need an MMP is because you can set up custom dimensions in your reporting to orient all your dashboards around that key thing, making it easier to know when you’re approaching it, meeting, and hopefully, eventually, exceeding it.

So much more in the full podcast

Yeah, you need an MMP. But you also need much more.

I think you’ll enjoy this episode which follows a solo founder (well, with some freelancer help) on his journey to significant success at a pretty young age.

Here’s a preview of what you’ll find:

  • 00:00 Do you really need an MMP?
  • 01:46 Owen’s Journey: From Timer App to Vocab Success
  • 04:59 Marketing Strategies: From Organic to Paid
  • 06:15 The Role of Meta Ads and Campaign Optimization
  • 08:22 Subscription Models and Monetization
  • 15:34 Balancing Product Development and Marketing
  • 20:51 The Importance of Focus and Product-Market Fit
  • 22:50 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

As usual, subscribe to our YouTube and/or add Growth Masterminds on any major podcasting platform.

Scaling mobile user acquisition strategy in 2025

For 99.9% of apps, mobile user acquisition is the foundation of app growth. Scaling mobile user acquisition is critical for all but the most viral of apps.

But in 2025, the rules are changing.

  • Yes, there’s privacy still
  • Yes, media costs continue to rise (the good news for app publishers who monetize via ads is that CPMs are going up too)
  • And yes, there’s challenges in making great creative and driving profitability

But cash isn’t (nearly) free anymore, and marketers can’t just spend their way to growth like it’s 2022.

To scale efficiently, you’ll need smarter mobile user acquisition strategies that include diversification, AI-powered everything (including you), first-party data, creative intelligence, and an acceptance (however reluctant) that the ecosystem is fragmented and will change dramatically every few months.

Key takeaways

  • Scaling UA in 2025 demands smarter strategies, not just bigger budgets.
  • AI, creative optimization, and diversified channels are your edge.
  • Better data is back—combine it to navigate the fragmented ecosystem.
  • Retention drives sustainable growth; acquisition alone won’t cut it.

Data and the state of mobile user acquisition in 2025

UA runs on data. Always has, always will.

Good data drives optimization and growth; bad data — or unavailable data — results in confusion, chaos, and ultimately stasis. You can’t invest if you don’t know what’s working.

That said, marketing measurement data is getting better, bigtime, in 2025. Which is a big statement, given that IDFAs are still rare thanks to ATT, and SKAN hasn’t really delivered on its promises.

The improvement is coming from other sources.

SKAN and Privacy Sandbox are still around, but we’re getting more and more data from ad networks big and small in 2025.

  • Google’s Integrated Conversion Management is bringing on-device data to bear in marketing measurement
  • On Meta, AMM is back, baby … Advanced Mobile Measurement offers much more granular data on acquisition, offering better ROAS modeling, cohort analysis, and creative optimization (plus Meta also offers Advanced AEM for more measurement richness)
  • TikTok has Advanced SAN
    Snap has its own version of Advanced SAN
  • And all the other non-SAN networks offer probabilistic measurement solutions that are good enough for attribution and optimization, and are working on modeling solutions too

Meanwhile, first-party data is still great. Zero-party data is useful. SKAN data can complete a picture. If Privacy Sandbox ever happens, it’ll fit in somewhere too.

With all of this extra data, it’s potentially a golden age of marketing measurement.

Scaling mobile user acquisition may not be as simple as it used to be, though.

Without IDFAs on iOS, post-truth marketing measurement is about triangulation and bread crumbs rather than rock-solid certainties derived from a single datapoint. But marketing measurement is FAR better now than in the first few years after iOS 14.5, and maybe — just maybe — better than ever.

And on Android, of course, we still have GAIDs, plus referrers.

Scaling mobile user acquisition in 2025

If all of that is true, maybe that’s 1 reason why mobile ad spend is on track to hit $362 billion globally this year, according to recent projections.

That sounds good, but all those billions of dollars drive trillions of ads, and that’s a lot of noise. Our already super-competitive market is now hyper-competitive.

So what’s your playbook for scaling mobile user acquisition in 2025?

  1. Adapt to post-truth marketing measurement
    One of the biggest adjustments for marketers in 2025 is adapting to the new measurement reality. When SKAN tells you 1 thing, Meta another, and your internal app data yet another, Singular’s Unified Measurement brings them all together.
  2. Enlist AI to scale YOU
    Money is scalable. Machines are scalable. Data is scalable. Your biggest challenge in 2025 is scaling you: your attention, your analysis, your knowledge, your abilities. And that takes AI. Start with Creative IQ from Singular for creative optimization. Add our ability to connect your data with LLMs to ask natural language questions of your data so you both see and understand more. And use all the other tools that make sense … your competitors certainly are.
  3. Diversify to lower CAC and boost ROI
    Often you need to KISS, keep it simple stupid. Sure. But scaling mobile user acquisition requires using an MMP to KISS many frogs, because scaling ad partners is key to boosting ROI, reducing CPI, and earning higher retention rates. We have the data; we can show you the receipts. We’re seeing almost a 3X jump in ROI from those using 5 or fewer ad networks to those using 6 or more.
  4. Understand and use incrementality
    I’m not talking big fancy studies. Nor am I talking about insane levels of analysis or special tools. But check if adding an ad partner is helping you to fish in OTHER streams, not just dropping yet another fishing pole in the same stream. There are simple ways to do so, as Jonathan Reich, the CEO of an app publisher with 750 million app installs, recently told me.

Of course, as you do all this scaling and work, don’t forget about the Pareto Principle: 80% of your results will still come from 20% of your efforts.

Of course … growth isn’t just about acquisition

UA costs are going up. I’m working on Singular’s next Quarterly Trends Report right now, and CPIs are up steeply in some cases.

That means mobile user acquisition strategy isn’t just about acquisition.

Don’t be so focused on UA you forget about UX, value, engagement, and ongoing product development to boost retention.

Retention is as important if not more important than acquisition.

Don’t underestimate its critical importance. When you keep a high percentage of your existing users, you spend less time and energy fighting to fill a leaky bucket at the top. High retention means you can be profitable, even at a high CAC. Of course this is an ongoing strategy, not a quick fix, but every bit you’re able to improve retention and engage users results in huge gains in LTV, ROAS, and ultimately break-even.

This all supports a broader shift in mindset.

In 2025, mobile user acquisition is about more than the number of installs.

It’s quality, it’s onboarding success, engagement, and the full lifecycle including hybrid monetization with in-app purchases, subscriptions, and ad monetization.

And yeah … creative matters in mobile user acquisition

As you know …

Creative remains one of the most important levers for performance.

Creative can’t be underestimated, even as marketing teams are asked to do more and more with less. It’s the single most important factor (and yes, there are more.)

What are the elements of an ad that contribute to success, according to Mckinsey?

  • Targeting: 9%
  • Deliverability/viewability: 22%
  • Creative: 49%

Spend time where you need to to build great campaigns. But don’t neglect creative.

Because when you find a 10X creative … a unicorn creative … you change your mobile user acquisition picture. 10X creatives allow you to scale profitably, when you’re doubling your profitability goals at low volumes.

Can’t find the unicorn creative?

Keep looking.

Until you do, it’s incredibly hard to scale ad spend profitably. And if you can’t scale ad spend profitably, you can’t grow sustainably.

Need some insider tips on creative? Singular’s newest Creative Optimization Guide will be a valuable resource.

Final thoughts

Scaling mobile user acquisition in 2025 means adapting to a world where privacy and performance coexist.

You and your team need to blend automation and AI with creative strategy and data fluency. Success today requires a shift from volume to value, with a focus on acquiring the right users, nurturing them, and driving long-term engagement.

If you’re looking to scale efficiently and effectively, talk to us to see how the top app marketers are doing it.

Win with creative: insights from TikTok, Craftsman+, Tinuiti, SplitMetrics, Liftoff, Moloco, and Singular

It’s tough to win with creative today. Everyone is smart, everyone is spending, everyone has AI, and everyone is fighting like H E double hockey sticks to kick your metaphorical rear end.

So what do you do? 

Watch our latest webinar with 6 creative experts on building a creative advantage. And shamelessly steal some of their best tips to shift into a higher creative gear. 

win with creative webinar

 

While you’re watching the full webinar, check out some of the top insights from the webinar here …

Win with creative: what’s the problem?

First up: insight from attendee polls

Everyone wants to win with creative. The problem is that desire is not enough. It’s freakishly hard.

We asked the hundreds of webinar attendees about their core creative challenges, and what’s working:

  1. When it comes to UA performance, what is currently your biggest creative challenge?
  2. Which ad format has driven the highest ROAS for you recently?
  3. Where are you using or planning to use AI in your creative process?

What’s actually working?

The biggest creative challenge: figuring out what’s actually working. (Sounds like it’s time for Creative IQ!) The second: coming up with new ideas.

Biggest creative challenges-2

 

Here are the results:

  • 34.1% Figuring out what’s actually working
  • 25.0% Generating enough new creative concepts
  • 20.5% Fighting creative fatigue
  • 15.9% Scaling production without losing quality
  • 4.5% Localizing creative effectively

Marketers’ biggest creative challenge is understanding what’s working, followed by the pressure to generate new creative concepts. Creative fatigue and production quality are also significant concerns: it’s hard to maintain high-performing creative over time.

Understanding what’s working should not be the biggest challenge, but with siloed data all over your partners’ dashboards and black boxes proliferating, it’s understandable. As suggested above, get Creative IQ from Singular to clear the confusion.

What are the right formats?

To win with creative, you also need to use the right formats. We asked the webinar participants which ad formats have driven the highest ROAS for them recently.

Video and UGC ran away with the field.

win with creative Highest ROAS formats

 

Here are the results:

  • 39.0% Short-form video
  • 27.3% UGC
  • 16.9% Playable ads
  • 10.4% Influencer-driven
  • 6.5% Static image

Short-form video dominates with 39% of respondents calling it their top ROAS driver, followed by UGC at 27.3%. Playables and influencer content have meaningful traction too. Static images are falling behind, reinforcing the move toward interactive and motion-based formats.

Where does AI fit in?

And finally, we asked webinar participants where they were using or planning to use AI in their creative process …

ai and marketing

 

Here are the results:

  • 27.2% Concept creation
  • 20.6% Visual generation
  • 18.6% Voiceovers or audio
  • 17.5% Localization and translation
  • 15.5% Creative tagging and reporting
  • 0.5% Not using AI yet

Most marketers are already using AI to ideate and generate visuals. Concept creation leads, followed by visual and audio production. Very few said they’re not using AI, signaling that adoption is already mainstream in creative workflows.

Win with creative: magic and math

Our own CMO Stephanie Pilon hosted the session and she kicked it off with a kick in the pants highlighting just how important it is to win with creative …

“Targeting only makes up 9% of the success of an ad… deliverability and viewability make up 22%. But creative makes up a shocking 49%.”

Just to state the obvious because it’s so ridiculously critical, that means nearly half of your ad’s performance hinges on the creative you put in front of people.

No pressure.

There’s magic in creating creative, but there’s math in finding the ones that work best.

As I’ve heard from marketers before, it doesn’t have to hang in the Louvre. It does have to perform. It does have to demand the click. It does have to sell the next step in the customer journey.

How?

“It’s just about continuous iteration,” said Lisi Gardiner, Director of Product at Singular. “And I think a lot of marketers understand that it’s one of the best, most cost effective ways of driving performance.”

Structure matters too

Don’t misunderstand that continuous iteration. Testing creative isn’t just about throwing variations into the wild. It’s also about organizing ideas into frameworks and testing them with purpose.

Tinuiti’s Brent Hastie talked about using performance buckets to structure testing:

“These aren’t just themes, they’re concept archetypes … storytelling cohorts, if you will, that we use to ensure we’re telling distinct stories that can be tested and optimized.”

Those might be buckets of ad types focused on social proof, or product/service education, or brand introduction.

That helps with iterations, too. Now you can generate variations on the bucket themes easier, and structure them better. All of this will help you understand what themes resonate with specific audiences in specific geos.

Once you’ve dialed that in, you can dive down into more granular elements, fine-tuning what is working into what is awesome. 

For example, if your UGC personal story bucket is doing well, maybe you try different version, like a skeptical weight loss veteran, or a first-time mom who’s looking to get back into shape, or an exec who just wants to fit those jeans again, or a retiree looking to be able to play more golf.

Win with creative by sweating the assets

If you’ve got it, flaunt it.

You’ve made a bunch of stuff already: brand images, product images, screenshots, videos. Rip, mix, burn all that stuff to make it work for different purposes.

From TikTok’s Dina Kirshner:

“We really try to emphasize making the most of what you already have… repurposing material, whether it’s a photo or clips that you have, and then making them feel like new again to create that robust volume you need.”

It’s always tempting to make new stuff, or to discount what you have.

But some of your best campaigns might come from materials you’ve already created.

So much more in the full webinar

There’s gold in this webinar. Here’s an overview of what you can expect to find …

  • 00:00 Introduction and Session Kickoff
  • 02:33 Importance of Creative in Advertising
  • 03:43 Panel Introduction and Session Overview
  • 06:10 Biggest Creative Challenges
  • 07:16 Why Creative is Critical
  • 10:21 Adapting Creatives for Different Audiences
  • 15:37 Brainstorming New Creative Ideas
  • 20:12 Best Practices for High-Value Creative Assets
  • 24:44 Creative Testing Strategies
  • 30:03 Iterative Strategies
  • 31:43 Maximizing Ad Formats for ROI
  • 32:39 Leveraging UGC for Authentic Marketing
  • 37:46 AI in Creative Strategy
  • 45:46 Addressing Creative Fatigue
  • 52:19 Show and Tell: Creative Examples
  • 58:19 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

Get it free and on-demand right here.

10 top tips for building web funnels, plus 1 tactic to boost revenue 20%

Web funnels are huge in subscription apps. 

It’s obvious why: web funnels are essentially an interactive long-form sales experience where you get to know a prospect, explore needs, present a solution, and close the sale. 

Or soft-close the sale and get contact info for later.

So many reasons to do web funnels

Plus, where app store listings are limited by platform constraints, web funnels give marketers full control over messaging and storytelling, personalization, and perhaps most importantly, payment flows, pricing, and monetization models. 

They also provide instant owned-platform data on performance, easy testing, segmentation at scale — BetterMe has more than 15 funnels for different personality types — and a way to get an email address or phone number for follow-up and retargeting.

I recently chatted with Andrey Shaktin, CEO of FunnelFox, about building kickass web funnels. 

He’s optimized more than 3,000 of them throughout his career, and here’s what he’s learned:

10 top tips for building web funnels

High-performing web funnels consistently get the key elements right. 

Here are the key elements to make your funnels sing:

  1. Strong creative assets
    Only about 2% of creatives are top performers. You desperately need top-performing creative to kill it with web funnels, so testing at scale is essential.
  2. Holistic funnel design
    If you like the cafe from the outside but the inside looks awful, you’ll turn around. Consistency is key: funnels should visually and narratively match the ad that brought the user in. This is also why you need multiple funnels (for multiple campaigns) and you need to be able to spin them up quickly and easily.
  3. Trust-building start page
    Why should someone trust you? Unless you’re a major global brand, do they even know about you? And if you are, how do they know you’re not a scammer? Use awards, social proof, and user counts to establish credibility. Then offer personalized quizzes to kickstart engagement and let people know they’re going to get a custom experience.
  4. Personalization through relevant questions
    Asking about people’s goals and preferences builds perceived value as well as connection. It also gets them invested in the process of fixing their pain points.
  5. Multiple funnel variants
    You need more than 1 web funnel. In fact, high-performing companies segment their audiences and build funnels tailored to specific goals. For fitness, that might be weight loss versus muscle gain. For memory, that might be people’s names versus geographic details. Align each segmented web funnel with its own ad group.
  6. Visualize success early
    If people want to solve a problem, they need to see how your solution is going to impact it. Show graphs or projected results to deliver an early aha moment and build anticipation for the results they’ll achieve.
  7. Sneak peek of product methodology
    Offer a glimpse behind the curtain. Today, people care about who makes things. How they work. Where they’re made. Why they’re made, and what your passion is. Offering a glimpse of how the product works builds confidence in its value.
  8. Effective paywall
    At some point, you want to close the deal. Tie the offer you’re presenting to the personalized goals they’ve just set, and remind them of the value visually with before/after pics or graphs. Connect their use of your service with achievement of their goals.
  9. Email collection
    More on this later, but capturing emails mid-funnel can dramatically boost post-funnel revenue. Also, it’s a soft close that doesn’t require handing over a credit card, but does signify a desire to get deeper.
  10. Creative > quiz optimization
    Don’t spend all your time building and optimizing your quiz. Start by optimizing creatives, not quiz content or UI: it’ll be more important in the long run.

Boosting web funnel revenue 20% with 1 simple tactic

I mentioned it above, but it bears repeating.

A super valuable tactic Shaktin highlighted was adding email collection in the funnel. Get an email address! Getting an email address magically transforms a 1-time advertising experience from a drive-by-1-and-done to the start of an ongoing relationship.

Hello retargeting!

Hello email marketing!

Hello no more endless cold starts!

Yeah, you’re probably concerned about drop-off. But let’s be honest: if they’re going to drop off at an email request form, they weren’t ever going to hand over their credit card number either. 

So, Shaktin says, despite concerns over drop-off, adding email collection to a web funnel consistently proves its worth when done well.

The reason: email retargeting can generate 20% more revenue from users who drop off before subscribing. So they don’t convert immediately … but

  • Now you have a direct line for re-engagement
  • Now you can offer exclusive deals, reminder nudges, or content to bring them back

This helps you recover revenue from people who maybe exited the funnel due to timing, cost, distraction, or even a technical problem. It’s a mini psychological commitment too: a soft close before actual payment. It’s a small investment in your solution, and this micro-conversion boosts the likelihood they will follow through with a purchase later.

Along with smart segmentation and automation, it’s a low-cost, high-return strategy that everyone making a web funnel should implement.

Much more in the full podcast!

As usual, there’s much more in the full podcast.

Subscribe to Growth Masterminds, follow our YouTube page, and get the entire episode wherever it works best for you. 

Here’s what to expect:

  • 00:00 Introduction to Growth Masterminds
  • 00:34 Common Traits of Successful Funnels
  • 00:59 Vertical Differences in Funnel Usage
  • 02:13 Essential Elements of a Funnel
  • 02:27 Tips for Approaching Funnels
  • 03:37 What Not to Do in Funnels
  • 05:42 The Role of AI in Funnels
  • 06:56 Multiple Funnels for Different Audiences
  • 10:24 Building Effective Start Landing Pages
  • 18:37 Importance of Email Collection
  • 21:06 Critical Aspects of Paywalls
  • 23:07 Optimal Funnel Length
  • 25:11 Geographical Differences in Funnels
  • 26:02 Effective User Acquisition Channels
  • 27:22 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

G2 redo: yep, Singular’s the top MMP again, according to 1,794 marketers

It’s kinda getting to be a habit, no? Singular is the top MMP on the planet according to updated G2 results as of last month. This time the surveys included opinions from 1,794 marketers on dozens of parameters.

We’re sort of making a habit of this:

Now, in freshly updated results as of June, 2025, Singular is the top MMP by customer ranking AGAIN. (Maybe our customers know a thing or two!)

Singular top MMP

 

Singular is a top MMP by what parameters?

G2 has its own proprietary research methodology that includes refreshing data every 6 months to stay up-to-date with changing products. They’ll often ask up to 40 questions, then feed the results into their G2 score, which is based on both satisfaction and market presence. There’s also a recency bias: newer reviews are weighted more heavily.

Here are the parameters that Singular was the top MMP on:

  • Quality of support: 93%
    Average: 85%
  • Likelihood to recommend: 91%
    Average: 86.2%
  • Meets requirements: 88%
    Average: 84.6%
  • Ease of set-up: 84%
    Average: 76.4%
  • Ease of use: 87%
    Average: 81.4%
  • Ease of admin: 89%
    Average: 82.2%
  • Has the product been a good partner in doing business: 93%
    Average: 83.8%
  • Attribution: 89% (tied with AppsFlyer)
    Average: 84.8%
  • Custom event tracking: 89%
    Average: 84.8%
  • Conversions: 89%
    Average: 78%
  • Dashboard: 86%
    Average: 81.6%
  • Cross-channel insights: 86%
    Average: 77.6%
  • Cross-platform attribution: 88%
    Average: 81.2%
  • Custom dashboards: 88%
    Average: 77.6%
  • Analytics dashboard: 87%
    Average: 80.6%
  • Data segmentation: 88%
    Average: 78.8%
  • Fraud detection: 85% (tied with AppsFlyer)
    Average: 77.4%
  • Post-fraud attribution: 86%
    Average: 76.4%
  • Validation rules: 86%
    Average: 80.8%

A top MMP is a “good partner in doing business”

The first time I wrote about Singular’s G2 results, I focused on time to ROI. What we saw then was striking:

  • Singular averages 11 months
  • Branch averages 16 months
  • Kochava averages 17 months
  • Adjust averages 19 months
  • AppsFlyer averages 19 months

The second time, I focused on the best customer support in the business in the Quality of Support metrics. Again, the results were impressive:

  • Singular scored 93%
  • Adjust scored 79%
  • AppsFlyer scored 86%
  • Branch scored 81%

This time, I’m focusing on being a good partner in business. Because ultimately, that’s what it really comes down to, right? 

Does your software provider see themselves as a partner in your success? Does your MMP put you first, and focus on driving your business results?

Or are you just a meal ticket? Dollar signs in a quarterly revenue report?

According to 1,794 marketers, Singular wants to partner with our customers. We see ourselves as your supporters. We want to enable your growth. And we’ll bend over backwards to make it happen. I’ve literally seen it happen from the CEO and CTO on down.

  • Singular: 93% yes
  • Adjust: 79% yes
  • AppsFlyer: 86% yes
  • Branch: 85% yes
  • Kochava: 84% yes

Industry-wide, the numbers are fairly high, at least for 4 of the key MMP contenders. But there’s 1 top MMP, and we’re thankful to be able to report that it is Singular.

What does ChatGPT say?

We don’t do anything without asking AI for its opinion these days, right? I shared the results with ChatGPT and here’s what it said:

  • Singular’s strengths
    Dominates across nearly all functional and satisfaction metrics from customer support to fraud detection
  • Who to pick
    Choose Singular or AppsFlyer for leading performance and reliability
  • Who’s the leader
    Singular is the clear overall leader in user satisfaction and features.

I also asked where Singular most clearly outpaced the competition. Here’s what my digital friend answered:

  • Partnership
    Margin: 9 percentage points (to nearest competitor)
  • Quality of support
    Margin: 8 percentage points
  • Ease of set-up
    Margin: 6 percentage points
  • Ease of admin
    Margin: 6 percentage points
  • Custom dashboards
    Margin: 4 percentage points
  • Cross-channel insights
    Margin: 4 percentage points

Need help choosing Singular?

Talk to us.

We’ll listen more than we talk. We’ll share what we do and how it works. And we’ll give you everything you need to make a super-informed decision … including in terms of what we’ve done with many, many clients who have switched from other MMPs.

Start here!

AI-enabled marketing: what marketers are asking Singular via our Claude MCP integration

Last month we integrated Singular data and insights with an LLM to allow people to talk to their data: to use natural language queries to get insight into what’s happening with their campaigns. Hundreds of marketers have jumped at the opportunity, and now we have good data on AI-enabled marketing: what marketers are asking AI about their marketing results.

The results are fascinating to review.

Here’s what we’re seeing …

AI-enabled marketing: 6 categories of things marketers want to know

AI-enabled marketing helps marketers quickly get the data they need. We analyzed queries from hundreds of marketers to see what people want to know, and how they ask AI for answers. 

(We check these as part of our pursuit of zero-hallucination AI-generated marketing insight, which is critical for usability and trust. None are public, and any identifiable or sensitive words in the queries have been removed to maintain anonymity.)

So what do marketers ask AI?

A common type of question is this: “What are my top performing campaigns by installs and revenue?” It’s important, it’s actionable, it’s easy to ask, and now with AI, it’s easy to answer, too.

In general we see 6 different query clusters: larger topics into which basically every query can be categorized:

  1. Campaign performance and ROAS
  2. Trend analysis and time-based reporting
  3. Revenue and spend comparison
  4. Creative performance and A/B testing
  5. Install and conversion tracking
  6. Geo and platform-based segmentation

AI-enabled marketing isn’t just for the easy stuff. Marketers are asking AI some fairly complex questions. Here’s an example around campaign performance and ROAS:

“For the cohort from September 2024 on Android platform with xx,xxx installs at $xx,xxx.xx cost, what is the total ROI as of today and how many of these installs are still active?” 

That’s a deep cut, going pretty far back in time and may take a minute to find. But with Claude doing the heavy SQL lifting and Singular holding your data, it’s as simple as asking.

Here’s another that caught my eye:

“Calculate the Cost per Trial for Apple Search Ads, Facebook, Google, TikTok and Organic using formula: Cost / SUM(“Trial Standard” + “Trial Pro”)”

Again, this is no simple thing. It’s a deeply important question requiring a lot of install and post-install data and some not insignificant calculation.

But yeah, AI-enabled marketing is for quick hits too. We also see much simpler queries that still can result in profound instant insight for marketers:

  • “Show me all campaigns by source for the last 30 days”
  • “What is the creative with the most downloads over the past 7 days?”
  • “How much did we spend on Facebook in the last 7 days”
  • “Export last 3 days events as CSV”
  • “Show me all unique traffic sources over the last 90 days”
  • “What is the current DAU and lifetime ROI for Android users?”
  • “Give our spend for last 7 days split by network”
  • “How much total ad revenue did I have yesterday?”
  • “Which ad partners are driving the most ROI?”
  • “Countries with best 7d Total ROI for App X over the past 2 weeks”
  • “Show me D1 retention, D7 retention, and D30 retention by source”

As I said at the top, it’s a fascinating window into what marketers need at any given moment. 

And it’s simply amazing that the data you need to make instant decisions is right at your fingertips, just like asking Claude or ChatGPT for information on something in the wider world.

Analysis and insights: going broad and (maybe) unexpected

AI-enabled marketing can also go broad. While Claude is pretty useful in answering specific questions quickly in plain English, it’s even more impressive in analyzing the data and providing key highlights or recommendations on how to drive higher performance.

Marketers sometimes ask questions as general as:

  • “Show my top performing campaigns for last month”
  • “Analyze my LTV patterns for 2025”
  • “Break down my metrics by all segments and provide recommendations on where I should invest”

In these cases, Claude has a bit more freedom as to which metrics might be the most relevant, or how to run that analysis. It won’t always get the conclusions right, but it can still uncover interesting highlights you haven’t considered before.

See for example how Claude analyzes the top performance of our demo data, looking at multiple KPIs from volume to ROI and general efficiency:

AI-enabled marketing via Claude

 

Sometimes you need to see the data. Or to share the results of your AI-enabled marketing analytics deep dives.

Good news: Claude is also great at visualizing data. Even adding a short prompt like “Show the results in a nice dashboard” results in an interactive screen with surprisingly good charts and highlights:

Claude MCP Singular

 

AI-enabled marketing in your own language

I’m not sure who decided that English was the lingua franca of the business world, but to some extent it is. 

And while you can use many different languages when building SQL queries, Singular’s default table names are in English and we don’t support every language under the sun.

AI-enabled marketing to the rescue.

We currently see marketers ask AI questions in at least 6 languages:

  • English (of course)
  • Czech
  • Spanish
  • Chinese
  • Portuguese
  • French
  • And possibly a few other languages (some of the data is a bit garbled thanks to character encoding issues)

Since most large LLMs like Claude and ChatGPT speak at least 15 languages well, and dozens of others with varying levels of proficiency, this opens up marketing data and insight to many more people not just in natural language but in their mother tongue.

Last I checked, Czech was not a language we officially support. 

Now that lack isn’t checkmate any more for native speakers.

(So sorry. Huge apologies. But not sorry enough to delete it.)

Marketers ask AI long questions

We already know that people use longer queries when searching for information via AI compared to typical web searches:

  • Most web searches: 2-4 words long
  • ChatGPT prompts: 15-23 words
  • ChatGPT with SearchGPT on: 4.2 words

We see that in AI-enabled marketing as well. When searching their marketing data in Singular via our Claude MCP integration, marketers use a lot of words in their search queries:

  • Shortest: 1 word (probably a mistake)
  • Longest: 51 words
  • Average: 15.88 words
  • Median: 14

I do similar things in my own use of AI. 

Often I’ll just hit the mic button and speak my query in a kind of stream-of-consciousness flow. That helps me add a lot of detail and put a bunch of parameters around my question, and I just trust the AI engine to figure it all out.

Dimensions and metrics: what marketers ask AI for …

AI-enabled marketing uses exactly the same dimensions and metrics as any other form of analysis.

Marketers use dimensions to break down their data and look at specific campaigns, geos, devices, or ad partners. They want Singular to calculate metrics impacted by those breakdowns: installs, revenue, cost, ROAS, ROI, and so on.

On average, marketers use just 2 dimensions when asking questions.

Marketers want many more metrics, however. On average, marketers ask AI for 5.66 metrics per query (median: 4.0). We did see a massive outlier, though: one question had 44 metrics in 1 particular query. 

(I hope that was the AI query equivalent of a pocket dial. Or an intentional test-to-destruction experiment.)

The top dimensions we’re seeing right now:

  1. App
  2. Campaign Name
  3. Source
  4. OS
  5. Country
  6. Platform
  7. Campaign ID

The top metrics marketers ask AI to calculate include:

  1. Ad network cost
  2. Installs
  3. Revenue (7-day)
  4. ROI (7-day)
  5. Actual revenue
  6. Actual ROI
  7. Revenue (1-day)
  8. Ad network clicks
  9. Ad network impressions
  10. ROI (1-day)
  11. IPM (installs per mille)
  12. ARPU (7-day)

Much more to do and learn

There’s much more to do and learn over the next weeks and months, but it’s great to see the massive uptake for our MCP integration with Claude. It’s also a great way for us to learn how AI-enabled marketing works.

We continue to add new features and fixes almost daily, so please keep the feedback and suggestions coming through your typical channels!

Best apps for kids in 2025: reading, drawing, math, learning, coding & more

Looking for the top apps for kids in 2025?

In most parents’ dream world, kids are using their phones and tablets to get smarter, read more, play with math, and learn more about the world. In reality, kids are probably mostly just looking for something fun to do. 

It’s always a tough thing: how to deal with kids and mobile devices, so we decided to put together a list of top apps for kids.

We’re going to look at some of the top apps for kids in 6 categories:

Top apps for kids: why this matters

There’s lots of challenges around kids and screen time. For extremely young children ages 2 to 5, more than 2 hours of screen time a day is associated with poorer vocabulary, speech delays, and worse thinking skills.

We’re going to be looking at apps for older kids, ages 6 to 12, but too much screen time still isn’t good. 

We know how addicted we are to our own phones, and kids have even fewer defenses, with half showing signs of phone addiction. In teens, that can lead to mental health issues, anxiety, and depression.

But we know kids aren’t going to drop the devices. They have them. They’re going to use them. So we need to find top apps for kids that will be positive influences. We want apps that will:

  • Boost literacy
  • Increase motivation
  • Support learning
  • Be safe
  • Provide opportunities for parents to engage as well
  • Ensure privacy

Here are some that we think make the cut. They’re widely downloaded, well-reviewed, and popular among kids aged 6 to 12 …

Prodigy Math Game

Reading apps for kids

Almost nothing predicts school success as well as reading ability, so a list of top apps for kids really needs to start here.

Khan Academy Kids (free)

This is a good place to start. Khan Academy Kids is a 100% free educational app with a rich library of books and reading activities for ages 2–8. 

Kids can read interactive stories and practice phonics and comprehension. It’s well-reviewed for its quality content and has no ads or in-app purchases.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Libby (free)

For kids who are a bit older or advanced readers, Libby is a library app that lets you borrow children’s ebooks and audiobooks for free with a library card. It’s not kids-specific in terms of its interface, but many libraries have kids sections, making Libby a great way to get books or comics on a device legally and for free.

Important:

Set content filters to keep selections age-appropriate.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Homer Learn & Grow

If you’re looking for more reading apps for kids, Homer is a good choice. It’s a comprehensive learn-to-read app for early readers that uses phonics-based lessons and interactive stories to build literacy skills. Homer also includes some math, art, and emotional learning content. 

Home offers a 30-day free trial, then subscription.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Epic

Epic is a digital library with 40,000+ children’s books (fiction and non-fiction) for ages up to 12. Epic makes reading fun with badges and personalized recommendations. It’s available on iOS/Android with a free trial, then a monthly subscription.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Hooked on Phonics

Every parent knows Hooked on Phonics.

Here’s the classic phonics program in an app form. It’s aligned with school standards and uses its proven learn-to-read curriculum. The app offers systematic phonics lessons, games, and ebooks. 

It’s a subscription app, but check for promos, which are frequent.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Starfall

Another early-literacy app, Starfall features phonics games, read-along stories, and songs. It’s great for mastering ABCs and basic reading through fun animations. 

Free for basic use (covering letters and phonics); there’s an option to unlock more content via membership.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Math apps for kids

Math gets a bad rap among both kids and adults as being hard, annoying, and inapplicable to daily life after school, but it’s kind of unfair. Getting a firm grasp on the basics will set kids up well for school, and form a foundation for financial literacy, if nothing else, later in life.

A list of top apps for kids, therefore, needs some math apps …

Monster Math (free trial)

Kids love monsters, so why not combine them with math? 

Monster Math is for kids aged 5 to 9, with a focus on building true math fact fluency. Tailored especially for kids with ADHD, autism, or math anxiety, the app avoids timers and sensory overload, offering soothing visuals and calm gameplay.

There’s a free trial; buy the subscription for full access

Get it on Google Play | App Store | Web

Prodigy Math (mostly free)

Prodigy Math is a popular math RPG (role-playing game) for kids in grades 1 to 8 with millions of players. 

Kids cast spells by solving math problems in a fantasy world. It’s aligned to school curricula and free to play, though it has an optional membership plan.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

SplashLearn

SplashLearn is an interactive math learning app for pre-kindergarten kids through to grade 5. It has 1,900+ games and adaptive lessons aligned to Common Core standards. It covers match, geometry, and more, and is available on both web and mobile

Basic content is free, but full access requires a subscription.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Khan Academy/Khan Academy Kids (free)

Khan Academy isn’t just for reading. There’s the main app for older kids and Khan Kids for younger ones that also provides comprehensive math practice with exercises and videos. This app is impressive, with simple, easy-to-follow explanations for math challenges.

Khan Academy covers elementary math up to calculus while Khan Academy Kids focuses on early math via playful activities.

Khan Academy is free and Khan Academy Kids also has no ads.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

ABCmouse Early Learning Academy

I’m pretty sure I had a CD-ROM from ABCmouse decades ago. 

ABCmouse is a multi-subject app for ages 2 to 8 that includes a high-quality math curriculum. It offers thousands of math activities like number recognition, addition/subtraction, shapes, and more.

ABCmouse is subscription-based.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

drawing apps for kids

Drawing apps for kids

Top apps for kids are in all categories. Drawing apps might fall into the fun category for some kids. For others, it might be the launching pad for a life of creativity in the visual arts, whether that impacts their eventual careers or not. 

Doodle Buddy (free)

Doodle Buddy is a popular free drawing app that provides a blank canvas, various brushes, stamps, and backgrounds for kids to draw on. It’s probably best on a tablet, but you can use it on your phone too.

It’s simple to use for all ages, making it great for open-ended creativity and sharing silly drawings with family. It’s not just a blank canvas: kids can also doodle on photos. 

(Yeah, get ready for the moustache and glasses.)

Get it on App Store

Draw and Tell (free)

Draw and Tell is a free award-winning creative app by Duck Duck Moose (Khan Academy). 

Kids can free-draw with crayons, paint, and stickers, then record themselves telling a story about their picture which plays back as an animated slideshow. This merges art with storytelling, encouraging imagination in multiple dimensions.

Get it on App Store

Crayola Create and Play

This is an official Crayola app filled with art activities. Kids can draw, color, paint with virtual crayons, and also do educational crafts and puzzles.

The app offers guided coloring pages as well as free draw mode. 

It is subscription-based with a free trial.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Kids Doodle, Joy Doodle

This is a fun, neon-glow drawing app with 2 names: Kids Doodle on Android, and Joy Doodle on iOS. 

It’s super simple: choose a neon brush and draw on a black background with a glowing effect. It offers rainbow colors and 24+ brush styles (like hearts, stars, and so on).

Free, but has ads.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Drawing with Carl

Drawing with Carl is a quirky creative app featuring Carl, a cartoon character, and various tools like mirror drawing and talking stickers. Kids can draw on photos, use pattern paint buckets, and enjoy silly effects like stickers that repeat what you say).

One-time purchase (which is very rare these days).

Get it on App Store

Learning and educational apps for kids

Some apps are just generally educational. They might be based around a game or a story, or around drawing, but they incorporate learning of all kinds, including math. 

Since many apps cover multiple areas, a few that we’ve already mentioned bear repeating:

  • Khan Academy (and Khan Academy Kids)
  • ABCmouse

There are also, of course, many more top apps for kids in learning and educational spaces.

PBS Kids Games (free)

This is a free app by PBS with educational mini-games starring characters from PBS Kids shows. 

There are games focusing on math, reading, science, and more, all designed for elementary ages. 

As you’d expect from PBS, it’s safe, and screen time is filled with learning. Note that PBS also offers the PBS Kids Video app for educational cartoons.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Lingokids

Lingokids is an educational play and learning app for ages 3–8.

It has games and lessons focused on English literacy, basic math, science, and life skills. It’s kidSAFE-certified for child-friendly content. 

The app is free with limited content, but you’ll need to buy a subscription to unlock all the content.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

YouTube Kids (free)

As you’d expect, YouTube Kids is a video app, but it’s still worth mentioning for learning and education.

YouTube Kids curates child-appropriate educational videos on tons of topics. Kids can explore subjects like science experiments, how-to art projects, story read-alouds, and more, and there are parental control settings.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Duolingo (mostly free)

If your kid (or school) is into learning new languages, Duolingu is a popular language-learning app known for bite-sized, fun lessons. 

It has gamified lessons, and Duolingo Kids offers a child-friendly version for learning to read and basic literacy in English and Spanish. 

Duolingo is free with optional extras.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Duolingo

 

Coding apps for kids

It’s possible you want your kids to grow up knowing a bit about how computers work, and how software is built. Your kids may even have asked you about that.

If so, there are some fun beginner coding apps that kids can play with at a very young age.

ScratchJr (free)

ScratchJr is a beginner coding app designed for ages 5–7 partially developed by MIT. 

It uses a simple visual block interface where kids snap together code blocks to animate characters and create stories. It’s free on tablets and will introduce kids to programming logic like loops, events, and more. 

Scratch, a higher-level app, is also very popular for kids to make games/animations.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

ScratchJr

codeSpark Academy

codeSpark Academy is an award-winning app that teaches coding fundamentals through game-like puzzles and creative play. 

It’s aimed at ages 5–10 and has kids solve coding puzzles to help cartoon characters, then design their own games. It uses icons, so there’s limited reading required, and covers sequencing, loops, and conditionals. 

codeSpark requires a subscription after a free trial.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Kodable

Kodable is a coding app for kids from 6 to 10 which presents coding as guiding a fuzzy character through mazes using sequence, conditions, and loops. Kodable introduces real code gradually and, for those who progress, includes some JavaScript or Swift syntax for older kids. 

Kodable offers a mix of free levels plus a paid plan for more instruction. It’s often used in elementary schools to teach programming basics.

Get it on App Store

Tynker

A popular coding platform for kids aged 5 to 14 is Tynker. 

Tynker has a mobile app with coding games and tutorials, and young kids can use visual block coding to make Minecraft mods or simple apps. Older kids can start learning JavaScript or Python.

Tynker is used in many schools and has a huge library of coding projects and lessons. Requires a subscription.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

codeMonkey

codeMonkey is another notable coding app. In codeMonkey, kids solve puzzles by writing real code. They program a monkey to catch bananas, among other things, and gradually learn concepts like loops and functions.

codeMonkey is web-based and mobile-friendly.

The basic levels are free, but you’ll have to pay to access everything.

Get it on codeMonkey.com

Cash apps for kids

Just like anything else, kids don’t automatically know everything they should about money. Spending wisely, saving, budgeting, earning money for work done … all of these things are areas they can learn and grow in with the right top apps for kids.

Greenlight

Greenlight is a top-rated debit card and money app made just for kids and teens. 

It has robust parental controls, chore/allowance tracking, savings goals, and investing lessons. Each child gets their own prepaid Mastercard under the parent’s account. 

Greenlight does require a monthly fee.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Acorns Early (formerly GoHenry)

Acorns Early, by fintech company Acorns, is designed for ages 6–18. Parents can set up automated allowances and tasks, while kids get a personalized Visa card. It includes “Money Missions” which are in-app financial literacy games, and has strong parental controls. 

Acorns Early charges a monthly fee.

Get it on App Store

BusyKid

BusyKid is a chores and allowance app that comes with a prepaid Visa card. 

Kids can check off chores to earn money at rates set by their parents. Then they can save, spend, or even invest those funds. BusyKid emphasizes real-world money skills, and it is subscription based.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

FamZoo

FamZoo is an interesting family finance app that acts like a virtual bank for kids. 

FamZoo supports parent-paid interest on savings, split accounts (spend/save/give), and works with prepaid cards or IOU tracking. It can be used on both web or mobile apps, and can work without a smartphone. 

FamZoo charges a monthly subscription fee.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Step

Step is a mobile banking app geared toward teens. 

It provides a free Visa card that acts like a debit card with credit-building features, which has no monthly fee. Teens can use Step to receive direct deposit from work (like a summer job) and use peer-to-peer payments.

Get it on Google Play | App Store

Top apps for kids: so many choices

There are many more top apps for kids.

The key thing is to take a bit of time as a parent to look for the right apps. Be aware of those that are paid or have ads, and ensure that your kids only get apps that you approve. 

A few things you want to check into as well:

  • Apple Screen Time
    If your kid uses an iOS device, you can set it up as a child’s phone or table. You can also set daily limits for categories or individual apps, block installing or deleting apps, and restrict explicit content, app store access, and specific kinds of web content. In addition, you can set up a downtime schedule so your child isn’t playing games — even good ones — until 3AM.
  • Google Family Link
    If you’re an Android family, check out Google’s Family Link. Similar to Screen Time, you can approve or block app installs, set time limits per app, track screen time, control access to websites, Play Store content, and purchases, and even lock devices remotely.

In addition, if you’re looking for more apps, or your kids come to you with an app they want to install, check Common Sense Media, which has a section on apps so you can check for safety, privacy, and whether the app is appropriate or not.

If you’re building or marketing apps for kids, make sure you’re meeting the latest privacy and compliance standards—check out Singular’s Kids App Compliance solution.

RIP waterfalls: 3 levers to boost ad mediation revenue when MAX kills the waterfall

AppLovin MAX is killing the waterfall on July 16th. While you can still use waterfalls with a few other mediation providers, this is a big, big deal. Essentially, this move takes ad monetization control out of the hands of mobile app publishers in favor of real-time bidding. In return, it offers simplicity, a larger addressable market of advertisers, and — theoretically — more money.

But is that actually true?

I chatted with the co-founder and COO of Wildcard Games, Josh Chandley:

Mediation: more bidding, more money?

Let’s be honest: waterfalls are ancient tech. 

A waterfall is generally a manually intensive tool for selling ads. Waterfalls take a long time to execute, and they totally ignore potentially unknown advertisers who might value specific inventory much more than the advertisers you’re asking.

How it functions:

  • I have an ad placement to sell in My Most Awesome Game
  • I talk to ad network A: wanna buy it for $50?
  • If not, I talk to ad network B: wanna buy it for $40?
  • And so on, until I find a buyer

Bidding is way faster: all networks can bid simultaneously. And it opens up my potential ad-buying market to the world, theoretically, so more ad networks can bid on my ad inventory. That should increase my revenue.

But it’s hard to tell.

“I haven’t personally seen a massive improvement in our CPMs or our revenue from real-time bidding,” says Chandley. “I’ve seen a simplification in our processes. But this theoretical incremental revenue hasn’t appeared for us yet.”

And you can’t A/B test waterfall versus mediation, for a bunch of reasons.

First, it’s really hard. 

How do you pick equivalent times and periods? How long would it take to show a difference? How can you isolate for any changes in organic or paid growth? Are the conditions similar between the test periods? How often are you willing to make changes in your app, and play with integrated SDKs?

And, it’s against the law … AppLovin’s law:

“Any ad units… are now being blocked from running any A/B tests or making changes,” says Chandley. “Even though it is still being allowed to run in that waterfall instance, A/B tests and changes have been blocked.”

There’s clearly good money in mediation — you don’t grow your stock price 5X in a couple of years if your profit margin isn’t insanely great — but it’s not clear that the extra cash is trickling down to app publishers.

Mediation is monetization is acquisition

This is all complicated by AppLovin’s position as the premier mediation platform and the premier ad monetization platform for mobile gaming, one of the most critical sectors in mobile apps. 

That position gives AppLovin a great view of both sides of the market, meaning it can price inventory more accurately, perhaps, than anyone else. The result is that who you choose for mediation is no longer just about monetization. 

It’s also critical to your growth engine.

“Mediation is no longer about ad monetization,” says Chandley. “It’s about user acquisition.”

Why?

“When you mediate with MAX… the large bulk of your UA spend goes to AppLovin’s AppDiscovery products,” he explains. “If you move away from AppLovin, you by rule lose access to that UA source.”

Which leads to a hard question. Or a rhetorical question:

““How much better does LevelPlay or AdMob have to be for you to take a 50% reduction to revenue?”

Answer: orders of magnitude.

Alternative answer: impossibly better.

So what do you do when you lose waterfall control?

You can’t build a waterfall. You can’t totally control who bids and how. Mediation manages all of that, and you don’t even really have insight into auction rules or who is bidding.

So what you do instead is you focus on what you can control.

There are 3 levers Handley sees now for boosting ad monetization in the era of mediation.

  1. Segmentation
    Who do we show ads to? Who do we not show ads to? What should their ad experience be? What’s the optimal strategy to balance revenue and retention?
  2. Ad load and frequency
    Where do we show ads? How frequently do we show ads? What kinds of ads do we show? How do all these parameters impact revenue and retention?
  3. Expanding auction participants
    In theory, Handley says, you can have an infinity of ad SDKs now. (Don’t talk to your engineers about this.) This opens up the ecosystem to having a lot more direct SDK connections.

Interestingly, there could be significantly more revenue here in optimizing the ad experience than you’d get from boosting revenue slightly in the move from waterfall to bidding.

One more dose of good news

Theoretically, mobile gaming publishers could be opening up to a whole new ecosystem of advertisers over the next few years. 

There are 2 reasons why:

  1. Everyone is a gamer now, so all target audiences available in games
  2. AppLovin and others (Unity? Google? Meta) are making progress in targeting those audiences in games

The current scenario is actually slightly crazy.

As Chandley puts it:

“You open Instagram and you see one ad, then you move over to play your game and you see another ad. It’s like, hey, I’m on the same couch. It’s still 5:30 PM. I’m the same dude. I literally just flipped apps.”

If we see progress here there’s an open gateway for 10s of billions of additional advertising dollars to flow into mobile ads. And frankly, I think we’re already starting to: I got an ad for Blinkist in my favorite mobile game just this week.

Much more in the full podcast

If you don’t subscribe to Growth Masterminds, you probably should. We just got rated as a top-10 podcast for adtech and mobile marketing. And we talk to some really smart people.

Check it out on YouTube and all the usual audio channels …

  • 00:00 Introduction to App Monetization
  • 00:53 Understanding Waterfall and Real-Time Bidding
  • 05:59 Challenges and Changes in Ad Mediation
  • 13:15 Impact of Bidding on Revenue and CPMs
  • 14:50 The Impact of Performance and Revenue Distribution
  • 15:17 Transparency in Ad Auctions
  • 15:56 AppLovin’s Dominance and Mediation
  • 16:30 The Shift from Ad Monetization to User Acquisition
  • 20:32 Segmentation and Ad Experience
  • 23:15 Expanding Ad Audiences in Mobile Games
  • 26:19 The Future of E-commerce Ads in Gaming
  • 29:26 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

AI marketing: 99% of marketers are using AI … here’s what they’re doing

A study on AI and marketing commissioned by Iterable says that almost every single marketer uses AI every single day. As in literally 99% using AI in some way every day for at least something, while a still-staggering 91% are using AI for their jobs daily. And three quarters of marketers are optimistic that AI marketing tools will create new jobs as well as unlock new opportunities for growth.

Iterable talked to 1,200 marketers in the U.S., UK, Netherlands, and Germany.

Marketers and AI: what are they using?

Interestingly, according to the study of 1,200 marketers, generative AI, the noisiest and most-hyped application of artificial intelligence at the moment, has some work to do. 57% say that AI marketing tools enhance optimization, 53% say automation is the best use, and 50% look to AI marketing tools for predictive analytics. 

(Maybe these marketers have tried to get text into generative AI images and failed.)

But, 49% say that generative AI tools enhance their working lives.

creative potential of AI tools

However, half of marketers find AI intimidating, and 54% say the existence of AI marketing tools is heightening expectations from managers. And most feel they don’t have all the skills and knowledge they need to use AI effectively.

  • 49%: AI is intimidating
  • 54%: AI increases expectations
  • 89%: AI requires new skills, which is somewhat concerning
  • 29%: AI requires new skills, which is extremely concerning

Not surprisingly, less than half of marketers have been trained on AI marketing skills. 

That fully accords with my personal experience, which is based on personal dabbling with OpenAI, Creative Diffusion, MidJourney, Dall-E, and multiple other tools, but no formal training. (Of course, so many of the new AI tools have become available so recently that it’s almost impossible for training developers and programs to keep pace.)

AI marketing: what we’re seeing at Singular

Singular now has a lot of first-party data on how marketers use AI, because we’re incorporating artificial intelligence throughout our product suite.

What we’re seeing in both tools is that marketers want better insight, faster, and easier, with AI. Marketers have gigabytes of data: they are not low on data. What they need is for that data to make sense, and AI can help there.

In our recent State of User Acquisition webinar, we asked marketers: what is your top priority with AI?

Here’s what they said:

  • 37%: Improving creative performance
  • 34%: Automation
  • 17%: Optimizing re-engagement
  • 11%: Expanding into new regions
  • 6%: Leveraging first-party data
marketers AI priorities

 

We also asked marketers about their top AI use cases for user acquisition specifically. Here’s what they said (they could select any or all answers that applied to their particular circumstances):

  • 86%: Creative production or optimization
  • 57%: Bidding or budget automation
  • 31%: Predictive LTV or segmentation
  • 20%: Not using AI yet
AI in user acquision

 

So what we’re seeing is that creative is king. A massive 86% of marketers using AI say they apply it to creative production or optimization. In other words, AI is now a core tool for accelerating creative production and testing. But predictive analytics is still not mainstream, and only about half of marketers are using AI in bidding and budgeting optimization.

AI marketing: what’s happening?

There’s obviously a lot going on in generative AI and marketing. Here’s just a few of the recent developments that we’ve talked about on the Singular blog:

Back to the study: AI marketing and ROI

One place where there isn’t clarity among marketers, however, is whether AI marketing tools are generating a positive return on investment. Or how they will do so in the future.

I’d assume that increased efficiency in what you’re already doing and increased capacity to do more things than you previously could are both indicative of positive ROI, but the survey focused on where AI will most likely benefit marketing organizations.

The ROI of AI
Image credit: Iterable

50% say ROI will come from better customer service — think users or players in a mobile app — while 47% say more effective analytics will be where AI marketing tools generate ROI. Slightly lower numbers see other areas of analytics as top priorities as well: predictive analytics for revenue and forecasting.

What marketers want from AI

According to the 1,200 marketers surveyed, 39% of marketers want AI marketing tools to enhance their creativity. 37% want AI to do part of their jobs so they have “more free time for fulfilling tasks,” and 37% want to feel tech savvy.

Almost a third are looking for AI to reduce their stress levels as well.

What pretty much everyone agrees is that we haven’t tapped AI’s full potential yet.

“While many marketers have embraced AI, they haven’t yet tapped its full potential. AI offers an incredible opportunity to liberate marketers from operational minutiae and tasks like data analysis and content creation,” said Adriana Gil Miner, Chief Marketing Officer of Iterable. “This frees them up to focus on creativity and crafting unique experiences that bring joy to customers. AI isn’t just about automation; it’s about elevation, unleashing creativity, and amplifying brand voices. 

I buy some of that, but not all of it.

Muddling in the data sometimes feels like drudgery (ok, almost always) but often brings eureka! moments when you find something unexpected. AI marketing tools can do that too, but not always. And you do have to double-check AI’s answers in data as well as text, since AI hallucinations are not yet a thing of the past.

Also, for writing — yeah, that thing I’m doing right now — AI-created content can be pretty basic, a bit meh, and fairly surface. That said, it can be a great starting point for the addition of human insights, creativity, and tone.

Miner agrees:

“The future of marketing lies not in replacing human ingenuity, but in using AI to empower it.”

At least, that’s what I’m telling the Terminator. And any AI marketing tools I use. 

And myself, of course.

Zero hallucination AI-generated marketing insight

You want marketing data. You want it fast. So you get a little help from your silicon friends. But is it right? Will AI tell you that you have 5 million app installs on Venus? Will your favorite LLM report -3,000 conversions in your top-performing Match-3 game? In other words, will using AI result in bad data thanks to a hallucination?

Hallucinations are a fact of life with modern LLM-based AI systems. 

It’s smart to be worried about them. 

That’s something that we’ve taken a great deal of care to avoid with our new MCP integration with Anthropic’s Claude. 

  • You don’t want to be that lawyer who used ChatGPT to draft a brief that referenced non-existent case law
  • You won’t want to be that airline whose chatbot invented a compassionate refund policy that didn’t exist
  • You won’t want to be that real estate company that advertised ocean views in Kansas, thanks to an LLM that confused 2 similar-looking city names

(Yeah, all true stories, by the way. I know because ChatGPT told me about them.)

You want to be the marketing hero who gets the right information and makes the right decision and delivers measurable growth. But you need that data. You need it quick. And a couple sexy charts wouldn’t hurt, too.

But it needs to be correct. Accurate. True. Actionable.

Plus, not something you’ll get fired for.

Zero hallucination AI-generated marketing insight

So how do we avoid hallucinations with our AI-generated marketing insight? 

There’s probably no completely perfect, 1000% safe solution here, but we’re seeing amazing results with really high-end accuracy with a multi-pronged 7-step approach:

  1. We eat the elephant 1 bite at a time
    We break every user question into tiny, fully tested tasks. Each task handles just one piece … dates, metrics, dimensions, filters, breakdowns, you name it, and then runs in parallel. Breaking down tasks this way lets the model focus on 1 thing at a time, lets us validate each step, and cuts response time while also boosting accuracy.
  2. Strict schemas
    We enforce strict schemas for every task. If a start date comes after an end date or a metric name is unknown, the flow stops immediately and returns a clear error instead of inventing data.
  3. No guessing allowed
    Like a highly-secure competent person, we allow the model to admit uncertainty. When the required information is missing, the LLM can answer “I don’t have enough information,” preventing creative guesses.
  4. KISS: keep it simple, stupid
    We keep every prompt lean. We skip tasks your desired answer doesn’t need, like filtering when the user didn’t ask for it. That reduces noise, latency, and token use.
  5. Small is beautiful
    We design each model call to do just 1 small job: nothing more. Clear, single-purpose calls prevent prompt injection, keeping outputs predictable.
  6. Observability, logging, daily evaluation
    We ship with full observability and daily evaluation loops. Every run is logged and replayable, and a mix of unit tests, integration tests, and an automated LLM-as-a-judge checks the model against key metrics, so quality improves over time.
  7. Friendly failures
    We handle failure gracefully. If something goes wrong, users see a plain-language suggestion like “Try a shorter date range” instead of some cryptic stack trace.

Add it all up, and you get trustworthy dashboards that match what you’d see if you pulled all the data the old-fashioned way in Singular manually.

It also speeds up your responses, because small tasks executed in parallel via smaller prompts deliver answers in seconds.

Extra bonuses:

  • Future-proofing
    More LLMs are delivering MCP integration capabilities. With all these steps, the guardrails remain as we onboard additional partners.
  • Peace of mind
    The lawyers who argued their case on non-existent precedents got sanctioned and fined. With all these checks and balances, you can be confident that the data you’re getting from your AI helper is secure, validated, and keeps surprises to a minimum.

Sum it all up, and our MCP integration plus our data integrity best practices helps us provide accurate, grounded data that is continuously validated.

That means your plain English questions transform into reliable performance insights. No hallucinations, just numbers you can count on.

Usage is off the charts

Now’s a good time to mention, by the way, that we had no idea how many of you were just waiting for this kind of solution.

Usage is completely off the charts. Here’s what it looks like in a demo account:

There’s literally a CTO of a major mobile gaming company who is using this daily. (I mean, we expected the non-technical people to jump on this quickly, but it turns out that the nerds among us also like quick and easy data.) The charts that Claude is almost instantly creating for him are very cool too: total installs, total cost, total revenue, LTV, ROI, average DAU, ARPU, ARPDAU … you name it.

And it’s not just the data.

Thanks to the magic of today’s super-smart LLMs, people are getting insights, not hallucinations:

  • Recent change: lower volume but higher quality
  • New: massive improvement in profitability
  • Higher UA cost in the last month
  • Better monetization in the last month

If you haven’t tried it yet, check it out.

Any questions, talk to your Singular rep. And, if you’re not yet using the best MMP in the world as rated by marketers, there’s no time like the present.

We’d be happy to chat.