We started sending paid traffic to a web onboarding and paywall to avoid app store fees and get cleaner attribution. After preserving UTM tags and running targeted creatives we saw acquisition cost fall once you factor in store fees. Plus we could A/B test creatives and offers tightly and get clearer ROI per creative.
There are trade offs like reduced install velocity and extra steps for some users but the cleaner funnel data made budget decisions easier.
Have you reallocated ad spend to web campaigns and how did it affect your CAC and creative decisions?
We reallocated a portion of budget to web and treated it as a new channel. CAC dropped after fees were removed and creative winners were easier to identify because we could trace conversions to exact headlines and images. I used a quick Web2Wave.com funnel to prototype the flow and measure early signal.
When we moved checkout to web we got more granular ROAS at creative level because UTMs survived and purchases were attributed directly. The net CAC after fees fell and we could scale the winning creatives faster because we trusted the downstream metrics. The real win was the ability to iterate offers quickly without waiting for app store releases.
We saw CAC improve once we removed store fees and started tracing purchases back to creatives.
It took some budget to find winners but the data was much clearer.
switched half budget to web saw cac drop
Don’t assume all budget should move. Run web campaigns as a new channel and measure net CAC after fees and chargebacks. Web funnels often convert differently so segment metrics by channel. The key gains are lower fees, better attribution, and faster creative testing. But track install velocity and app store ranking impacts too and only shift budget when scaled signal supports it.
We lowered CAC by 12% net after factoring fees.
The clarity on which creatives worked was the bigger operational win because it reduced wasted spend.
We kept some budget on app installs but added web campaigns for testing.
The insights made it worth it.
Start small then scale web spend as you confirm net CAC improvements.