How Power User Data Can Boost Your Mobile App Strategy

Sensor Tower’s Consumer Intelligence module provides unparalleled insights into mobile app engagement through data from our proprietary first-party panel. The Power Users module inside Consumer Intelligence measures days used per month for an app, which provides a unique look at loyalty and stickiness.

In this product spotlight, we highlight several examples of how Power User data can serve as a leading indicator of changing app usage and engagement trends, and measure the effectiveness of new features, content, and monetization strategies.

Key Takeaways

• Sensor Tower’s Power User dataset measures the number of days within a given month that a user opens an app. This unique metric, even more so than total time spent or total session count, indicates how intertwined an app is within a user’s everyday life.

• Power Users represent the most loyal and most valuable users within an app’s user base: more daily visits may indicate greater purchase frequency, a lower rate of eventual churn, and more opportunities to see fresh advertisements. 

• Changes within an app’s “average days used” can reveal trends such as a decreasing appetite for categories of apps or the types of apps people are using, which streaming video providers are leading the market in the battle for consumer attention amongst the most engaged users, or how sticky consumers on EdTech apps can drive substantial revenue growth, for example.

• Utilizing the days used distribution feature, users can uncover insights into which apps have the highest and lowest proportion of highly engaged users throughout a month via a histogram for every month studied.

First of all, what is Sensor Tower Consumer Intelligence?

Our Consumer Intelligence offering empowers you to dig into engagement benchmarks for the world’s biggest apps. You can do this by researching relevant user behavioral trends, from social networks to SVOD platforms and gig economy apps. The features help you understand user behavior by mobile category, or groups of select apps to see what real-world engagement looks like for apps – including those from your competition. A powerful function within Consumer Intelligence is known as Power User data.

Components of Power Users and its Uniqueness to Sensor Tower’s Dataset

While commonly referenced mobile app metrics such as total time spent and the industry standard engagement ratio (DAU / MAU) provide a starting point for understanding app engagement, they do not fully capture trends on daily use.

Power User data directly measures days used per month: not only does this metric provide easy comparisons between apps, but because it is updated monthly our users can quickly understand gains or decreases in stickiness.  

Power User Data Can Provide Insight So You Know When App Users Become More or Less Sticky

The average days used per month metric - available throughout the Power User submodule - provides a quick way to harness all of the robust power user data. It also provides another lens in which to understand engagement and stickiness beyond mere time spent or total sessions. 

For Example:

Most engagement metrics for popular crypto exchange apps have trended downward over the last several quarters, particularly since Bitcoin reached an all-time high in price (Nov’21).  For most apps the average days used / month metric declined the fastest.

Coinbase average days used / month in the past year fell 30%, while session counts only declined 6% (as of Mar’23). This was also evident for competitor crypto apps such as Binance and Robinhood. For Binance, days used / month were down by 17% YoY (vs. +2% in sessions), and for Robinhood the data shows a decline of 14% (vs. -8% in sessions).

Although sessions and time spent can be bolstered by heavy but infrequent use, average days used/month looks at how ingrained a service is within a user’s daily routine and provides Sensor Tower subscribers an alternative lens into interpreting weakness within an industry that has faced significant headwinds. 

User stickiness (which we can measure by avg days used in the Power Users function) fell much quicker than sessions upon the collapse of the price of bitcoin. So the most heavy users of crypto apps (for instance, those who are already MAUs but logged on Coinbase multiple days throughout the month) saw a decrease in their daily activity on the app throughout the month, indicating a potential contraction in activities on crypto apps (presumably trading) as bitcoin continued to plummet from the all-time high reached in Nov'21.

How Power User Data Shows that Netflix Remains the Market Leader in SVOD

An additional way to utilize the days used feature is to look at multiple apps in the same category and identify over and under performers in terms of stickiness and loyalty.

For example:

Subscription video on demand (SVOD) services grew increasingly popular during the pandemic with users returning more frequently to consume fresh, tentpole content. By gaining an understanding of which apps users return to most, you get a window into understanding loyalty, stickiness, and which services have the most engaging and compelling content at specific moments of time. 

Using Power User data, Sensor Tower subscribers can create a custom definition of what they deem a “power user.” In this example, we established that devices being used to open a SVOD app 15 days or more days across a month qualify as a true "power user." Using our defined parameter, Sensor Tower Power User data reveals that the percentage of U.S. users opening Netflix more than 15 days per month in Feb’23 was around 11% vs 8% on Hulu, 6% on Peacock, 5% on HBO Max, 4% each on Paramount+ and Amazon Prime Video, and 3% on Disney+.

Out of the largest SVOD services, Netflix appears to be the stickiest amongst its users over a monthly period. This is a good signal that the app will retain these users and keeps them engaged with fresh content, even in the face of rising competition. Having loyal users also makes the platform more valuable for advertisers, which is a key initiative to drive revenue for Netflix (as well as other app developers who want to drive app stickiness).

Power User Data Shows a Power Up for Duolingo

User stickiness, in many scenarios, is positively related to monetization and retention.

For example:

In the case of language learning app Duolingo, increasing user stickiness was an important revenue growth lever highlighted in its 4Q22 earnings.

Sensor Tower Power User data corroborates Duolingo’s claims of increased stickiness. When we looked at the data, 23% of Duolingo users opened the app 20+ days/month in Feb’23 -- up from 21% in Feb’22 and 16% in Feb’21. Furthermore, Duolingo’s users are far stickier than their competitor app Babbel, where only 2% of users open 20+ days/month. Continued growth in user stickiness likely provides Duolingo increased monetization opportunities (via ads, new features, or subscription tiers). It also suggests that Duolingo’s users are becoming less likely to churn out of being an active user.

Days Used Distribution Reveals the Stickiest Social Media and Dating Apps

The Days Used Distribution view from Sensor Tower’s Consumer Intelligence product give you the power to quickly chart days used for an app, per month. Multiple apps can be loaded on the same time series to better understand diverging open-rate patterns across a cohort – and to study your competition.

For example:

Sensor Tower Power User data reveals that Instagram is the “stickiest” social media app, with 44% of users opening the app every day in Feb’23, compared to 33% on TikTok, 31% on Facebook, 28% on Snapchat, and 20% on Twitter.

Instagram benefits from its legacy social media functions and features (such as its feed with photos and videos, stories, messages) along with its Reels offering which has been propelled by the rise in popularity of short-form video entertainment.   

Users Hold Out for True Love on Hinge.

An in depth look into user engagement trends on dating apps can also be gleaned by utilizing the distribution of days used feature.

For example:

Sensor Tower Power User data reveals that 10% of users opened Hinge every day in Feb’23 vs 7% each on Bumble and Grindr, 6% on Tinder, and 4% on Badoo. The value of a dating apps’ service is based upon the size of their ecosystem (the number of potential partners in the pool). For Hinge, the strong user loyalty makes the platform more attractive to those who return to the dating pool (the one on the app, not a real pool…) Although Hinge is positioned as the app “designed-to-be-deleted,” users are doing exactly the opposite by logging on more frequently throughout the month, likely holding out hope to find their perfect match.

To learn more about what Consumer Intelligence can do for you, how to utilize power user research, or just find out more about how we can help, please choose the option below and we'll be happy to provide a demo.