HOW TO GET FINANCE TO OPEN THE UA WARCHEST!

In my years of doing UA, I’ve found that gaining upper management’s trust for ad spend is pretty much a direct correlation to how “user-friendly” (read: simple) your reporting is. You start tossing around jargon and complex charts, and management’s support for your budget nosedives faster than a missed quarterly target.

A brilliant UA wizard, David Mauslof (FoxNext days, shout-out!), once used a method that worked wonders. His secret? Make reports so clear that even the folks who think ROI is a new streaming service can follow along.

Now, every finance and C-suite bigwig has the same line on UA budgets: “Prove that you can drive profitable installs, and we’ll open the purse.” Sounds dreamy, but we all know the reality – proving ROI for free-to-play games is like watching grass grow; it takes time. So instead, you’re banking on convincing everyone that the ROI curve will eventually pay off.

Enter the magic tool: INDEX TO TARGET. Yep, a single number that’s as easy to read as a stop sign. Think of it as:

100 = We’re golden!

Less than 100 = Houston, we have a problem.

Greater than 100 = We’re making it rain!

And while we used to focus on, say, a 12-month payback window, trends have shifted. Today, a 6- or 9-month window is common, with quarterly adjustments to match performance data in real-time. This means your UA team gets challenged to keep up, but hey, it’s all in the game.

Two years ago, this was revolutionary. Now? It’s the baseline.