Upland

The Objective

Expanding the User Base: Attracting Engaged, Long-term Players

Upland is an innovative mobile game blending real-world locations with virtual reality via blockchain technology. With over 3,000,000 registered and about 30,000 daily active users, it enables players to build virtual empires by acquiring, trading, and managing properties linked to real-world addresses.

Players can create shops, manufacture cars, and engage in entrepreneurial activities to boost their in-game economies. The game uses UPX, purchasable with fiat or cryptocurrency, for property minting and buying digital assets. Upland's use of NFTs ensures genuine ownership of digital properties, fostering a vibrant, sustainable virtual economy where players can potentially earn real income.

Upland identified TikTok as a key platform for attracting high-quality, engaged users. TikTok's vibrant gaming community make it an excellent channel for reaching potential players who are likely to invest time and resources into the game.This strategic choice aligns with Upland's objective of growing its user base with participants who are likely to be active and financially invested in the game long-term.

The Solution

TTCC and TTCX Synergy: Expanding to New Markets and Driving Quality User Engagement

Upland initiated its TikTok campaign in the US market, which continues to be their primary focus. The campaign utilized Mobile App Installs to reach a broad audience of relevant users, followed by App Event Optimization (AEO). They strategically targeted a mid-funnel event—game registration—which proved to be the most cost-efficient approach for their campaign objectives.

Also Upland ran an Advanced Dedicated Campaign on AEO in their key market the US (Registration optimization) and compared it to an identical regular iOS Dedicated Campaign. With Advanced Dedicated Campaign, publishers get better iOS campaign performance, including improved MAI and AEO, advanced reporting and real-time updates via SKAN 4.0.For their creatives, Upland initially produced ads native to the TikTok feed, adhering to the platform's best practices. However, they noticed that these creatives quickly began to burn out. In response, they shifted their creative approach to incorporate more UGC-like elements into their ads.

They started leveraging the TikTok Creative Challenge to design these engaging creatives, which enabled them to increase the volume of content tailored for English-speaking markets and significantly improve their campaign performance.Upland aimed to expand its reach beyond English-speaking markets, selecting Brazil and Spainish speaking countries in LATAM as key targets. To effectively engage these new audiences, they recognized the need for creatives that resonated with the local cultural context.

To achieve this, Upland utilized the TikTok Creative Exchange (TTCX), a platform that offers a one-stop solution for fast, scalable video production, delivering high-performing ad creatives tailored for TikTok. TTCX provides advertisers with access to top creative partners skilled in maximizing success on TikTok. These partners offer comprehensive support from concept creation through to video production, facilitating efficient collaboration at scale.

Upland leveraged UGC creatives from TTCC as inspiration and reference to craft relevant content for the LATAM markets. They aimed to tap into the market's cultural context with TTCX creatives, ensuring a strong local presence. For example, they localized the content by using a map of São Paulo.

The Results

Scaling in the dedicated markets and increase in quality user flow

The approach proved highly efficient, enabling Upland to scale significantly. Observing the successful results from combining TTCC and TTCX, Upland decided to exclusively use these platforms, phasing out their original creatives.

By leveraging the strengths of both TTCC and TTCX, Upland capitalized on the synergy of these creative resources to enhance their campaign's impact.They successfully unlocked new Spanish-speaking markets and significantly increased the flow of new users, which was previously quite low. With the introduction of TTCX, user flow increased by more than 45 times.

Based on this success, Upland significantly increased their spending in both new and established markets. For example, in the US, they quadrupled their investment. Also, Upland plan to execute more TTCX briefs to continually refresh their creatives.

After TTCC launch was a significant impact on performance, with the most significant improvement in the US market - CPI (cost per install) with TTCC decreased by 1.4 times, CPR (cost per registration) decreased by 1.7 times and CPP (cost per purchase) decreased by 1.74 times. As for the ADC integration, it delivered a 23% increase in registration volume (SKAN).