Ad Spend Was Going Out Faster Than Revenue Came In
An AI-powered fitness app on the Apple iOS store was struggling to make a breakthrough. The features were good. Attracting users was the hard part, and the advertising was not paying for itself. They had invested in ads across various platforms, and the returns were not enough to fund the app’s growth.
Here’s what they were up against:
- High acquisition costs: ads on multiple platforms were burning through the budget, with a high cost to win each new user and little coming back.
- Poor return on ad spend (ROAS): they were spending more on ads than they were making, which put a ceiling on how far they could scale.
- Unrealized user lifetime value (LTV): there were untapped opportunities to increase subscriber value and long-term revenue.
If your budget is split across several platforms right now, this is the shape the problem takes. Everything looks busy. Nothing compounds.
One Platform, One Message, $3,000 Behind It
We ran a three-step approach: simplify, optimize, iterate. Each step had to show up in a number before we moved to the next one.
Simplify. We cut the message down to one clear value proposition, pulled the budget off every other platform, and concentrated a $3,000 spend on Meta, where this audience actually was. At the same time the App Store listing got new keywords, a rewritten description, a redesigned icon and new preview screens, so the traffic the ads bought landed on a page built to convert it.
Optimize. With one platform and one message, testing got a clean read. We tested formats including user-generated content (UGC) and different calls to action, tuned targeting toward the users whose subscriptions lasted, and A/B tested the store visuals. Better targeting raises what a subscriber is worth; better creative lowers what one costs. The ratio needs both.
Iterate. Once a combination of ad, copy, and audience proved it paid, we scaled it and kept feeding new angles into the account. The tuning never stopped, and neither did the slow fall in acquisition cost.
Every Dollar Came Back as $8.54
Three months in:
- Revenue per subscriber: $13.51
- Cost per subscriber (CPS): $5.24
- Return on ad spend: 2.58 (every $1 spent returned $2.58)
After six months of optimization, the same account looked like this:
- Subscriber lifetime value: $37.31
- Cost per subscriber (CPS): $4.37
- Long-term return on ad spend: 8.54 (every $1 spent returned $8.54)
- Subscription rate: up 475% across the six months, the figure the original study published and the one our service pages quote
Put the cost-per-subscriber line of each list beside your own. The cost of winning one came down while the value of one went up. That gap is where the whole result lives.
“Working with Strataigize completely transformed our app’s growth trajectory. Their strategic approach not only boosted our ROAS to 8.54 but also lowered our acquisition costs and increased user lifetime value. We couldn’t be more thrilled with the results!”
Founder & CEO, AI Fitness App
What This Means If Your Spend Is Spread Thin
Within three months they saw real gains in return on ad spend, and after six months they were scaling on a long-term ROAS of 8.54.
Read the order, not just the number. Simplify first, because a focused budget is the only way to get a clean read on what is actually working. Optimize second. Scale last, once something has already proved it pays. If your own spend is spread across platforms today, your first move is fewer places to run it, and you can make that decision this week without briefing a single new ad.
Note: we have signed an NDA with this client. We have permission to share this case study to showcase the strategies and results achieved.