So you’re trying to work out a budget for Apple Search Ads in the UK. It’s the million-dollar question, or hopefully, the few-quid-per-install question. The truth is, anyone who gives you a single number is either lying or has no clue what they're talking about. There's no rate card for this stuff. The cost is a moving target, dependant on so many things that it's impossible to give a straight answer without looking at your specific situation.
The cost you’ll pay per tap (CPT) and ultimately per install (CPI) comes down to a live auction. You're bidding against every other app developer who wants to show up for the same keywords you do. If you're a new mediation app, you're bidding against giants like Calm and Headspace who have massive budgets. If you've built a niche app for identifying rare British fungi, your competition is probably a lot smaller. The bottom line is this: stop looking for a fixed price and start thinking about how to build a system that finds the profitable price for you.
But seriously, what am I likely to pay?
Alright, alright. You need a ballpark figure to even start a conversation with your finance person, I get it. In the UK, a developed and pretty competitive market, you're not going to be paying pennies. Think about it like this: the cost per tap (CPT) could be anywhere from £0.50 to well over £2.00, maybe even more for super competitive keywords like 'online banking' or 'food delivery'.
But the CPT is only half the story. The real metric you care about is the cost per install (CPI) or cost per action (CPA), like a signup or a trial start. This depends entirely on your app's conversion rate (CVR) on its App Store page. If your page is rubbish, with bad screenshots and poor reviews, you might only convert 20% of the people who tap your ad. If it's brilliant, you might get a 60% CVR or higher.
Let's do some quick, rough maths to show how this works in practice.
Hypothetical Cost Per Install Calculation (UK Market)
| Scenario | Average CPT | App Page CVR | Estimated CPI (CPT / CVR) |
|---|---|---|---|
| Poorly Optimised App Page | £1.20 | 25% | £4.80 |
| Well Optimised App Page | £1.20 | 50% | £2.40 |
| Highly Optimised Page + Less Competitive Niche | £0.80 | 60% | £1.33 |
See? The same keyword with the same CPT can lead to wildly different install costs. The single biggest lever you can pull to make your ad spend efficient isn't just bidding lower; its improving you're app store page so more people who tap actually download.
So how do I figure out my budget without just guessing?
This is where most people get it wrong. They pick a budget out of thin air – "Let's spend £1,000 this month and see what happens." That's not a strategy; it's gambling. The real question isn't what you should spend, but what you can afford to spend to acquire a customer. To answer that, you need to know what a customer is worth to you. You need to calculate your Customer Lifetime Value (LTV).
Forget the cost per install for a second. Let's focus on the value. If you don't know this number, you are flying completely blind. Here’s a brutally simple way to work it out for a subscription app:
Average Revenue Per User (ARPU) per month: What's the average amount a user pays you each month? Let's say it's a £9.99 subscription.
Gross Margin %: What's your profit after App Store fees, server costs, etc.? Let's say it's 70%.
Monthly Churn Rate: What percentage of users cancel their subscription each month? Let's say 10%.
The calculation is:
LTV = (ARPU * Gross Margin %) / Monthly Churn Rate
LTV = (£9.99 * 0.70) / 0.10
LTV = £6.99 / 0.10 = £69.90
In this scenerio, each new subscriber is worth about £70 in gross margin to you over their lifetime. Now we have a real number to work with. A healthy business model often aims for a 3:1 LTV to Customer Acquisition Cost (CAC) ratio. This means you can afford to spend up to £23.30 (£70 / 3) to acquire one paying subscriber.
If you know that 1 in every 20 people who install your app becomes a paying subscriber (a 5% conversion rate), then you can calculate your target CPI:
Target CPI = Affordable CAC / Subscribers per Install
Target CPI = £23.30 / 20 = £1.16
Suddenly, you have a goal. Your job isn't to get the cheapest installs possible. Your job is to get installs for under £1.16. If you can do that, you can pour money into ads and know you're building a profitable business. This is the maths that unlocks growth.
What kind of results should I be aiming for?
It's one thing to talk about theory, but another to see what's actually being done out there. We ran a campaign for a client in the software, events, and sports space who was looking for rapid app growth. Using a mix of ad platforms including Apple Search Ads, we helped them get over 45,000 signups at a cost under £2 per signup. For them, that was a huge win and fueled their expansion. It shows that with the right strategy and a solid app, you can definately get users at a reasonable cost, even in the UK.
But it's not always about cheap signups. For a B2B software client using LinkedIn, we were happy to hit a $22 cost per lead because those leads were high-value decision makers. For an eCommerce client, we generated an 8x return on ad spend. The "good" result depends entirely on your business model and your LTV. That sub-£2 signup was fantastic for that app, but it would be a disaster for an app needing a £500 LTV to break even.
Why are my costs so high? Is it me or the algorithm?
If your CPI is through the roof, it’s time to play detective. The problem usually lies in one of two places: your targeting (the ad) or your product page (the destination). Here's how to diagnose it:
-> Low Tap-Through Rate (TTR)? If people are seeing your ad but not tapping on it, the problem is your initial pitch. For Apple Search Ads, this means your chosen keywords are a poor match for what your app actually does, or your app icon, title, or subtitle aren't compelling enough to earn a tap. Are you targeting 'photo editor' when your app is really a 'cartoon avatar maker'? That's a mismatch. Your ad isn't grabbing the searcher's attention.
-> High Taps but Low Installs? This is a more common and painful problem. You're paying for taps, but people are getting to your App Store page and deciding not to download. This is a massive red flag that your product page is failing. It could be:
- Bad Screenshots: Are they just random captures of the UI, or do they tell a story and show the benefit?
- Weak Video: A good app preview video can make a huge difference. Is yours engaging or does it just show someone aimlessly tapping around?
- Poor Description: Does the first paragraph clearly state the problem you solve and for whom? Or is it a wall of text about features?
- Negative Reviews: Social proof is massive. If your first few reviews are one-star rants, no amount of ad spend will fix that. You need to fix the product first.
Your ad's job is to get the click. Your store page's job is to get the install. You need to figure out which part of the team is letting you down.
What's the best way to structure my campaigns?
Don't just chuck all your keywords into one campaign and hope for the best. That's a recipe for wasted money. A propper structure separates keywords by intent, which lets you control your budget and bids more effectively. I'd start with a structure like this:
Recommended Apple Search Ads Campaign Structure
| Campaign Type | Keywords | Purpose & Bidding Strategy |
|---|---|---|
| Brand | Your app name, company name, variations. | Defend your own space. CPTs will be low, CVR high. You must run this to stop competitors stealing your traffic. Bid to ensure you're always #1. |
| Competitor | Names of your direct competitors. | Aggressive growth. Steal users who are already looking for a solution like yours. CPTs will be higher. Bid based on your target CPI. |
| Generic / Category | 'task manager', 'running app', 'budget planner'. | High volume discovery. Captures users searching by problem, not by brand. Performance will vary. Monitor closely and cut keywords that don't convert. |
| Discovery | Use Search Match (no keywords). | Keyword research. Let Apple find new, relevant search terms for you. Keep bids low. Add converting terms to your other campaigns as exact match, and add non-converting terms as negative keywords across all campaigns. |
This seperation gives you clarity. You can see exactly where your money is going and what's working. If your Competitor campaign is burning cash with no installs, you can pause it without killing your profitable Brand campaign.
This is the main advice I have for you:
Getting your Apple Search Ads strategy right in the UK isn't about finding a secret cost-per-install number. It's about a disciplined, data-driven approach. Here is the framework you should be implementing:
| Action Item | Why It's Important | Your First Step |
|---|---|---|
| 1. Calculate Your LTV | You can't know what you can afford to pay for a user until you know what a user is worth. This is the foundation of a profitable ad strategy. | Gather your ARPU, gross margin, and churn rate. Use the formula to find your LTV and then calculate your target CPI. |
| 2. Fix Your "Shop Window" | Your App Store page is where conversions happen. A low-converting page will make any ad spend inefficient, driving your CPI up. | Get honest feedback on your icon, screenshots, video, and description. A/B test different elements using Apple's Product Page Optimisation feature. |
| 3. Structure Your Campaigns | Lumping all keywords together is chaotic and wasteful. Separating them by intent (Brand, Competitor, Generic) gives you control and clarity. | Create the four campaign types outlined above. Start by populating the Brand and Generic campaigns, and use the Discovery campaign to find new keywords. |
| 4. Start Small & Measure | Don't blow your whole budget in a week. You need to gather data to see what's working before you scale. | Set a small daily budget (£50-£100) to start. Let it run for at least a week. Analyse the data: which keywords are driving installs below your target CPI? |
| 5. Optimise, Then Scale | Scaling is easy. Scaling profitably is hard. The goal is to turn off what's not working and put more money behind what is. | Pause high-cost, low-conversion keywords. Increase bids on high-performing keywords. Once your campaigns are consistently hitting your target CPI, start to gradually increase the daily budget. |
Look, this is a lot to take in. It's not as simple as just turning on ads and watching the downloads roll in. It's a constant process of testing, measuring, and optimising. You're competing against other businesses, some of which have teams of people who do nothing but manage these campaigns all day.
Getting it right can be the difference between burning through your startup capital and building a scalable, profitable app. If you're feeling a bit overwhelmed by the complexity or you're just not seeing the results you need, it can often pay to get some expert advice. We spend our days in these platforms, running campaigns and figuring out how to make them work.
If you'd like an experienced pair of eyes on your strategy, we offer a free, no-obligation initial consultation where we can look at what you're doing and give you some straight-up, actionable advice on how to improve. Sometimes a 20-minute chat is all it takes to find the one thing that will turn your campaign performance around.
Hope that helps!
