How to measure persistence using the Google Analytics Mobile SDK

Question

I would like to create cohort analysis for my Android mobile application using the Google Analytics Mobile SDK.

Basically, I would like to segment my cohort by the installation date (for example, the group of all users who installed my application on the same day) and measure the delay after two weeks (for example, how many of each group still use the application after two weeks). I want to get a graph showing the date on the x-axis and the corresponding storage percentage for this date on the y-axis.

I was able to do this in the past (using the previous version of analytics) using a user variable that specified the installation date for each user, and than for each installation date, request an API for all users in this group who were still visitors after two weeks. This is no longer possible using the new Google Analytics Mobile Application API.

Answer 1

Google Universal Analytics now supports Cohorts. Create a custom segment and set the "Date of the first session." This works for mobile devices tested on Android, iOS and Unity.

Find a slide show that shows how to:

http://www.slideshare.net/Local-Ventures/local-ventures-customsegreporting-27989106

Answer 2

You can do this using the Quantcast app app SDK . This allows you to determine any cohort of installation dates on the fly and look at user retention for that cohort. It will also compare your application with regular user retention. A good example of this is the profile for the GoodReads iOS app . See the section “User Retention after Installation”.

Full disclosure: I work at Quantcast