• Event Atmosphere and Participant Engagement

Despite being a weekday evening, the venue was nearly full with app publishers and mobile marketers, creating an enthusiastic atmosphere even before the presentation began. Throughout the session, many attendees took notes, and after the presentation, there was vigorous business card exchange and information sharing. Many remarked that the session was “immediately applicable to the field” and something they “wanted to bring back to their teams.”

Key Insights from the Session

■ 1.KPI Design as a “Decision-Making Tool,” not Mere Visibility

At the beginning of the session, Morishita defined KPI as “a lens to maximize sales and profit through customer understanding.” He emphasized escaping superficial “just capturing numbers” or “just creating improvements” approaches by advocating three analytical frameworks:

・By magnitude: Clarify priorities based on revenue impact or market size.
・By comparison: Understand your position through relative evaluation against competitors or similar products.
・By timeline: Forecast the future based on KPI evolution after release.

■ 2.Beyond Diagnosis—Turning KPI Analysis into Prescriptive Action

Morishita stressed that visualizing KPIs is merely the entry point; the marketer’s role is to identify issues and translate them into concrete actions. In products like game apps where a small user segment contributes disproportionately (e.g., “top 10% generate 90% of revenue”), it’s vital to identify that cluster structure and design experiences or rewards tailored to those users.

■ 3.Balancing LTV and CPA with an n-Day LTV Practical Investment Lens

The session introduced the formula n-day LTV ≥ CPA as a practical decision-making axis. While longer payback periods expand investment flexibility, they also increase cash flow concerns and business risk. Thus, collaborating with finance, development, and product teams is essential, positioning ad budget decisions as business—not just marketing—decisions.

■ 4.Pitfalls of “Local Optima Marketers” and the Needed Mindset

Three common traps in actual practice include:

“Dashboard addiction” where trivial fluctuations overexcite marketers.

“Everyone is our target” disease where lack of targeting leads to vague messaging.

Overreliance on leading indicators (e.g., CPA or lead counts) termed “numbers-worship.”
Morishita advocated for traits like intellectual curiosity, persistence, and a sense of engagement with actual work, combining both quantitative and qualitative insight.

■ 5.Using KPIs as a Common Language — Empowering Marketers as Cross-Functional Leaders

Finally, Morishita argued that KPI design should serve not just marketing, but also as “a common language to converse with management, development, and operations.” He urged marketers to be cross-functional decision-makers, handling “numbers not for someone, but for our future.”

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Conclusion / Outlook

This session reaffirmed that Japanese app marketers and game publishers are growing increasingly focused on strategies and organization design that deliver results in the global market. It’s not only KPI redesign and analysis methods that matter, but also precision in investment and decision-making for overseas expansion. HARS Global aims to continue partnering deeply with clients across global marketing and app development, leveraging its strengths in product understanding, market insight, and bridging strategy with execution to create a foundation for “made-in-Japan” products to be chosen worldwide.