• by Ben Frederick  @mp_benfred, May 2, 2016

The cost to acquire a loyal user fell 8% -- down to $3.21 from February, according to a new index published by Fiksu, a mobile marketing tech company.

App download volume has also decreased 11% year-over-year (YoY) among the top 200 free iOS apps, down to 7.6 million daily downloads.

Fiksu says that according to the evidence at hand, the so-called "app frenzy" is slowing down, with users spending more time in a smaller number of apps — in fact, the average user spends 88% of their time in five apps.

Per comScore, most people aren’t downloading apps on a monthly basis because they aren’t even looking for new ones.

Advertisers have adjusted accordingly, trying to focus their efforts on users that already have some affinity for their brand. This has also changed the success metrics for the industry.

Fiksu is actually retiring its cost per install (CPI) index as a result of how drastically the app ecosystem has changed. The metric will continue to be used to calculate return on investment (ROI) by comparing how much it cost to acquire a user versus their lifetime value.

“App users aren't a single, monolithic group, and that's why advertisers can't measure against a single cost per install,” stated Micah Adler, CEO of Fiksu. “Smart marketers should be willing to spend different amounts for users that have different lifetime values."

As opposed to seeking after app downloads, more brands are looking for users that will remain loyal for a long period of time. Most marketers are aware that around 20% of their most loyal users bring in about 80% of revenues.