Stock Broker App Marketing: How We Drove 180K Installs for a Fintech App

In mid-2025, we began working with a SEBI-registered discount brokerage that had recently launched a mobile trading app. The app offered zero-brokerage equity trading, mutual fund investments, and an IPO application feature—a competitive but growing segment dominated by well-funded players like Zerodha and Groww.

The client's existing install base was small—around 12,000 downloads, mostly from word-of-mouth among existing web platform customers. They had tried running Google UAC campaigns independently but saw CPIs of ₹25–₹35 and poor quality: users were installing but not completing KYC verification or making their first trade. The effective cost per active trader was north of ₹400—commercially unsustainable.

The brief was clear: get to 200,000 installs within 9 months, but focus on quality. We needed installs from users likely to complete KYC and trade—not just download and forget. The fintech regulatory environment added another constraint: certain ad creatives and targeting approaches that work for consumer apps are restricted for financial products under SEBI and Meta's financial advertising policies.

We identified three root causes of the client's poor earlier results:

1. Wrong keyword positioning. The app was ranking for generic terms like "trading app" and "share market app"—high volume but low intent. Users searching these terms are often early explorers, not ready-to-trade investors.
2. Incorrect optimisation event in UAC. The campaigns were optimising for installs, not post-install events. Google's algorithm was finding users most likely to tap "Install"—a very different population from users likely to complete a 12-step KYC process.
3. No trust signal in store creative. The screenshots led with features (charts, portfolio view) rather than trust signals (SEBI registration, bank-grade security, 4.7★ rating). Fintech is a trust-first category—users need reassurance before they will hand over PAN card details and bank account credentials.

Our plan addressed all three: restructure ASO around trust and intent keywords, switch UAC to CPA optimisation targeting KYC completion, and redesign store creative to foreground trust signals.

Trust keyword expansion. We conducted keyword research specifically around the intent signals that high-quality trading app users exhibit. Instead of just "trading app", we targeted: "SEBI registered broker app", "zero brokerage app India", "demat account open free", "best broker for beginners", and long-tail keywords like "how to buy IPO from mobile". These keywords have lower search volume but dramatically higher conversion rates because the searcher is further down the decision funnel.

Metadata restructure. We rewrote the app title to include "SEBI Registered" and the primary keyword. The subtitle led with the zero-brokerage proposition. In the long description (which Google Play indexes for search), we wove in 22 target keywords naturally, emphasised regulatory credentials in the first 150 words, and included a structured "Why Trust Us?" section addressing common security concerns.

Store creative redesign. The new screenshot set led with a trust-first message: "SEBI Registered. Bank-Grade Security. ₹0 Brokerage." Screenshots 2–5 then demonstrated the core features. We tested two icon variants and two screenshot sets via Google Play Store Listing Experiments. The trust-first variant lifted install conversion rate by 34% over the feature-first original.

Rating improvement programme. The app had a 3.9★ rating—acceptable but not reassuring for a financial product. We implemented the Play In-App Review API at the moment after a user's first successful trade. Within 60 days, the rating improved to 4.5★, adding approximately 800 organic installs/month from the conversion rate improvement alone.

Google UAC restructured for quality. We rebuilt the UAC campaigns from scratch with two objectives: one campaign optimising for app installs (for volume and algorithm learning) and one campaign optimising for "KYC Started" as the in-app event. The KYC-optimised campaign ran at a higher CPA bid but delivered users 4x more likely to complete the activation flow.

Creative assets were completely refreshed: we produced 8 video assets (15s and 30s) featuring real trader testimonials (actors playing personas of the target demographic—salaried professionals and self-employed individuals between 24–38 years old), 12 image assets across all aspect ratios, and 5 text asset variants emphasising zero brokerage and ease of KYC.

Meta campaigns for intent audiences. On Meta, we targeted interest segments that indicated active investing intent: Zerodha and Groww page followers, NSE and BSE pages, "Stock Market India" groups, and financial literacy content consumers. We avoided broad interest categories like "Finance" which delivered poor-quality users at equivalent CPIs.

We also built a retargeting campaign targeting users who had visited the client's web platform but not downloaded the app—a high-intent audience that converted to KYC at 3x the rate of cold audiences.

CPI network for tier-2 volume. We supplemented Google and Meta with CPI network campaigns targeting tier-2 cities (Jaipur, Indore, Nagpur, Lucknow, Coimbatore) where both CPIs and competition from larger brokers were lower. These campaigns delivered installs at ₹5–₹7, with post-install filtering ensuring only quality installs were counted and paid for.

Over 9 months of the engagement, the results exceeded the original brief:

• 180,000 total installs across all channels (target was 200K; ahead of pace by month 8)
• ₹8 blended CPI (down from ₹28–₹35 before engagement)
• 28% D30 retention — defined as users who logged in at least once in days 25–35 after install — versus an industry average of 18–22% for trading apps
• 22% KYC completion rate among all installs — meaning approximately 39,600 users completed full account activation and became active traders
• 4.5★ average rating on Google Play (up from 3.9★ at start of engagement)
• Page 1 rankings for 14 target keywords, including "zero brokerage app", "demat account app free", and "best trading app for beginners India"

Note: These are anonymised client results shared with permission. Individual results will vary based on app quality, category, and market conditions.

1. In high-trust categories, ASO is about credibility, not just keywords. For fintech, health, and legal apps, users do not just search for features—they search for reasons to trust. "SEBI registered trading app" converts better than "best trading app" because the former speaks directly to the user's primary concern. Build your keyword strategy around the objections you need to overcome, not just the features you want to showcase.

2. Optimise for the user you actually want, not just any user. Optimising UAC campaigns for installs is almost always the wrong choice for high-activation-cost apps. Every campaign should optimise for the deepest event your volume allows—registration, KYC, first transaction. The CPI will be higher, but the cost per activated user will be dramatically lower.

3. Tier-2 cities are an underexplored opportunity for fintech. While metros were already competitive, tier-2 cities showed strong appetite for zero-brokerage trading with significantly lower CPIs. The users from these markets also showed comparable D30 retention to metro users—a finding that has since informed our approach to several other fintech clients.

4. Store ratings compound. The 0.6-star improvement in the app's rating was not just a feel-good metric—it translated into a measurable lift in organic install conversion and an improvement in editorial consideration from Google Play's curation team.

If you are marketing a fintech app and facing similar challenges around install quality and cost, talk to our team. We specialise in user acquisition and ASO for regulated and high-trust categories. See also our crypto app marketing case study for a related challenge in a different regulated vertical.