A mobile gaming startup in Latin America had built a compelling product with strong interface design, addictive mechanics, and a modest base of early adopters. But it was bleeding money fast. Despite receiving initial funding from private investors, the app's financial runway was rapidly shrinking due to unsustainable user acquisition costs and poor monetization. The marketing team was acquiring users at $1.83 per install, but only a small percentage were making deposits.
There were no attribution systems in place to track which campaigns were working. The development team treated paid advertising as a black box, trusting platform-reported numbers without verification. Investor confidence was deteriorating. The burn rate suggested the app wouldn't survive another funding round unless something changed fast. Multiple ad networks were running simultaneously with no budget caps, no channel performance comparison, and no visibility into whether traffic was real or fraudulent.
Pholus was brought in on a short-term advisory basis to evaluate the situation and make recommendations. What began as a marketing performance audit soon turned into a rescue mission. We had to stabilize operations, cut costs dramatically, and restore investor confidence before the company ran out of time and money.
This case study is relevant if you're facing:
Unsustainable user acquisition costs that are draining your runway faster than revenue can replace it. You're acquiring users through paid advertising, but the cost per install or cost per customer is so high that even with reasonable conversion rates, you're losing money on every cohort. Investors are questioning how long the company can survive at current burn rates, and you need to either fix the unit economics quickly or prepare for shutdown.
Marketing campaigns running without proper attribution or fraud detection systems. Your advertising platforms report impressive install numbers and conversion metrics, but you have no server-to-server tracking to verify those claims independently. You're essentially trusting self-reported data from vendors who have financial incentives to inflate their performance, and you have no way to distinguish real users from bot traffic or incentivized installs that will never convert.
Multiple ad networks running simultaneously with no performance comparison or accountability framework. You're spreading budget across various traffic sources, display networks, and affiliate partnerships without clear visibility into which channels deliver quality users versus which ones are burning money on junk traffic. Budget allocation happens based on intuition or vendor relationships rather than objective performance data, and there's no systematic process for cutting underperforming channels.
Low deposit or conversion rates despite strong product design and user engagement metrics. Users download your app, interact with the interface, and seem genuinely interested, but they're not taking the monetization actions you need them to take. The disconnect suggests problems with onboarding flow, messaging clarity, friction points in the deposit process, or misaligned targeting that brings in users who were never likely to convert regardless of product quality.
Investor pressure to demonstrate improved unit economics or face funding withdrawal. Your backers have issued warnings about burn rate, questioned your marketing team's competence, or threatened to pull future funding rounds if performance doesn't improve within a specific timeframe. You need measurable results fast, but you're uncertain whether the problem requires new leadership, different platforms, better targeting, or fundamental changes to your acquisition strategy.
We conducted a forensic audit of the marketing operation and discovered the acquisition problem was structural, not tactical. The team was acquiring users at $1.83 per install with no visibility into which campaigns delivered quality traffic versus fraudulent or low-intent installs. Advertising platforms were self-reporting conversions with no independent verification, meaning the company was making budget decisions based on inflated or inaccurate data. Multiple ad networks ran simultaneously with no spending caps or channel performance analysis, and there was no framework to distinguish valuable users from junk traffic that would never monetize.
We implemented server-to-server postback tracking to eliminate self-reported metrics and establish true attribution. Working with the development team, we integrated S2S tracking across the mobile app and each advertising platform. This move enabled precise attribution of installs, deposits, and user behavior to specific campaigns and traffic sources. It immediately exposed which campaigns had been falsely claiming credit for conversions and allowed the team to shut down wasteful spend that had previously appeared profitable based on platform-reported data alone.
We leveraged relationships with high-quality ad networks to reduce fraud and improve bidding efficiency. Pholus connected the client with multiple advertising partners we had worked with previously in Latin American markets, including sources not on their radar that specialized in health, wellness, and consumer trust-building verticals. These networks offered improved ad placements, better fraud controls, and optimized bidding strategies. Within 10 days, cost per acquisition dropped from $1.83 to $0.14, a 92% reduction that immediately extended runway and restored investor confidence in the business model.
We advised targeted conversion funnel improvements and prepared investor communications that stabilized funding. Beyond traffic acquisition, we identified friction points in the onboarding and first-deposit flow. Messaging was tightened, calls-to-action were reordered, and user experience barriers were removed. Deposit rates improved 15% within the first month. We also prepared a private investor brief showing new unit economics, improved campaign performance, and an accountability framework for ongoing spend. Investor sentiment stabilized, and concerns about marketing waste were significantly reduced.
However, when we attempted to implement longer-term governance reforms, internal resistance from the development team revealed deeper cultural problems that made sustained engagement untenable, and we chose to conclude the project rather than compromise our standards.
The full case study details the forensic audit methodology that exposed hidden fraud and waste, the S2S tracking implementation process that restored attribution accuracy, the ad network partnership framework that reduced acquisition costs by 92%, and the governance assessment that led us to walk away when cultural alignment proved impossible
If your user acquisition costs are unsustainable, your marketing campaigns lack proper attribution or fraud detection, or investor pressure is mounting due to poor unit economics, Pholus provides rapid diagnostic audits, technical infrastructure fixes, and network partnerships that can dramatically reduce costs and extend runway.
This expertise also applies when you suspect traffic quality problems but can't prove them, need to implement tracking systems your development team has resisted, or require fast results to satisfy stakeholder demands while preserving long-term operational integrity.