About Aha
Aha is a leading Telugu on-demand video streaming platform, offering a wide range of movies and TV shows tailored to Telugu audiences worldwide. With a mission to make diverse Telugu content accessible to every household, Aha has rapidly expanded since its launch in 2020, now capturing 55% of the global market share and reaching 60% of Telugu households in key international markets like the U.K., U.S., Canada, and Australia.
As Aha continues to grow and diversify its content offerings, the company faces new challenges in user acquisition and engagement.
Challenge: Combating fraud and maximizing organic channel performance
To expand its user base, Aha increasingly relied on ad networks and agencies for user acquisition. While this strategy fueled growth, it also introduced a significant challenge: fraudulent installs. Aha observed that 28% of app installs were fraudulent, leading to inflated ad spend and costly payments for false attributions.
Aha also struggled to accurately track the performance of organic and owned channels, including push notifications, SMS, and in-app messages. Most installs went unattributed, creating an overreliance on paid channels and making it difficult to optimize customer acquisition costs (CAC).
Aha needed a solution to tackle fraud, close attribution gaps, and gain visibility into the true performance of both paid and organic efforts.
Solution: Comprehensive fraud prevention and attribution
Tackling fraud with comprehensive rules and thresholds
Aha deployed Branch’s fraud detection features, using a combination of universal, standard, and custom fraud rules to block fraudulent attribution data and regain control over its ad spend.
Branch’s universal fraud rules provided the first line of defense, automatically blocking common fraud, such as installs from Tor networks and suspicious IP addresses. These universal protections safeguarded Aha from the most common forms of fraud without any manual intervention.
Aha then activated Branch’s recommended standard fraud rules, adding an extra layer of security. These rules filtered out fraudulent activities like click injection, where fake clicks are inserted between app download and installation to claim credit for installs. By monitoring conversion times, Aha blocked installs occurring too quickly after the click — an indicator of click fraud. Aha also enforced device conflict rules to prevent mismatches between the device that clicked the ad and the device where the app was installed.
To further refine its fraud prevention efforts, Aha designed custom thresholds tailored to individual ad agencies. By setting specific limits on the number of clicks, impressions, and installs, Aha could quickly identify abnormal spikes in activity that signaled fraudulent behavior.
“At Aha OTT, we were struggling with fraudulent installations, so we implemented a solution to address fraud and improve our ad performance. We used Branch’s fraud detection features and set custom thresholds for our agencies to identify suspicious activity. Enhancing our fraud prevention efforts reduced fraudulent installs by 82% and clicks by 80%.”
Santhosh Kumar Reddy Thelukuntla, Head of Retention and Business Strategy
Arha Media & Broadcasting Private Limited
Holistic attribution across channels with Quick Links
Next, Aha improved visibility into its owned and earned channels by implementing Branch Quick Links — trackable deep links — across all user touchpoints, including push notifications, social media, SMS, WhatsApp, email, and in-app messages. These Quick Links direct users to specific content within the app and capture valuable data on user interactions, such as click sources and subsequent actions.
Through deep link data analysis, Aha uncovered which channels were most effective in driving subscriptions and how various touchpoints influenced user behavior. This analysis not only showed where users originated but also detailed their engagement with the app after clicking a link. Armed with this data, Aha was able to refine its marketing spend, focusing on the most impactful strategies and targeting specific user cohorts, which significantly improved campaign performance.
Results
By implementing Branch’s linking and measurement solutions, Aha made significant improvements to both fraud reduction and channel performance.
Aha reduced fraudulent installs from 28% to 5%, cutting out false attributions and optimizing its ad spend. Fraudulent clicks dropped by over 80%, allowing Aha to pay only for legitimate user activity and improve data quality.
Aha’s cross-channel attribution efforts led to a 30% increase in non-paid attribution. By optimizing targeting based on channel performance insights, Aha increased its subscriptions coming from owned channels by 17%. The company also reduced spend on WhatsApp and SMS communications by 10%.
Looking ahead, Aha plans to deepen its use of Branch’s solutions by exploring smart banners, SEO attribution, and in-app content sharing. These next steps will further enhance its ability to track user behavior and drive organic growth in a highly competitive over-the-top (OTT) landscape.
“We’ve been able to address two major issues effectively. First, Branch’s fraud detection capabilities have significantly reduced fraudulent installs and traffic, resulting in substantial cost savings and a better return on ad spend (ROAS). Second, with the use of Quick Links across all organic channels, we’ve gained clarity on which channels drive the most valuable traffic. This has enabled us to target customers more effectively and invest in the right areas to maximize ROI.”
Santhosh Kumar Reddy Thelukuntla, Head of Retention and Business Strategy
Arha Media & Broadcasting Private Limited
