The "let's say they are only 25% as good" is a bad assumption. The real downloads you get from increased app store ranking are as good as any others you'll get.

The "let's say they are only 25% as good" is a bad assumption. The real downloads you get from increased app store ranking are as good as any others you'll get. The ratio - 20K real downloads from 20K incentivized, or 1:1 - is also a bad assumption. Here the actual ratio varies wildly, depending on how much the incentivized installs actually influence your app ranking. It's a feast or famine situation - spend too little, and your ratio will be closer to 1:10, since your ranking won't have moved enough to influence organic traffic. Spend sufficiently, and your ratio will be closer to 10:1, if not higher. The LTV of 3:1 is also a bad assumption - I've worked with firms who would spend at breakeven all day long, often because they wanted to grow their user base into an acquisition or use it for future in-house cross-promotion. Many others are happy to make (say) $1.50 on $1.00 spend. My experience agrees with the parent comment - anyone that has the budget to buy incentivized downloads does buy incentivized downloads, except for a small proportion of developers who strongly disagree with the practice. It simply works too well.