App Marketing 101: Push Notification Dos and Don’ts
Using push notifications with your app marketing plan can be extremely instrumental in creating brand awareness while increasing engagement with potential clients. It’s not as easy, however, as simply sending information out into the virtual universe. If you aren’t mindful of your execution, your notifications can have the opposite effect than intended.
Don’t
Sometimes eliminating what you should not do is half the battle. Here are a few practices to avoid.
- Be Irrelevant
Push notifications are a wonderful tool to communicate information … unless, of course, that info is completely irrelevant to that person. Do not send notifications for goods or services that the consumer has never been shown to have an interest in. If they come to expect your notifications to be less than enthralling, they are less likely to engage or continue receiving them.
- Disregard Timing
If you are trying to engage with a demographic that tends to have school aged children, avoid the late night notifications. Trying to get the college crowd’s attention? A 5 a.m. wake-up alert probably won’t make you any friends. Poorly timed push notifications can easily be over-looked, disregarded or, worse, perceived as a nuisance. Figure out the time your client base is most likely to be awake and available to increase your chances of a positive reception and potential engagement.
- Spam
Driving a mobile app user crazy with continual information, no matter the content, won’t benefit your brand. Set a limit that best fits with your preferred demographic and make sure alerts they do receive get noticed. Don’t make the mistake of thinking the app user will welcome all notifications relevant to their interests; overkill in any capacity is still overkill.
Do
Once you’ve eliminated the pitfalls, there are a few things to take your push notifications to the next level.
- Personalize
Know your audience base and create notifications specifically based on their interests, needs and purchasing patterns. Don’t send parenting information to a teen age demographic and keep the racy updates away from the G-rated crowd. Not everyone on your list needs the same information sent to them so be sure to prioritize who gets what. Every notification sent from your brand should have a purpose and create a situation where the person receiving it will be likely to engage.
- Keep an Eye on Metrics
When creating a live campaign through your mobile app, you have the perfect opportunity to see exactly what works within your consumer base. Keep an eye on metrics and take note of which types of push notifications get the warmest welcomes and result in high engagement as well as which ones are being ignored. Watching the numbers in real time allows you to make tweaks during your campaign, removing aspects that are proving to be more detrimental than constructive to your brand. Take note, also, of the extent of impact of new ideas so you can expand on them in future campaigns or even the current one if they unexpectedly take off.
Using your app for marketing to mobile users can greatly enhance your brand recognition and engagement. Take the time to create a marketing plan that is beneficial and avoid common pitfalls that can have a damaging effect.
