Imagine a day your friend comes to pay you a visit and, due to an unfortunate turn of events, your doorbell malfunctions because of an electrical fault. Your friend tries to send you a message, but your phone has run out of charge. He’s hesitant to knock on the door due to the fear of waking your new-born. Alas! He retraces and you never learn of the fact that your friend had come to pay you a visit. While this example is unlikely to play out in real life (or it might, because the universe has a rather strange way of functioning), it is highly possible for important information to not get relayed to you on time.
Push notifications are pop-up messages that you receive even when a certain application on your smartphone remains closed. Ever heard jokes about how Duolingo’s passive-aggressive push notification system is highly motivating for its users to continue learning a new language? Think of all the important news updates about flight delays and traffic jams due to road accidents that flashed up on your personal devices, even when you were not actively reading the news, that ended up saving your day?
If you are running a business and have launched a new app, then chances are, the users who end up downloading it are yet to explore the entire gamut of its functionality. A very convenient method to ensure that your users are not deprived of all that your app has to offer is by installing a push notification service on your app. Push notifications are all about sitting up and making you take notice, and that makes it a highly effective tool if you are trying to build a user base for your app.
Listed below are six reasons as to why push notifications are so important in the current age for app marketing:
Personal Appeal
As opposed addressing someone generically like ‘Excuse me, madam/sir?”, it is likely for the individual to pay more attention to you when you allude to them by their name. Think of the popular Zomato push notifications which light up your day immediately with their customised short and sweet messages, looking something like ‘Excuse me, Anisha, are you hungry?’ A simple, personal message reminding Anisha to take care of her body while she is immersed in work, is highly likely to make her take some time off and engage with the message without mercilessly writing it off.
Using people’s names, especially their first names, is a fool proof way of making them pay attention to you. That is exactly how push notifications work. People are much more likely to sit up and take notice of a speech, or written material if they find their names being said out loud, or written down somewhere.
Makes You Pay Attention
Life is all about stumbling upon things that you were not looking for, only to realise how convenient life would have been, if you’d have found them earlier. Consider how efficiently a push notification facilitates that process. It makes you pay attention to avenues and options you would not have otherwise looked into. A notification’s job is to alert people about something; and it’s even better if it relates to, or meets the immediate requirement of the user. It holds the potential to bring about a change in the mood of the user. It can be about acquiring a splendid deal at their nearest grocery store, or about their favourite movie star visiting a theatre near their place. A little effort goes a long way. This is why push notifications are short and sweet, yet so impactful!
Less Words, More Action
Push notifications don’t need to say a lot, and they don’t. The structure of a push notification consists of a title, followed by a very short description of what you should expect if you choose to press on the notification. If you wish to, you can even include a picture or the thumbnail of a video clip on the push notification in order to increase its visual appeal.
While leading extremely hectic lives, most people are not in the headspace to read lengthy paragraphs on why they should consider buying a certain product, or why they should install an application, for that matter. While such decisions are taken after putting much thought and time into a matter, push notifications do the job of getting the users interested in the first place. Brevity is the key, and keywords are your best friends!
Perfect Timing
As humans, we always keep harping on the importance of perfect timing. Setting ideal timings to deliver push notifications can go a long way in increasing their effectiveness and appeal. Add to that, geographic locations. How about checking up on one’s hunger levels as they are getting off work. A quick pop-up message regarding the availability of discounts at a pizzeria near their home might work wonders. Or, asking if someone is in the mood for a wholesome breakfast before they start their day, say, at around 8 am? Imagine scheduling push notifications in such a manner, that it’s almost as if your immediate wishes were being granted as you see an offer related to your cravings pop up on the screen of your smartphone!
After figuring out the details of achieving the perfect timing, unlock the true potential of push notifications to enhance the appeal of your application.
Optimal Usage of Installed Applications
Ever installed an app, and then you somehow lost the motivation to engage with it on a regular basis? One day, you see the app as nothing more than a junk object taking up way too much space in your storage system and you decide to simply do away with it. Well, push notifications are here to remind users why they installed the application in the first place, and how to use it optimally.
The application might get upgrades and new features, and you would want to tell the users how the application has improved, and if possible, give a demo to pique the interest of the user. Flash up a card that informs the user that they are being missed. Notify them of how many other users are satisfied with the application. Or simply, remind them of why they found the application useful in the first place!
Serve as Reminders
Let’s say you wanted to take a new step towards your health and fitness goals. You wanted to track your calorie intake, or achieve your 10,000 steps goal for the day. After getting home exhausted, very obviously, you forget the exact number of steps you’ve taken that day, and lose a track of how many more steps you need to cover to hit the 10k target.
In another deterring instance, let’s say, you wanted to buy something off Amazon but you left it in the cart and forgot to check out. Now the item is about to go out of stock, and there is no knowing when it will be available again.
Human minds are simple. They tend to forget things, even if they sincerely want to achieve certain goals. A simple push notification motivates one to get the job done right then and there, especially when it serves as a reminder that you can still get it done! While the tone of the push notification is motivational, there’s also a time factor that urges users to act on the message when the users receive it. It is perhaps a task that needs to be completed before the day runs out, or even that particular hour. The item(s) are purchased before they run out of stock, and the steps are taken, one by one, to ultimately add up to a total 10,000 and more.
The user not only stays on top of their game after being relentlessly reminded of why they set out to achieve a certain goal, but also feels more engaged with the application, and is likely to continue using it after being satisfied with the results they achieve after using it.
Push notifications are a game changer in the way app marketing works. You can not only utilise them to inspire users to install the application in the first place, but also use it as a handy tool when it comes to sustaining the likability and relevance of your app to the user.
Your favourite YouTube subscription wants you to press the bell icon, so that you are informed every time they upload a new video. It is a bummer when you realise months later that you have missed out on their content if you did not have the bell clicked. Recall the example of the malfunctioning doorbell mentioned at the beginning of the article? When you replace that with a functional doorbell, you are much less likely to miss out on your friend’s visit to your place. Similarly with push notifications, your target audience finds a way to extensively engage with your vision and creation, thereby reinstating the success of your brand.
