How push notifications improve user engagement and retention

Fortunately, plenty of modern tools can help build a solid approach to extending a customer's lifetime value. Here, I will focus specifically on push as one of the most powerful user retention tools.

Engagement and retention tools for marketers: A quick overview

Here are the most popular tools used by brands to engage users and motivate them to return to websites and apps:

• Email marketing (the third leading marketing channel according to Statista.com)
• CRM systems (according to webfx.com, 91% of businesses with 10 or more employees use CRM systems)
• Chat bots (as per Salesforce research, 23% of service organizations already use chatbots, and 31% of them are planning to integrate them into current strategies)
• Paywalls (Inma’s research that involved 473 websites showed that 41% of them used paywalls)
• Push notifications: web push for browsers and mobile notifications for apps (according to the CleverTap survey, this channel was adopted by 78% of businesses)

Push notifications as a part of a marketing strategy

One survey revealed that 57% of users find push notifications useful and willingly subscribe. That’s pretty inspiring, isn’t it?

Why are push notifications so effective?

Let's look at what's so great about push notifications and see what makes them so effective as a marketing tool.

Push is easy to implement in your strategy

In many cases, it only takes a few minutes and involves simple additions to a website code. Besides, some providers offer plugins that can be quickly integrated into WordPress-based websites.

Web and in-app push notifications are delivered only to users who have opted in to receiving the notifications

This means that push alerts are only sent to the interested audience who opted-in — making the whole experience very non-intrusive. Brands can motivate website visitors to subscribe more actively by using customized opt-in requests like this one:

It is easy for users to opt in

They don’t need to share any personal details and can subscribe with one or two clicks, depending on the opt-in request type. It can even be automated for mobile push: apps on older Android versions don’t require user confirmation.

Push notifications can directly generate extra revenue

Many providers offer monetization plans that allow you to send messages with ads alongside regular messages from your brand. Unlike other channels, push notifications allow you to set the ad frequency, choose ad topics, and boost your project’s profit thanks to additional revenue coming from users interacting with ads.

What are some peculiarities of push notifications?

Overall, push notifications are an easy and intuitive tool for marketers. Still, there are some nuances you need to understand in order to get the most out of this channel.

What should you consider when using push?

Operating system limitations

Push notifications have the same design. You can change text, images and add emojis, but the layout of all these elements as well as the notification size will stay the same and this unifies the message format. So, keep in mind the image resolution and the number of symbols you add to the message.

Besides, some operating systems can also control push notifications on-screen time or their sounds.

Multichannel settings

Subscription to push notifications is always linked to a particular browser and device. If a user subscribed from several devices, it is not always easy to track and connect all their accounts.

However, this is not quite an issue. On the contrary, it ensures a better reach— for example, if one device is offline, another will still receive all the messages. Overall, this only boosts a user's interaction with a brand.

Deliverability

A user doesn’t control the time when notifications arrive and may miss some of them. Moreover, if a device is offline, a push won’t arrive immediately after it is sent. This is an essential point to consider when choosing the push provider: it makes sense to ask how push is delivered once a device is connected to the Internet again. For example, the Notix push service has a time-to-live feature: the provider will keep attempting to deliver a message until a set deadline expires.

Case study: How a Brazilian media group use push to engage audience

To show the effectiveness of push on a real-life example, we will use the case study with Contteudo — a large media group that runs several content websites.

Contteudo was already familiar with push as a marketing channel — but their subscribers were not active enough.

With the help of the Notix managers and their tips on the strategy, which involved more engaging messages with emojis, scheduling of push, monetization, and the right choice of the opt-in prompt, Contteudo significantly increased their retention rates.

In two months, they achieved the following results:

• Fresh database: Notix helped collect 3.4 million subscribers within two months, and new subscribers keep joining the base — about 100,000 users daily.
• The number of clicks started growing: It proved that subscribers were truly active and engaged.
• Growing ROI and bigger revenue: With the Notix monetization plan, subscribers began seeing and interacting with ads, generating extra revenue for the media group.

This case study is not the only example of successful work with push — and you are welcome to join Notix to build your own push strategy with the most modern push notifications tools.