Push notifications, also known as marketing alerts, are a revolutionary but underutilized marketing tool.
Yet, despite their high conversion rate, they’re often perceived as intrusive if not executed properly – causing annoyance rather than engagement, leading to higher opt-out rates. You may have experienced this yourself several times.
Notifications that overwhelm and irrelevant messages are surefire ways to lose customers. It’s a common pain point for many users, which makes it a challenging tool for marketers to leverage. But it doesn’t have to be this way.
By following a set of ‘Do’s and Don’ts,’ you can turn the tables. And we’ll explore just how in this post. Learn what to do and what not to do to ensure you convert more customers and keep your audience engaged.
Do’s of Push Notifications and Marketing Alerts
How would you like to connect with your audience so well that they appreciate and look forward to your marketing alerts?
You can make that happen by following the best practices laid out here.
1. Segment your audience
Marketing alerts on their own are intrusive, but they are even more so when they are irrelevant. Imagine getting a notification inviting you to buy a ticket to a hockey game when you have no interest in sports.
You don’t want a one-size-fits-all approach.
Rather, you need to understand your audience, their preferences, pain points, and shopping behaviors and segment them accordingly. For example, create a segment for new customers, for leads who downloaded a free lead magnet, or for an age demographic between 18-25.
Segmenting your audience like this will help you craft personalized messages which will boost engagement and overall push notification effectiveness.
2. Plan your push notifications
The key to effective marketing alerts lies in strategic planning. This isn’t about sending messages randomly; instead, it requires a well-thought-out plan akin to a content calendar.
Your plan should outline when to send alerts, what they should contain, and who should receive them. This way, you ensure that your notifications are timely, relevant, and targeted.
Having a strategy or a plan for your marketing alerts means you’ll be timely and consistent. You also get teh opportunity to track your push notifications performance and find ways to tweak them to work better.
3. Optimize Timing
Timing is critical with push notifications.
The core of push notifications is that they happen in real-time, appearing when your audience is active online on their phones or their desktops.
You need to automate your push notifications and trigger them to appear when your audience is engaged online. Not only that, but you also have to take their previous behavior into consideration to time your marketing alerts and present the right message.
However, here’s a simple industry breakdown of when is the best time to send push messages:
- News: 10-12 pm and 5 pm
- Fashion & Lifestyle: 12 pm, 5 pm, 9 pm
- Travel: 9 pm
- BFSI: 10 am-3 pm and 7 pm
- Hospitality: 10 am, 2 pm, 8 pm-10 pm
- Entertainment: 8 pm-10 pm
- Education: 11 am-1 pm and 8 pm
- Healthcare: 12 pm
Start with these times as a baseline, but change your tactics as you learn more about what works for you.
4. Provide Value (Always)
Each alert should offer something useful or valuable to the recipient.
This could range from information and tips to special offers, discounts, or personalized recommendations.
By providing value, you not only pique your audience’s interest but also incentivize them to take action.
Also, you ensure that you don’t lose people who get frustrated with a lack of relevant content.
5. Use Clear and Concise Language
With the abundance of information and limited attention spans, it’s more important than ever to convey your message quickly and clearly.
Use short, concise, and clear language in your notifications to ensure your message is understood and appreciated.
Avoid the passive voice or independent clauses. Also, add emotion to your content with power words like: free, best, unlimited, reveal, and so on.
6. Test and Analyze
Just like any other marketing strategy, your push notifications should be consistently tested and analyzed.
By doing so, you can gain insights into what works best for your audience and continually refine your strategy.
This data-driven approach takes the guesswork out of your notification strategy and helps drive better results.
Start by launching your marketing alerts to a small group of people. And see how they respond to that. A surge in unsubscribes should warn you that it’s a poor idea and you need to rethink your content, timing, offer, or everything.
7. Use the right tools
The success of your marketing alerts will depend largely on the kind of platform you use.
And unless you have a development team and expertise in building your own marketing tools, it is best to invest in a marketing alerts platform.
The right tool will make push notification automation possible and enable analytics, personalization, and segmentation. By leveraging such a tool, you stand to make your marketing alert campaigns a seamless part of your overall marketing strategy.
Don’ts of Push Notifications and Marketing Alerts
Let’s break down the things you should avoid when you create marketing alerts.
1. Avoid Overwhelming Your Audience
While push notifications can be an effective tool to grab attention, an excess of them can lead to notification fatigue, causing annoyance and even leading users to opt out.
Strive for a balance – send enough to keep your users engaged without overwhelming them. If your audience hasn’t responded to one marketing message, the solution is not to barrage them with several more.
2. Avoid Non-interactive Notifications
Push notifications shouldn’t be a one-way street.
Aim to foster user interaction and engagement by crafting alerts to incite action.
This could be in the form of a question, a poll, or a call to action. For example: ‘Get the chance to win a free meal by playing a game!’
Making your notifications interactive is the key to getting more out of them.
3. Don’t Ignore Feedback
Feedback from your users is a valuable source of insight that can help you improve your alerts.
So, ask your audience about their experience and pay attention if they have feedback with your push notifications.
You have the chance to build a relationship when you take feedback seriously.
And also improve your marketing alert experience.
Start Leveraging Marketing Alerts
Marketing alerts and push notification tools are not just for getting attention but also for creating meaningful experiences for your audience.
Each alert is like a conversation, so make sure it adds value. With the right strategy, these simple alerts can greatly improve user engagement and business growth.
So, start leveraging marketing alerts, and you’ll soon see rapid growth in your business!
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Syed Balkhi is an award-winning entrepreneur and online marketing expert. He is the co-founder of OptinMonster, WPBeginner, MonsterInsights, and WPForms.