In the last few years, the explosion of mobile devices and services has meant that users now see the smartphone as an essential tool for everyday life.
According to the Deloitte 2015 report, 40 per cent of UK adults have now made a mobile commerce purchase with their phone; while 59 per cent have used their mobiles for browsing. Similar reports suggest this momentum shows little sign of slowing. If they’re not doing so already, brands must re-think how they incorporate mobile marketing into their customer engagement strategy. They must think about how mobile plays a key role in the customer purchasing journey – using the right channel, at the right time, with the right offer.
However there are challenges – brands must now compete with a wider collection of companies, all hoping to reach consumer through mobile offers and services, making it harder to attract attention. “Mobile” marketing, however, is not one dimensional. Smartphones give users the power to access information in many ways: through a web browser, email, SMS, or even via a brand’s app.
Savvy brands are also using push to break through the noise
A push notification is a message on a mobile device that alerts the user with a message displayed on the home or lock screen. The notification might draw attention to an updated service, or carry an offer via a branded mobile app. UK-based brand, Net-a-Porter, uses push to deliver updates on new content and products published on its app.
Yet a wider scepticism remains among marketing professionals over the effectiveness of push - especially for smaller brands who may not have the time, budget and technical ability to develop an app. This is understandable as there has been little research into the consumer appetite for this type of communication - until now.
Consumer attitudes towards push
In July 2015, we worked with OnDevice Research to survey 3,000 smartphone users in the US, UK and Germany; which explored consumer attitudes to push notifications and, more importantly, the brands that use them. Based on these findings, here are three reasons why brands should harness push:
1. Push is more valuable and effective than any other digital channel
There is an appetite for push – 61% of those surveyed stated that they currently choose to receive push notifications. Yet many brands are ignoring this opportunity, instead opting for activities such as promotional emails to engage with customers via mobile. However these mobile marketing efforts are limited, when compared with the current industry standard click-through rates - which sit at 10-20% for SMS and 3.2% for email. Our study found that push far outstrips these, with an average response rate of 55%.
On top of this, 23% of those surveyed ranked push notifications as their preferred mode of communication for brands and organisations on mobile – further proving its value as an effective mobile channel for engagement.
2. Push offers a fantastic opportunity to encourage path to purchase
As well as providing a channel for engagement, push notifications also appear to be an effective mobile channel for influencing a purchase decision.
The study found that of all of those who currently choose to receive push notifications, 40% of respondents indicated that they had made at least one purchase as a result of a push notification in the last 12 months. These purchases were largely made from the following three industries; Entertainment/Lifestyle (36%), Multimedia content (36%) and Retail (33%). When combined with the 22% of respondents who indicated that they would make more purchases if they received more offers; this represents a significant potential revenue-generating opportunity for brands – especially within these sectors.
Despite such a positive response to push, it is clearly still being underused as part of the customer journey for brands – 22% of those surveyed who had never made a purchase or redeemed an offer via a push notification, stated that it was because they had not received any.
3. Push for relevance
The survey also highlighted the importance of relevancy and control among consumers, especially when it comes to push notifications. A phenomenal 76% of those surveyed stated that they actively control their push notifications (turn on or off), with 54% of respondents claiming that they do this to ensure they are only receiving the messages most relevant to them – be it information or offers.
But brands should not be put off by this - 34% respondents indicated that they would make a purchase or redeem an offer if it was more relevant to them. Brands must ensure that their offers are personalised and hyper-relevant to consumers when using push.
So what about those smaller brands and organisations who do not already have an app?
To enable the capabilities of push, users are required to download an app to their device. Yet, for many smaller businesses and brands the development of apps, and the promotional drive behind them, are costly.
Sending push notifications via a mobile operator negates the need for the partner to develop its own app – it can use that of the operator. Through partnering with operators, brands of all sizes can enable push notifications to be sent to subscribers via operator self-care apps - for example in the UK, “O2 more”.
As well as enabling push, these apps include information on customer data usage and account details - providing brands with further contextual information that can guide relevancy when sending an offer to each customer.
As consumers increasingly turn to their mobile devices to inform purchase decisions, brands must respond. As the survey proves, push notifications offer a valuable way to do this and should be an essential mobile channel to reach customers.
However brands must also ensure they provide relevant experiences that reach the right customer with the right message, at the right time. For those that do not have the funds or technical experience to hand: partnering with operators to deliver push successfully, is a great way to be heard by today’s mobile-orientated customer.
By Alex Duncan, CEO, Openmind Networks
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