A week ago, I wrote here about push notifications and why should you use them. Now, when your customers are at a certain place, you can get even more creative and send context-specific notifications to educate, entertain or drive them to your location.
Push notifications were first introduced by Apple in 2009. Since then, they have become one of the most basic mobile app elements. The ability to deliver notifications that are instantly seen is the biggest benefit of mobile apps in general. Nowadays, we are always on our mobile phones and we check them up to 200 times per day. So mobile phones are the main screen in our lives. This is why mobile push notifications are an efficient way to communicate effectively with your customers.
Everyone has an individual set of heavily used apps. Such as instant messaging apps, social media, and streaming apps. And also mobile wallets, the service behind ever-increasing mobile payments. Start-ups and small businesses can use mobile wallets instead of wasting time and money for developing a custom mobile app. To start sending your own push notifications, you can create your coupons, stamp cards, point cards, membership cards, and other loyalty and customer cards and deliver them to your customers’ mobile wallets.
They may be called push notifications, but you shouldn’t push too hard. Make sure that each push notification you send out has a purpose and delivers great value to your customer. Strive to write smart copies that have a human touch. I know it’s challenging in the limited space that is available on the lock screen.
Location-Based Notifications Are Powerful
Getting the right message at the right time to the right people can help you a lot. Your digital coupons, stamp cards, point cards, membership cards, and other loyalty and customer cards are hiding another powerful feature. You can add GPS coordinates of up to ten predefined locations where the particular piece of content is relevant. And you can prepare a location-specific message for each of those locations.
This relevance information is passive. To make the long story short, it helps your customers find your digital content when they need it. The mobile wallet offers your digital coupon or customer card on the lock screen of your customer’s mobile phone upon arriving at one of the predefined places together with the corresponding message.
Location-based notifications feel extremely relevant. People would see your location-specific message right on the lock screen in exactly the place and time they need it. They would then just tap and use the coupon or customer card for action in the real world.
Surprise people and delight them. For example, a food truck, local restaurant, or sandwich store could spice up a grey and rainy day by showing up with a lunch special on the lock screen of people who have their customer card and that are within the defined area. If your retail store has a last-minute deal or a flash sale, why don’t you just alert your customers who have your loyalty card and are close enough to take action? Coffee shops could use their stamp cards to notify customers within a certain distance of their location to stop by to check a new coffee from Cameroon.
Ladislav Poledna inspires readers to “Become Digital” by publishing materials about digital marketing in his Prague Monitor column and aptly named blog. He has built a career around developing successful customer relationships for the past two decades. At present, Ladislav manages the Power Solutions division of the world’s leading producer of engines, batteries, and outdoor power equipment in Central and Eastern Europe and also oversees operations of the company’s regional office in Prague. Recently, he co-founded a B-to-B software service company making mobile marketing affordable and easy to use. Ladislav’s philanthropic contribution consists of a long-term relationship with a charity focused on funding dreams for people with muscular dystrophy.
Mobile phones are long becoming the main “screen” in peoples’ lives. Mobile marketing is no longer an innovation but a part of important decisions. Read articles on mobile marketing to get inspired on how to connect with people where they spend a lot of their time. Become Digital.
