When it relates to eCommerce, adopting high-performing advertising strategies is critical to achieving the desired & expected sales. Nowadays, there are many marketing solutions accessible, but just a few of them operate effectively with little testing & give great returns.
In this post, we'll examine two of today's most effective marketing methods: SMS & Push Notification marketing.
Many marketing professionals are seeking the most effective approach to convey information regarding a brand or an item to a client. They make every attempt to develop a devoted consumer who might install & utilize their brand application. It's natural for an inexperienced marketer to think, "Tada, we've got them!" as the people have installed their apps. A smartphone app is a direct conduit for providing clients with information that will benefit both the organization as well as the client.
Definitions of Push notifications and SMS
Push Notifications
Push notifications are brief pop-ups that appear on a screen that includes not just text, but also noises, icons, photos, hyperlinks, attachments, or interactive buttons. On the one side, engagement levels, entertainment, and customer loyalty. On the other hand, having the opt-in/opt-out authorization and the ability to customize push notification settings, could be bothersome for certain users or drive them to remove your program.
Push notifications are important as they may notify users of activities, such as those on an e-commerce app. They can urge users to do something regarding the app, alert them regarding accomplishments or progress, offers gained in an app, and also display recent conversation messages if it is a social media app.
Swipecart's AI-based push notification tool may improve buyer satisfaction by delivering push alerts about special deals at the appropriate location and time. Push notifications, unlike SMS, are inexpensive and infinite in quantity. There are two ways to send push notifications: choose a third-party provider or design your app. You can design your app yourself without investing in expensive development with Swipecart’s No-code drag-and-drop mobile app builder.
Push notifications have specific standards & ethics for mobile marketers, like delivering helpful, engaging, & clear content, minimizing early hours, not being sticky, and so forth. This allows this technique to remain very successful, with up to a 65 percent open rate.
Today, nine out of ten businesses want push notifications in their mobile apps, and 70% of those that want push notifications also want social & geolocation capabilities. An organization may use this strategy to integrate the implementation costs of a push with their mobile app development expenditures while also obtaining a channel of absolutely free and limitless communications.
SMS
SMS Marketing is the practice of delivering customized text messages to consumers to advertise, inform, or notify them about a business’ services. It is a type of marketing that many entrepreneurs miss. SMS stands for short messaging service, & it has grown in popularity as a digital marketing approach due to the convenience in which text messages may be delivered.
You could assume that this marketing strategy is out of date and useless. You are completely incorrect! SMS marketing may boost consumer engagement, generate traffic to your website or store, and give you useful information about what performs best for customers.
As per CTIA, 57% of persons aged 18 to 29 utilize their smartphones for texting. Furthermore, it is anticipated that over 2 billion SMS messages are being sent or received in the United States alone every day, making SMS Marketing an excellent approach to contact customers and re-engage with dedicated clients who have opted out from your site.
Push notifications vs. SMS: What's the difference?
Push alerts & SMS are both valuable in their own right. Following is a point-to-point comparison of how push notifications & SMS compete against one another based on several parameters.
Not enough time to read through this section? Don't be concerned! Everything is summarized in the points below. Examine it!
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1. Type and duration of content
Push notifications, in principle, have no content limitations. They may contain both text and graphics. Nevertheless, push notifications have a word limit to ensure that your message appears correctly on your mobile screen.
Notifications for Android smartphones are typically between 60 and 90 words, and less than 120 for iOS. According to a report, push notifications containing 10 or fewer words had the highest click rate.
SMS messages could only include text characters. There is also a character restriction of 160 characters. If more content is required, it is given in the form of numerous SMS messages. Many recent mobile devices enable concatenation, which reconstructs messages of up to 1600 characters on the recipient's device so that they are displayed as a single message.
2. Methods for opting in/out
The way receivers opt to receive push alerts and SMS differs significantly.
Before sending messages through SMS, organizations must obtain permission from receivers. A verbal or written agreement is necessary for informative, non-telemarketing SMS. Businesses must get specific written authorization for marketing or sales objectives. Consent can be obtained through the use of an opt-in text message.
To withdraw from a business's SMS messaging, receivers commonly react to the text conversation with a single word, like UNSUBSCRIBE or STOP. They would then be automatically deleted from future correspondence.
Meanwhile, permission for push notifications is entirely different. To enable notifications as an in-app function, users must go to the application's settings. They can also enable notifications by going to their device's settings panel. The same method goes for opt-out.
3. Screen display
Push notifications frequently appear on your screen, so unless you tap on the message right away, it will vanish to your lock screen. The push notification will remain on your lock screen unless you swipe or dismiss it. If you get a lot of push alerts from other applications, your lock screen may become cluttered.
SMS notifications resemble push notifications in appearance but vary in a few ways. You have the option of seeing a glimpse of the content or not seeing a preview & receiving simply one simple alert. In general, the latter could be preferred for greater privacy.
SMS texts are also saved separately on your smartphone than push alerts. If you don't read a text message right away, it is saved in your usual messenger app, where you may view it at any time.
4. Compatible Devices
Text messages may be received by any smartphone or cell telephone, even feature phones & outdated phones that are only compatible with GSM or CDMA networks. Gadgets that aren't linked to a cellular network, on the contrary hand, can't receive texts - even if they have the possibility of connecting to a network but aren't now connected.
Meanwhile, all current cell phones provide push notifications. Furthermore, desktop applications and web browsers can get push alerts. Nevertheless, feature phones lack these functions. Only modern devices may get push notifications.
5. Message Transmission
It is possible to send and receive text messages. Text messages may be sent & received using any gadget that is linked to a cellular network.
Push notifications, on the contrary hand, are only issued by application developers, and viewers can only read the message. Push notifications, therefore, are one-way interactions, but SMS texts are often two-way communications.
Marketing via Push notifications
ASO revolves around keywords whenever it comes to searches.
Push notifications are frequently effective in directing users to a specific goal. It might be anything from finishing a payment to upgrading to the most recent version of the program. If you wish to keep the push notification authorization, your messages must provide immediate value.
Push notifications, thankfully, are quite adaptable, and you may use them to provide information about:
Promotional notifications- These include things like flash sales, discounts, continuing offers, coupons, and so on.
Reminder notification- It includes things like watching the introduction or onboarding information, updating your profile, renewing or buying a subscription plan, finishing an abandoned cart, joining social network accounts, and so on.
Product recommendations- recommendations based on user activity, for instance, the latest product view.
News & updates- introducing changes to economic models, new revisions or adds to the catalog, data protection policy, and so forth.
Education- It includes instructing new people on how to utilize the application, among other things.
Avoid push notifications regarding reference information that consumers may need afterward, re-engaging with no instant value proposition, or delivering lengthy, wordy messages.
SMS Marketing
SMS is deemed more intimate & credible since it includes the recipient's cell phone number. As a result, you should utilize this direct marketing method carefully. Because text messages address the receiver individually, you may use them to keep the recipient up to speed on any information about their health, money, personal hobbies, or safety.
Text messages, on the other hand, are better suited for sending information, such as:
Transactional - Notifications on delivery, billing reminders, parcel warnings, and so forth.
Urgent- Appointment reminders, financial notifications, weather warnings, and so forth.
Time-saving- Delays and cancellations, appointment rescheduling, and so forth.
Text messages should not be used for information that consumers may have to return to in the future.
They are not as simple to skim through or browse through as email. Furthermore, they may indeed be deleted by mistake.
In conclusion
To summarize, the option to employ push notifications or SMS solely (or a mixture of the two) is entirely to your audience. You might come across someone eager to receive push alerts, but others are more concerned with text messages. As a result, you'll need to modify your marketing strategies based on how customers respond to either communication.
Now that you understand the advantages and disadvantages of both mediums, you can select the strategy that resonates with your target audience and use it to your advantage! It is always a good idea to mix multi-channel marketing approaches for long relationships and engagement, higher retention rates, and higher revenue.
