Mobile: A Lifecycle & Lifestyle

Mobile is more than just a channel. It’s an integral part of how we live — our relationships, homes, health, money, shopping, information, news, vacations, and much much more. With the bulk of internet traffic (and now online sales) originating from smartphones and most of consumers’ mobile time spent on apps, it’s evident there’s a new preferred destination for experience today.

Yet, the challenge remains: average Day 30 activation rates have barely budged in years, and most consumers (57%) decide whether to delete an app in one or two uses. Lewis zeroes in on the Activation phase of the mobile app lifecycle, which spans the first 30 days after download, and highlights its significance in shaping user behavior and driving long-term customer engagement.

By implementing 3 key strategies, brands can enhance app activation rates and improve key business metrics, such as purchase conversion. Let’s explore.

1. Identify Your Customers
Lewis emphasized the value of identifying users early in the lifecycle. Airship research indicates that identified users have 4X higher activation rates and are more likely to convert than anonymous users. By leveraging customer profiles and historical data, brands can personalize experiences and foster deeper connections with their audience.

Identified users purchase 43% more
frequently than anonymous users.*

2. Get Opt-In Permissions
Obtaining opt-in permissions for push notifications is crucial for driving app engagement and retention. Lewis stressed the importance of using soft prompts or native app screens to explain the benefits of opting in before presenting users with operating system prompts. Brands that effectively communicate the value proposition of push notifications and optimize how they ask users for opt-ins can achieve higher opt-in rates and ultimately increase purchase frequency.

Opted-in devices have a 13% lift in purchase
frequency compared to opted-out devices.
Top performers see a lift as high as 39%.*

3. Gather Preferences
Understanding user preferences is essential for delivering personalized experiences that resonate with customers. Lewis discussed various methods for collecting preferences, including preference centers, interest-based surveys and contextual data. By progressively gathering and leveraging preferences, brands can enhance targeting accuracy and drive higher conversion rates.

Campaigns that use preferences for audience
targeting see a 59% lift in purchase conversion.
Top performers see a lift as high as 91%.*

Opt-In Insights from Sustainability B-Corp, Olio 

Jennie Lewis chatted with Honey Hodgson, Engagement Marketing Lead at Olio, a certified B Corporation focused on creating a circular economy within communities. They discussed the importance of activating customers within the first 30 days of app download and strategies for encouraging opt-ins to push notifications. They also shared insights from their favorite brands, such as Duolingo, and discussed aspirations for the future of Olio, including optimizing communication preferences and testing new features. 

Olio customers who are opted-in are
2.5x more likely to list an item in the app.

Olio recently implemented an opt-in campaign that had a 51% conversion rate. Amid concerns of potential decline following the Android 13 rollout, their aim was to drive opt-ins from users who had previously opted out and users who had not yet made an opt-in selection. After deploying an A/B test with Airship and seeing record conversion rates, they achieved a 24% increase in opt-in rates YoY and were able to guide future campaign approaches. 

Overall, Lewis and Hodgson emphasized the importance of personalized communication and ongoing engagement in driving long-term retention and success in mobile. 

Capture Customer Attention with Airship  

Mastering mobile app experiences requires a strategic approach to Life After Download, and that begins with improving user progress through the activation stage of the lifecycle. Apps that outperform their category in activation focus on user identification, opt-in permissions and preference gathering. By implementing these strategies and committing to continuous experimentation and optimization, you can effectively capture long-term value and lasting customer relationships.

Watch our on-demand webinar, Capture Customer Attention: 3 Strategies in 30 Days, to gain valuable insights and delve deeper into each strategy.

To see how your app compares to your category on critical activation benchmarks, please download our Activation Benchmarks Report.

Get in touch to learn how Airship can help you acquire, activate and engage app customers.

The post Mastering Mobile: 3 Strategies for Capturing Customer Attention appeared first on Airship.

The reason for using ASO is to foster growth by expanding the user base and capturing more market share. ASO is the #1 driver of app acquisition and is crucial for app market success, the equivalent of search engine optimization for websites. According to Apple, 70% of App Store visitors use search to discover apps, and almost 65% of downloads happen directly after a search, not from being featured by Apple or Google. Additionally, “searching and browsing the app stores” continues to be the top way every generation globally discovers new apps to download, according to our survey of 11,000 global consumers. 

In our recent webinar, ASO expert Dave Bell, GM of Airship’s Gummicube, shared valuable insights and best practices on app store visibility, conversion rate optimization and improving ASO strategies to drive user acquisition and maximize your market share. You can watch the full presentation on-demand or get the highlights here:

1. Take Advantage of Custom Product Pages and Custom Store Listings

Custom Product Pages  (CPPs) allow you to create 35 different product pages for your store listing, with unique URLs to include in your advertising campaigns. When a user clicks on an ad, they will be brought to the specific page you linked, which you can optimize to reflect the environment the user came from.

With every unique CPPs listing, you can obtain actionable data about what content and features increase conversion rates across various marketing channels and then apply these insights to your broader acquisition and ASO strategies. App Analytics in App Store Connect will be your hub to track the performance of CPPs (impressions, downloads, re-downloads and conversion rates).

Customizing app store listings to target important user demographics with seasonal and culturally relevant content or listings relevant to different searches allows marketers to increase conversion rates and lower the cost of user acquisition across all traffic sources — paid, organic, earned and owned. Apple and Google have made it much easier to get started achieving these benefits with CPPs and Custom Store Listings, respectively.

2. Leverage In-App Events and Promotional Content for Engagement

Apple’s in-app events and Google Play’s promotional content are essential for boosting app discovery within the app stores and can help you reconnect and re-engage inactive app customers. Optimizing these features can contribute to a competitive edge, including the opportunity to be featured across a multitude of app store pages: Search, Apps/Games tabs, or the Today tab. In-app events are timely events within apps, such as challenges, competitions, premieres, special events, live-streamed experiences and major app advancements.

Once a user has downloaded your app, its listing in the app store becomes almost invisible. Also, both iOS and Android archive apps if users become inactive, reducing on-device visibility. In-app events reclaim visibility and ensure your app doesn’t lose out on real estate relative to competitor alternatives presented in search results.

3. Measure ASO Effectiveness for Success

Measuring the effectiveness of ASO requires understanding how external events can impact results and filtering out that noise. When measuring ASO, consider the impact of seasonal variations, sporadic external events, certain external marketing channels, and fluctuations in the app’s ratings and reviews. 

User ratings and reviews play a significant role in ASO success. Gummicube says four-fifths of users do not trust an app with ratings below 4 stars. Higher ratings can attract more downloads and improve an app’s ranking in search results. Conversely, low ratings can harm an app’s reputation and decrease visibility. 

4. Proceed Carefully With Google’s AI Helper

Google’s AI Helper, still in Beta, is not designed for ASO and may not always produce content that complies with Google’s own guidelines. Humans need to be in control. Inaccurate or incomplete details generated by AI Helper can seriously impact ratings and reviews if new app users feel misled. Additionally, AI Helper doesn’t have a prompt for desired keywords and doesn’t seem to use historically high-converting language from past experiments. 

Likewise, AI Helper does not take compliance into account. Aside from generating inaccurate or inappropriate content, AI Helper may generate language in the short and full description that does not comply with Google’s recommendations and guidelines. In addition, AI-generated app store descriptions may not satisfy Google’s  “accurate and compelling” requirement. Out-of-compliance language may cause an app to be ineligible for promotion or rejected.  

For now, we recommend restricting your use of Google AI Helper to sparking ideas that a copywriter and ASO expert can use to help create original content. 

App stores are evolving beyond mere distribution points; they have become dynamic environments where users discover new apps and services. The four strategies discussed here are not isolated tactics but should be integrated into a holistic approach encompassing keyword optimization, creative testing and frequent updates. Get in touch to learn how Airship can help you implement and master App Store Optimization strategies.

Watch our on-demand webinar, The New Era of ASO: Conquering the Modern App Stores, to gain insights about App Store Optimization.

The post 4 Ways to Master App Store Optimization (ASO) appeared first on Airship.

Now+Next is an association of companies operating in the data, technology, and design space that aims to inspire young women and provide pathways into the industry. We aim to drive affirmative action and create an environment that better supports and encourages young women interested in pursuing a career in technology. Since the association’s launch in 2022, Now+Next has connected with 6,000 female students (and counting!) across the UK.

Why Now+Next?

Our mission at Now+Next is to inspire young women through understanding possibilities, providing connections and gaining experience in data, design and technology. We represent a proactive effort to build upon past achievements and propel further advancements in gender equality, particularly by fostering inclusivity and representation in areas where women have historically been underrepresented. 

Laura Schwarz, Airship’s Sr. Director, EMEA Sales and Now+Next co-founder, underscores the importance of looking ahead and identifying areas where women are still underrepresented or marginalized. She said:

“We called this initiative Now+Next because we, as women in different sectors, businesses and fields, have already come a long way — which led us to the now. But we also have a responsibility to continue creating more equality — that’s the next step. We always need to ask ourselves, ‘What’s next?’ That’s why it’s so important that we do this work of getting girls to imagine themselves in tech jobs.” 

“We always need to ask ourselves, ‘What’s next’?”

Voices from diverse backgrounds amplified the importance of the Now+Next endeavor. Daria Granstrom, Partner Manager at Mixpanel, said:

“It’s important we broaden girls’ perspective on what working in tech really means, inspire them to pursue STEM subjects and challenge gender stereotypes in these disciplines. This helps the whole tech ecosystem in the UK welcome more diverse talent and, therefore, deliver better solutions.”

Sahara Baig, Head of Delivery at Candyspace, noted that the industry is male-dominated, so it’s crucial to inspire young women to take up careers in tech. She said:

“Diversity drives innovation, and women bring different perspectives, ideas and approaches to problem-solving, which can lead to more innovative solutions for businesses. Careers in tech pay significantly higher salaries than non-digital roles. By encouraging young women to take up careers in tech, we empower them to access jobs that pay more and offer them financial freedom. This can have a ripple effect on our society: if more women take up tech, there will be more female role models for future generations.”

Airship’s Laura Schwarz commented: “It’s representation. It’s being an example. It’s opening their minds and showing them something they didn’t even know before that they may like or want.”

These voices and others in the technology space echo the urgent need for initiatives like Now+Next. They aim to dismantle barriers and pave the way for a more inclusive and innovative future across tech and industries that utilize it.

Girls Learn About Design, Engagement and Data 

Engaged in a consulting challenge for the day, the girls divided into breakout workshops to explore various aspects of technology solutions.

Design
Candyspace guided the students through User Experience Design (UX), emphasizing research methodologies and the fusion of art and science. They highlighted how thoughtful and empathetic design can help address real-world problems.

Data
Mixpanel provided an overview of data analysis, stressing the significance of customer understanding and utilizing data to drive action. They emphasized the role of analytics in guiding data-driven decision-making processes. 

Personalization
AB Tasty’s workshop centered on personalization within the user journey and digital experimentation strategies. They highlighted the importance of tailoring experiences to individual users and leveraging experimentation to optimize digital interactions.

Engagement 
Airship’s workshop focused on engagement, beginning with an exploration of the mobile app lifecycle. We prompted students to reflect on their own app usage behaviors, then provided insights from Airship’s research on consumer behavior, comparing the students’ generation to other age groups. Discussions followed about strategies for brands to engage their app users effectively. We highlighted the importance of prioritizing apps as premiere destinations rather than using them as just another promotional channel.

Diversity Across Disciplines: What’s Next For Tech

A panel featuring speakers from Accurx, LCH, Brompton Bikes and Monday.com discussed the broad range of roles available in tech — from marketing and sales to data and operations — and the challenges women face across the sector. They stressed that having more women in organizations is not only important within tech — it’s vital across all industries. With millions of girls without access to education worldwide, it’s our responsibility to support and inspire those with this educational opportunity. 

Panelists offered guidance to young women contemplating careers in the tech industry. They cited the significance of purposeful engagement, assertive communication and self-worth. They also discussed the key attributes crucial for women’s advancement into leadership roles within the tech field, highlighting qualities such as resilience, adaptability, empathy and agile decision-making skills.

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion at Airship

As a founding member of the Now+Next association, Airship’s mission is to inspire young women by helping them understand possibilities, providing connections, and supporting experiences in data, design and technology. 

As part of our Women’s History Month celebration, our ERG for female-identifying individuals, Airship FIRE (Female Inclusion, Resilience, and Empowerment), will host a virtual coffee hour chat on self-advocacy and its importance in inspiring an inclusive and thriving work environment for women – both within and outside their profession. 

Airship continues to focus its DEI work on Talent, Workforce Culture, and Community Impact. The Now+Next initiative fits well into our Community Impact work by reinforcing Airship’s DEI commitments and year-round efforts to #uplift the industries and communities we serve across the globe. There’s plenty to do, but we know that creating an inclusive culture must top the agenda for all. It’s our mission to attract, retain, reward and develop top talent, says Airship’s Senior Director of DEI, Temidayo Afonja. 

How does your organization shape up in terms of gender equity and inclusion? Let us know if we can help share ideas or resources.

Interested in getting involved in one of our future events? Just get in touch.

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These are the top reasons customers continue to come back to apps. Keeping them top of mind will help increase app traffic, interactions and conversions. It comes down to this: your customers want convenience, you want conversions. So add in the right kinds of communications and everyone wins! 

In our recent webinar, Leslie Kettle, the Very Group’s App Marketing Lead, and Emily Stevens, Director of Strategic Services at Airship, shared valuable insights on key strategies to help you optimize customer engagement through mobile apps. The Very Group, with a customer base of around 4.4 million, has elevated its app to become its central hub for customer experience.

Grab your notebooks and let’s explore our top five practices to evolve your app customers from interested to obsessed.

1. Harness Data for Personalized Experiences

It all starts with data! Data is the fundamental input for improving your customer engagement. Zero-party data, obtained through surveys or onboarding processes, provides valuable insights into customer preferences and interests. Brands can deploy diverse methods, such as in-app quizzes, gamified rewards programs or customer feedback, to gather data progressively throughout the customer journey. Emily highlighted that moving beyond first-name-only personalization increases engagement rates by a pretty decent 37%! You heard it here first. 

2. Amplify Customer Engagement With Gamification

Gamification is a powerful tool for driving engaging app experiences! Depending on your goals, you can use gamification to create short-term bursts of engagement or support a longer-term loyalty strategy. Make your customer experience more exciting by inserting fun, game-like elements. Even the most serious customer appreciates a bit of fun or being recognized for progress and achievement!

3. Deliver High-Quality Experiences

Delivering high-quality experiences is the key to app value. To move people across the chasm — beyond activation to engagement — brands need to show them that you know them. It calls for in-app experiences tailored to the individual so you can build loyalty and generate revenue. In turn, high-quality experiences incentivize customers to share even more data with your brand, sustaining an ongoing value exchange.

What contributes to high-quality experiences? Leslie and Emily highlighted the following: 

• Delivering on customer convenience expectations
• Providing proactive help and support
• Keeping customers in the loop on product deliveries, service issues and app updates
• Showcasing new features and how to use them
• Exercising good timing to make the experience positive rather than disruptive
• Using tags and custom events to analyze use of features and content
• Micro-targeting customers through effective data collection and segmentation

4. Drive High-Value Action 

Brands can nudge users toward high-value actions at key moments using contextual and timely messaging. The first step to driving a high-value action is making it relevant. Say goodbye to random promotional messages and instead focus on sending out contextual alerts to customers. Is there a forgotten item in their cart? Is there a new product or service in your app similar to what they’ve already looked for? Is there a free trial they could benefit from? Encouraging your customers to complete high-value actions will improve their in-app experience.

Timing your messages for when users are likely to be active and receptive can make the difference between being ignored or triggering action. It’s about catching your customers at the right moment guided by their behaviors, context or predictive AI (such as Optimal Send Time).

According to Lesley, exploring partnerships can be a critical part of this engagement practice. Aligning with relevant partners can help provide additional value to your customers and expand your reach, resulting in higher customer engagement and an increased likelihood of customers performing these actions. 

5. Continuously Experiment

Your brand’s strategic approach should be geared towards continuous experimentation and optimization for optimal results. This process begins by identifying and bridging gaps in expertise, bandwidth, process and data analysis resources. 

It’s important to empower all your employees with both access and encouragement to use tools for ongoing testing and optimization — such as Airship’s A/B testing capabilities across messages, journeys and no-code app experiences. A culture of experimentation empowers everyone to test hypotheses and test fast. 

Get in touch to learn how Airship can help you implement and master mobile app engagement strategies.

Learn the Top 5 Mobile Engagement Practices. Watch the on-demand webinar to gain insights about in-app experiences that help your customers engage fully and see the benefits of your app they may not have noticed before.

The post Turn Clicks into Customer Connections with 5 Valuable App Engagement Practices appeared first on Airship.

As you reimagine delightful experiences for your mobile customers, consider what our experts, partners and customers had to say about the year ahead.  We’ve compiled their insights and predictions in our new 2024 Predictions & Insights eBook. Here’s a brief look:

AI, Data Privacy & Ethical Implementation
Generative AI (GenAI) will be red-hot in 2024, including calls for frameworks for responsible and ethical use, and cross-functional collaboration to navigate data security and copyright/IP concerns. Responsible use of AI is essential, and frameworks that guide and govern implementations are needed. Cross-functional teams must strike a balance between harnessing AI’s potential and mitigating its risks.

As businesses adopt GenAI to scale customer interactions, the focus sharpens on aligning efforts with business goals, with an emphasis on strategic goal-setting, continuous experimentation and data-driven optimization across the customer lifecycle. Without a strategic approach and the right goals in place, AI can’t be trained toward the best result and could accelerate mediocrity instead of enhancing competitive advantage. 

Simultaneously, the industry anticipates a transition toward expanded first- and zero-party data usage, marking a significant shift as third-party cookies fade away. This will provide publishers with a strategic opportunity to engage audiences more contextually, enrich user experiences and enable more precise targeting options.

Experimentation Mindset, Moments-Based Marketing & Customer-Centricity
Even though AI will continue to grab headlines, 2024 will actually be a transitional year for customer experiences. Sophisticated methods for reaching customers in their moments that matter will distinguish leaders from laggards.

Brands have a mandate to pivot from third-party to zero- and first-party data, leverage actionable insights, move away from channel-based approaches and embrace moments-based marketing — all of which are redefining customer engagement. As data privacy expectations evolve, we’re observing a shift: consumers are more willing to share information with brands they love. A customer-centric, mobile-first approach is becoming paramount, with the key being an ongoing exchange where brands can thoughtfully and progressively grow customer understanding over time.

Communicating value clearly, creatively, and in a timely manner is essential for retaining customers and developing brand loyalists. The challenge is to capture customer attention in their moments of engagement, meaning while they are actually using the app. As most customers decide whether to keep or delete an app within the first two uses, the window to secure ongoing use and grow customer value is fleeting and critical. Further, brands need to adopt an experimentation mindset to continuously optimize interactions inside and outside the app. As more brands embrace a culture of experimentation, mobile app experiences will become more personalized, customer-centric and immersive especially with the adoption of AR, VR and NLP. 

Learn more by reading our 2024 Predictions & Insights eBook for a full run-down of the trends you can expect to see this year.

The post Insights & Trends to Inspire Your 2024 Customer Experience Strategies appeared first on Airship.

Our esteemed panel of judges scrutinized each submission against a set of well-defined criteria, including performance, amplification, innovation, degree of difficulty and overall contribution to the mobile ecosystem. Today, we’re delighted to announce the finalists for the 2023 Altitude Awards. Finalists across four categories demonstrated an exceptional level of achievement, setting them apart from others in their industry.

Acquisition Award Finalists

Recognizing brands that leverage exceptional acquisition strategies to drive app downloads.

The judges noted the complexity of working with multiple partners and impressive results in a short timeframe. 

Activation Award Finalists

Highlighting brands that excel in activating new app customers and creating a foundation for long-term relationships.

Judges highlighted ongoing evolution of engagement methods in response to customer inputs; a focus on generating long-term value; and notable engagement results, as well as sustained engagement beyond campaign periods.

Monetization Award Finalists

Honoring brands that excel in generating revenue and creating sustainable value from mobile apps.

A trio of British brands! The judges appreciated the complex partnerships, navigation of tight brand controls, and full-journey approaches using propensity modeling and testing to drive top performance.

In-App Experience Award Finalists

Celebrating brands that deliver personalized and effective in-app experiences.

Judges highlighted the innovation behind these engagement campaigns, including systematic processes for continuous experimentation and data-driven customer interactions. 

Congratulations to the 2023 finalists!

The Altitude Awards aim to create a culture of continuous improvement, recognizing efforts that set new standards in achievement and customer experience, providing inspiration for everyone to continually raise the bar. 

Join us at Mobile Leaders Forum London, where we will announce winners following educational content, roundtables and networking. If you’re unable to attend in person, sign up to get access to a livestream of the awards ceremony here. 

The post Airship Altitude Awards 2023: Meet The Finalists appeared first on Airship.

It was a day of forging connections and sparking conversations within a dynamic community of leaders, all driven by a passion for mastering customer experiences.

Creating Value Inside and Outside the App

In the dynamic world of football, OneFootball stands out as more than just an app. It’s a comprehensive platform, meticulously designed to bring fans closer to the game they love. With a staggering 100 million monthly users, OneFootball is revolutionizing the way fans experience football. At its heart lies a mission to create a sense of community and loyalty within the football universe — which they’ve achieved through a seamless blend of personalized content, continuous news updates, exclusive club content and free live streaming, all complemented by an elevated advertising experience.

The app experience is crucial for OneFootball. Using Airship, OneFootball delivers valuable content that drives traffic and revenue. Fan engagement is significantly enhanced through personalization, deepening loyalty by connecting with their passions.

In the last five years, there has been a noticeable shift in fan preferences towards more personalized, interactive and community-driven experiences in online football content. OneFootball has deftly navigated this shift by incorporating social features, establishing loyalty programs and cultivating a dynamic football ecosystem. With a vast network of over 200 clubs, federations, leagues and players, OneFootball is linking fans not only to the game, but to a community that shares their passion deeply.

According to Georgiev, OneFootball envisions a future of even more personalized and emotionally resonant experiences expanding loyalty, community and meaningful connections between fans, players, teams and brands.

Panel: How to Create Delightful Customer Experiences That Boost Loyalty and Retention

Moderated by Airship’s Georg Steidinger, panelists included Alessia Roglieri, Urban Sports Club’s Head of CRM; Katja Ostrowsky, radio.net’s MD; Celine Riedel, bonprix’s Push Marketing Manager; and Christian Eckhardt, Customlytics’ CEO.

What Does It Mean to Prioritize App Experience?
Prioritizing app experience has become a cornerstone of success in today’s marketplace. Industry-leading Urban Sports Club, bonprix and radio.net exemplify dedication to crafting personalized, seamless and user-centric app experiences to drive customer satisfaction and loyalty. 

App prioritization for Urban Sports Club (USC) has meant moving much of its communications from an email newsletter to an app. That was its reason for adopting the Airship platform. Its goal is to make multiple sports available through one streamlined access point without bloating the customer experience. All its app content, therefore, needs to be highly contextualized and personalized. 

One membership with USC gives you access to their range of partners across sports and wellness, so you don’t need to purchase multiple memberships to gyms and clubs. For Urban Sports, the app is more than a tool. It’s their core product, designed around ease of use and reliability, offering instant booking, check-ins at physical venues, geolocation and filters. New features like waiting list and check-in overviews are in the works. The company continues to invest in app development to ensure that every user interaction is a tailored, delightful experience. 

In the same vein, Customlytics’ Eckhardt said that you should put yourself in your customers’ shoes and create a communication you’d like yourself. In his opinion, crafting a communication that resonates personally can even outweigh the superiority of a competitor’s product. 

Ostrowsky’s company radio.net places a premium on mobile-first marketing strategies. In a fiercely competitive market, radio.net recognizes that a simple and intuitive user interface and convenient, streamlined experience is crucial for customer satisfaction. Through a unified platform for radio and podcasts, its app customers get a seamless experience that aligns with their preferences and behaviors. With over 50% of app downloads originating from the mobile web, their app plays a crucial role in long-term retention and customer satisfaction.

For bonprix, the app serves as a pivotal channel for future growth, a sentiment echoed by Riedel. Since its inception in 2016, the bonprix app has become a cornerstone of its customer experience. The focus is on accessibility, quick navigation and sensitivity to the preferences of their predominantly younger demographic. By also monitoring KPIs to gauge quality and engagement, bonprix aims to optimize customer lifetime value and forge lasting connections.

Integration of AI for Enhanced Mobile Experiences
Businesses are increasingly harnessing the power of AI to bolster their mobile strategies. The panelists discussed the evolving role of AI in their respective businesses, and acknowledged the pivotal role of AI in automating tasks such as content creation and campaign optimization. 

For radio.net, AI revolutionizes resource allocation, ensuring that human efforts are directed where they yield the greatest impact. Bonprix and Customlytics echoed these sentiments, emphasizing AI’s potential to augment existing strategies, allowing for hyper-personalization and more efficient campaign execution. 

However, Eckhardt of Customlytics provided a crucial caveat, underscoring the irreplaceable importance of human oversight in the integration of AI. AI serves as an extension — not a replacement — of human capabilities, streamlining tasks that would have once necessitated a larger team. This acknowledgment underscores the delicate balance between leveraging AI’s capabilities and ensuring that human expertise guides its implementation. 

What’s Next for Mobile App Experience?
The rapidly evolving landscape of mobile app experiences promises exciting innovations. Urban Sports Club and bonprix both foresee AI ushering in an era of hyper-personalization and gamification to heighten engagement, while radio.net predicts a surge in AI-driven personalization setting the stage for a more immersive user experience.

Both the fireside chat and panel discussion illuminated the pivotal role of app experiences and personalization in driving customer loyalty and retention. Gamification will be key. And the integration of AI technologies promises to revolutionize customer interactions even further. 

Stay tuned for updates on our next Mobile Leaders Forum, coming soon to a city near you! It promises to be another insightful event, shaping the future of mobile strategies and innovation. 

The post Unlocking Loyalty through Mobile App Experiences: Mobile Leaders Forum Berlin appeared first on Airship.

The Cannes Lions “Personalization and Privacy” panel saw Airship Chief Strategy and Marketing Officer Thomas Butta, Infillion CMO Laurel Rossi, and Vayner X EVP, Zubin Mowlavi, engage in a stimulating discussion, moderated by Bain & Company Partner Maureen Burns. The panel focused on the effective tactics and approach necessary for brands of all sizes to continually optimize relevance and customer experience, while respecting privacy. The conversation also featured the unveiling of new research by Airship that delved into 11,000 global consumers’ preferences regarding brand interactions — ranging from the most useful forms of personalization to the factors influencing app retention and deletion. 

Here, we’ll explore the evolving dynamics of personalized messaging and privacy, while considering the challenges marketers face achieving this delicate balance. 

The Potential — and Limits — of AI
The realm of AI and machine learning present an opportunity to not only avoid the unsettling practice of intrusive, blunt retargeting, but also to discover individuals who share similarities with our initial target audience and may genuinely appreciate the experience we have in store for them.

Infillion’s Laurel Rossi said that by engaging with consumers during the next phase of their purchasing journey and eliminating an unnecessary step, we not only save them valuable time and attention but also ensure that they receive the relevance they desire. 

The untapped potential of AI is often overshadowed by its association with “creepiness” — when the consumer feels virtually “stalked” by the brand. 

Creep Factor? No, You Can’t.
Burns posed the question to the panel, “Is it creepy if it’s really relevant?”

According to Airship’s Thomas Butta, consumers are open to receiving information related to their stated interests. He emphasized, though, that potential problems arise when you cross a boundary with privacy. 

Rossi argued that the concept of relevance extends beyond traditional personalization and through to deep personalization. The goal is to identify the true value-add and moments of delight awaiting consumers along their journey. The thinking goes, consumers will appreciate the means if the ends are marvelous and meaningful.

Vayner X’s Zubin Mowlavi noted that it’s usually desirable to be at the forefront of marketing and technology, but this particular area is an exception: here, it’s crucial to align with consumer expectations and not exceed them.

When people perceive their phones to be listening to them and they receive unexpected content, that’s when the unsettling aspect arises — the creep factor. As brands, it’s vital to refrain from exceeding consumer expectations simply because you can, given available technology. 

How, When, Where — Best Practices in Privacy & Personalization 
Butta emphasized that brands that effectively implement personalization strategies achieve an impressive 30-45% retention rate from their initial app downloads. How? By focusing on the how, when and where of both privacy and relevance.

After download, brand leaders promptly query users about their interests and assist users in establishing communication preferences in terms of timing, frequency and preferred channels. By prioritizing these best practices, successful brands are able to strike a balance between personalization and privacy — ensuring a positive user experience, while respecting individual preferences.

Optimizing for Conversion: Rethinking Metrics and Consumer Engagement
According to Rossi, consumers are highly vocal about their aversion to ads and go out of their way to ignore approximately two-thirds of them. As brands, our primary objective should be to capture consumers’ attention. For an app, the way to do that is by providing consumers with a superior experience. If a customer genuinely does not desire ads, we should offer them the option to opt out. 

In real life, practices are different. In light of deteriorating macroeconomic conditions, the industry has gravitated towards inexpensive media, overly fixated on generating clicks. And, as Rossi highlights strongly, this approach is not getting us anywhere.

Mowlavi emphasizes the criticality of optimizing for the right metrics, as many marketers tend to prioritize engagement and marketing KPIs that may not necessarily influence actual purchases. Successful brands, on the other hand, prioritize optimization that extends all the way to conversion, whether at a macro or micro level, across different channels. Simply optimizing for clicks, without considering meaningful outcomes, leads to superficial engagement. The focus should be on identifying the consumers who generate the highest lifetime value — understanding their product usage patterns and the underlying drivers. By concentrating on these cohorts and optimizing accordingly, rather than fixating on clicks and engagement on external platforms, brands can achieve more meaningful and impactful results.

According to Butta, there is a growing realization that a significant portion of email usage is wasteful. At the same time, many marketing cloud platforms rely heavily on email as a primary channel. 

Interestingly, consumers are willing to share their email addresses as the most prominent piece of data. However, when it comes to communication, email is often the first to be ignored, particularly among younger generations — of whom, 81% or more ignore email marketing they’ve subscribed to at least half the time or more. This is partly due to the prevalence of disposable or fake email addresses. Promotional emails are typically dismissed as such, while transactional emails or those providing genuine value are considered “good” emails. The result is inefficiency and wasted effort in the realm of email marketing.

Brands are being forced to rely on internal (zero- and first-party) data rather than external (third-party) data. This is what consumers want as well. They want the relationship to be with the brand, not with third parties who are trying to get to them. 

No-code Solutions Allow Marketers to Drive Moments That Matter 
According to Butta, the potential of the mobile app lies in its always-on reach and the continuous conversation it fosters. Marketers — or at least, those who are eager to expand their capabilities — have historically relied on developers to improve app user experiences — and they represent a scarce resource. 

However, with the shift from HTML to native and the emergence of no-code solutions, non-technical professionals can now actively create meaningful moments and accomplish much more. Drawing inspiration from the app’s ability to provide continuous experiences, marketers can apply their insights without being burdened by time constraints imposed on developers. This paradigm shift empowers marketers to take charge and make a more significant impact in driving greater value creation. 

Butta suggested that brands can enhance their effectiveness by reacting promptly to consumer feedback, which may be direct via surveys or app store reviews, or observed from data on their behaviors. By responding directly, rather than relying on intermediaries like developers, brands can establish a more immediate and direct connection with their audiences.

Understanding Consumer Experience and Loyalty
According to Butta, the essence of brand interactions lies in the experiences we have with them, and the app serves as the center of these experiences. We’re all consumers, he reminded the audience, and our lives revolve around apps from morning to night — and for many types of apps, total time spent is inverse to value and usefulness provided. The foundation of value-exchange between consumers and brands rests upon respect and reward, and these experiences shape our expectations and preferences. 

“People will never forget how you made them feel.”
-Maya Angelou

By recognizing this and ensuring exceptional experiences within the app, brands have the opportunity to cultivate customer loyalty. While downloading an app is a significant step, ensuring users return to it is a whole other game that hinges on delivering relevant content that provides genuine value — from discounts to time-saving solutions. 

More on Engaging Consumers

Collectively, these insights underscored the importance of leveraging digital strategies, respecting consumer preferences, and seizing purchase potential through well-designed and engaging app experiences.  Watch the full panel video here.

Learn more about global consumer preferences, across countries, generations and income levels, and what exactly brands should be doing in our latest report, The Mobile Consumer 2023.

Did you know we also have a podcast? If your goal is to deliver extraordinary value for where your best customers choose to engage with your brand, Masters of MAX is the podcast for you. Never miss an episode by subscribing on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Amazon Music or Audible. 

The post Relevance vs. Privacy at Cannes Lions 2023: What Mobile App Customers Really Want appeared first on Airship.

There were over 140 talks and panels and over 300 speakers, but three topics stood out. These focus on what brands must do well to succeed in the digital landscape:

Prioritise Data-Driven Personalisation

Customers expect highly personalised and targeted communications. With so much information available online, it’s crucial to create compelling content that stands out and engages your target audience. Gartner recently shared that 80% of B2B sales interactions between suppliers and buyers will occur through digital channels by 2050. By creating rich and relevant app experiences for customers, you can position yourself in the best possible place to win business.

Maximilian Hausmann, Head of Media Strategy & Data-Driven Marketing at German supermarket chain REWE, discussed how they developed and implemented a customer data platform (CDP), working with partners Deloitte and Google, to optimize their marketing and retail media strategies. They explained how the CDP allows them to collect and analyse customer data from various sources, and how they use that data to create personalised marketing campaigns and improve the customer experience.

They also explored the challenges of implementing a new technology system and the importance of collaborating with external partners to ensure success. Overall, Hausmann highlighted the importance of data-driven insights to improve customer engagement and drive business growth in the competitive retail industry.

Marketers are increasingly focused on personalising experiences to make them more relevant to customers, and thereby better drive engagement and interaction. The market is tailoring messages, offers and recommendations to individual customers based on their preferences, behaviors and demographics. Leveraging data analytics, AI and machine learning is the way to segment and target audiences more effectively.

Leverage AI in marketing

Generative AI can help you take your content to the next level by automating the content creation process, making it more efficient and reducing content bottlenecks. This can save time and resources; it can also help improve the quality of the content by ensuring that it’s tailored to a target audience. AI can be a useful tool, but it’s important to maintain a balance between automation and human creativity to ensure the content remains engaging and original.

The powerful combination of AI and automation is revolutionising marketing processes. Marketers are using AI-powered tools and automation to streamline tasks, gain insights from data, personalise experiences and optimise campaigns.

Google’s Philipp Justus, VP Central Europe, and Zeina Hatem, MD Emea Partnerships, emphasised the potential to revolutionise across industries and drive significant economic growth, but also acknowledged the challenges in ensuring that the technology is used ethically and responsibly. Justus and Hatem confirmed the need for more education and awareness around AI, as well as the importance of social and diversity awareness in the development of AI algorithms to prevent bias. AI is not a replacement for human intelligence and creativity, but rather a tool that can be used to augment and enhance human capabilities.

Build strong customer relationships

In addition to these points, speakers also emphasised the importance of building strong relationships with customers. By creating engaging and loyalty-inducing app customer experiences — the kinds that delight audiences and stand out in a crowded marketplace — brands can create a sustainable competitive advantage.

Speakers also touched on social selling. Brands leverage social media platforms to engage with prospects, build meaningful relationships and ultimately drive sales. They’re using social media networks to connect and establish trust with potential customers by providing valuable content, engaging in conversations and offering personalised recommendations. OMR’s Philipp Westermeyer, and Rolan Eisenbrand, emphasised the need for businesses to stay up-to-date with new technologies and trends in order to remain competitive in this rapidly-evolving digital landscape. 

Airship at OMR

Overall, OMR marked the importance of developing across these areas to succeed in the digital marketing landscape. By creating compelling content, leveraging data and AI, and building strong relationships with customers, businesses can stay ahead of the competition and achieve their marketing goals.

At the event, we highlighted the importance of personalisation, real-time messaging, and a multi-channel approach to digital marketing, as well as the power of data-driven insights to inform an evolving marketing strategy. We also showcased our own platform, including our new App Experience Editor, which enables brands to create and deliver highly targeted and personalised campaigns across multiple channels without ongoing developer support.

We at Airship are absolutely committed to helping you navigate the rapidly-evolving digital landscape and create the best possible app experiences — so you can drive growth and stay ahead of the competition!

The post Mastering Marketing at OMR: 3 Key Takeaways for Success appeared first on Airship.

Walking through Spitalfields, the lively heart of London’s East End, you can’t help but feel a strong sense of community. As a creative hub of markets and independent vendors, Spitalfields is steeped in history, modern art and a fusion of Eastern and Western cultures. Its diverse international community reflects the vibrant group of individuals attending the Now+Next event — they’re brimming with new ideas. 

Entering the open foyer of Fora, the flexible workspace venue for the event, there’s a sense of calm excitement (along with the smell of fresh coffee). Gradually the space fills with the chatter of reunions and introductions. It’s a whole room of women and girls (and a number of male colleagues too) coming together in a powerful collaboration of school and industry. Then a hush. The welcome speech begins. 

STEM and Career
Gabrielle James, Diversity & Inclusion Manager, Mixpanel, and Maria Williams, Head of Delivery, Candyspace, set a raw and heartfelt scene of the tech industry — specifically, its gender gap. Historically, the industry has been unable to retain women employees due to fundamental issues — from inclusivity to opportunities for growth. But this has become an even bigger problem as businesses have digitized their operations and the demand for technology-specific skills has sky-rocketed.  

The students, all young girls, head to their first workshop session, led by Airship. We present an overview of organizational ecosystems, including the wide range of roles available in tech. Based on the audible reactions, some of these roles — such as marketing, branding, and graphic design — come as a surprise to the girls. 

In an interactive session, the girls explore their interests and aspirations. Many are drawn to creative fields, including interior design. Several make sardonic comments about boys. One or two girls, confidently outspoken, raise their hands at the first opportunity, eager to share their thoughts. Others require gentle coaxing, but progress to actively volunteering their opinions. 

The path to tech is not linear. I remind the girls that their decisions about what to study now are not limiting, but can have an impact on what they choose to do later in life. One student comments, “This has been so helpful. I didn’t really know what ‘tech’ truly meant before.”

I take the girls through my own school and career background — a mix of science and creative — to highlight the many different paths toward STEM careers. Despite my formal STEM training, I had no experience of the tech world until last year. It has been a steep learning curve and my aim is to share it honestly with the girls. 

“Today has made me think,” says one student. “Before this [event], I was set on going into teaching. Now I see there’s so many more opportunities.” The girls may be learning a lot from us, but I find myself learning a lot from them too — such as the importance of keeping an open mind and being receptive to change. 

Airship’s women inspire me on a daily basis, so it feels rewarding to be able to take that energy and channel it into inspiring a younger generation. I want to help them understand what they’re really capable of — which is often much more than they think. 

Diversity and Inclusion 
As energy levels dwindle between workshops, we lead the girls in a stretching exercise to get our bodies moving and minds refreshed. We end the day with an engaging panel discussion featuring women in leadership roles who are performing at the top of their game.

The panel stresses that having more women in organizations is not only important within tech — it’s vital across all industries. With millions of girls without access to education across the world, it’s our responsibility to support and inspire those who do have this educational opportunity. “Bringing people together from different backgrounds and genders helps organizations think differently and enriches the experience for all team members,” says Natalie Kouzeleas, RVP and GM, Mixpanel.

Historically, the tech industry has been challenged in retaining women employees. A diverse workforce is paramount in tech organizations, but inclusion is required to retain and empower that workforce. And it is most powerful when embedded within an organizational vision and mission — such as Airship’s, which affirms that diverse individual experiences, perspectives and backgrounds make us better. 

We all have biases, but it’s our self-awareness and collaboration that make the difference. As individuals, we each bring energy to a company and impact the overall energy. When it comes down to it, we’re all responsible for empowering ourselves and co-creating inclusive cultures. 

The digital workforce is male-dominated — and female students simply do not receive as much encouragement as their male counterparts do to take STEM subjects leading to technology jobs. Although the situation is improving, women make up only 35% of higher-ed STEM students, and less than 30% of STEM workers. According to the American Association of University Women, gender stereotypes, male-dominated cultures and limited role models perpetuate the disparity. Previously, I have heard the observation that “Female role models are just not front and center in the industry.” But as the Now+Next panel continues, Airship’s Marketing Director Ana Williams, notes, “With every advancement in the female workforce, the tech industry becomes more welcoming.” 

When panelists are asked to give one piece of advice to young women considering careers in tech, they cite the importance of showing up with intention, speaking up and not undervaluing themselves. They discuss the most important traits for women in tech when it comes to progressing through positions of leadership — resilience and persistence, adaptability, empathy and agile decision-making. They also mention positivity, goal-setting, comfort with change and the ability to trust oneself. I take these to heart and hope the girls do too.

Equity and Equality
There is much conversation around equality, but less so around equity and its application in female advancement in tech and beyond. Equality aims to provide all genders with equal opportunities on a level playing field, but women need to belong to a global space — one of equity — that promotes and supports their inclusion, from early education to the workplace. 

Not a single country in the world has achieved gender equality, and according to the United Nations, it could take another three hundred years to remove discriminatory laws for women and girls. Where we are in a position to create equity now, we must do so. 

“Initiatives like Now+Next are providing a positive change for women in tech by promoting the industry and showing that women can succeed in STEM,” says Kirstin Milne, Senior Account Manager at Airship.

Diversity, Inclusion and Equity at Airship
This is not about men supporting women — it’s about people supporting people. For women to be empowered in tech, I believe that we need to reach a point where gender inequity no longer exists. That’s something I think we do really well at Airship. Today, out of 371 employees, Airship employs 149 women. That’s 40%. With one quarter of our executive leadership team identifying as women, we still have some way to go. The industry is changing and women are coming through. But creating an inclusive culture must be top of agenda for all.  

As part of our Women’s History Month celebration our ERG, Airship FIRE (Female Inclusion, Resilience, and Empowerment) hosted a coffee hour chat on the importance of empowering all women within our communities. Our DEI work is focused on three areas: Talent, Workforce Culture, and Community Impact. The Now+Next initiative fits well into our Community Impact work by reinforcing Airship’s DEI commitments and year-round efforts to #uplift the industries and communities we serve across the globe, says Airship’s Senior Director of DEI, Temidayo Afonja.

As a founding member of the Now+Next association, Airship’s mission is to inspire young women by helping them understand possibilities, providing connections, and supporting experiences in data, design and technology. We aim to drive affirmative action and create an environment that better supports and encourages young women interested in pursuing a career in technology. Since the association’s launch in 2022, Now+Next has connected with 3,792 female students across the UK.

How does your organization shape up in terms of gender equity? Let us know if we can help share ideas or resources.

The post Now+Next Highlights: Girls Hear About — and Talk About — Tech appeared first on Airship.