When it came to supporting registration, scheduling, and real-time notifications for an event of this magnitude, it’s no surprise that SXSW would deploy a mobile app to stay in touch with everyone attending. And to cultivate the most effective mobile app experience, SXSW turned — as it had in previous years — to their technology partner Airship. 

When registrants downloaded the SXSW Go app, they were welcomed by a helpful onboarding workflow. From start to finish, this experience was powered by Airship. If you attended the event and got your hands on the mobile app, you were using Airship’s App Experience Platform. From before you arrived until you were long gone, Airship delivered everything you needed — recommendations, session information, passes, urgent notifications and even a post-event survey — all tightly integrated with lifecycle messaging to guide and inform you throughout the conference and festivals.

Inside the app, you could easily locate your personal inbox, which housed critical updates, such as weather impacts on outdoor events, need-to-know information for Industry Day, and how to get special access to apps like SXSW TV. The inbox, powered by Airship’s Message Center, remained persistent within the mobile app, so no matter when you needed the information, you could find it with ease.

Airship also partnered with Infillion’s Gimbal to make it easy to set up location-targeted messaging so you could receive customized messages based on your location, including machine learning recommendations to fill gaps in your personalized schedule. The app not only helped you get to your desired sessions on time, it also promoted nearby sponsor events relevant to your interests.

While this year saw the debut of Airship’s no-code native app experiences at SXSW, our company has been a technology partner of this world-renowned festival for more than 10 years. Airshippers were also active participants at SXSW 2023. You may have heard our Chief Strategy & Marketing Officer Tom Butta speaking alongside Lego Creative Director James Gregson in a fireside chat hosted by Brand Innovators. Or perhaps you attended Avocados From Mexico’s House of Good and watched me, Airship’s Senior Product Marketing Manager, talk about the Future of Food with Sprinkles Cupcakes CEO Dan Mesches and CMO Michelle Wong. Airshippers could also be found at the Creative Industries Expo and networking with the best and brightest at Porsche House, Austin City Limits and Wax Myrtle’s.

The most effective technologies are usually invisible to end-users who benefit from them. That’s how it was with Airship at SXSW. In the background — along with partners like event app platform Eventbase — Airship helped SXSW create great app experiences that made life easier and better for everyone involved. That’s what we mean by “the leader behind the leaders.”

The post The Leader Behind the Leaders: Airship Powered SXSW GO Mobile App Experiences appeared first on Airship.

Consumers know the best deals of the year are up for grabs throughout November. Merchants were flush with inventory this year, and inflationary fears put consumers’ bargain-seeking behaviors on full display. Whether for loyalty points, streamlined experiences or app-only exclusives, consumers know the best deals are in the app. And for brands, app customers are especially lucrative, contributing 3.5X the revenue with a 3X higher likelihood to make a repeat purchase than other customers. 

Whether for loyalty points, streamlined experiences or app-only exclusives, consumers know the best deals are in the app.

Airship’s platform data saw massive gains in the number of new mobile app users over the holidays. From October 31st to Cyber Monday, the number of people adding a new retail app to their phone increased 26% year-over-year.

Black Friday continues to be the top day of the year for people to add a retail app to their phones — at nearly double the daily average holiday season. New from last year, people added retail apps to their phones at a greater and sustained rate starting in early November. Three of the top five app install days in 2022 were November 18 through 20.

This earlier app-uptake during the holidays mobile’s role in growing direct online sales as well as the discovery and planning process for in-person excursions. It also reflects retailers pushing key promotions earlier in the season — Target’s Black Friday deals began 11/20, as did Walmart’s third round of holiday deals.

With all of this positivity and merriment, why do we think future value will be wasted? 
On average, only 8% of these new app customers will return on the 30th day after download. It’s a pattern we’ve seen repeated year after year across most every industry vertical. For retailers, it’s even costlier, considering the holiday economics of lower margin, door-busting deals and a cost per app install estimated to be $5.28 in North America.

For an app to be successful, a customer must find it, download it, and value it enough to keep using it. Maximizing ROI depends on customers progressing through the app lifecycle beyond activation and engagement to ultimately become loyal app customers. 

Stay tuned to our blog posts over the next several weeks as we share some of the top tips and best practices to actualize and improve life after download.

The post Retail App Downloads Set Holiday Records, But Retention Will See Future Value Evaporate appeared first on Airship.

Over the course of two days, many opinions were shared, but three themes stood out.

Driving customer loyalty is more important than ever
eMarketer reports that loyal app users generate 3.5x more revenue and are 3x more likely to make a repeat purchase. This statistic seems to be particularly relevant to the travel industry as the importance of driving customer long-term value through loyalty was addressed consistently across both days of the event. 

Travel companies have typically been focused on new customer acquisition, but the costs are high and, in unprecedented situations such as the global pandemic we’ve just been through, it was thanks to loyal customers that many brands were able to survive the difficult period. Benjamin Foster, Senior Marketing Manager, Central London Cluster, Marriott Hotels, referred to their core ‘tribe’ of loyal customers who truly appreciate and love Marriott brands, continued to engage throughout the pandemic and booked first when the travel ban lifted. 

According to Foster, Marriott Hotels focuses their initial marketing spend on this small group of people, which they rely on as the source of truth for all their marketing communications. Once the marketing is right for the tribe, Marriott believes the masses will follow. Phil Salcedo, Head of Market, UK & North America at HolidayPirates Group referred to the importance of being patient when it comes to driving loyalty. He believes that social media can be a key driver for loyal guests but only when the brand is willing to post consistently with truly relevant and useful content. Salcedo believes that brands who are using social media as a way to monetize their posts, or who still communicate only about the positives of a travel destination, are missing a trick. 

Social media platforms are accessed by savvy customers that can distinguish between being marketed to and being addressed authentically. HolidayPirates social strategy to drive loyalty provides content about travel destinations that addresses both positive and less positive features, so people can make informed travel decisions. This human and truthful approach supports the brand to drive more loyal customers. 

For David Ruiz Martinez, VP of Design & Customer Experience, SNCF Connect & Tech, customer loyalty is achieved through better customer experience. The French train operator recently improved its customer experience by integrating two of their apps into one so customers can find the best route for their journey and also buy tickets. Backed by significant research and a design-led approach, this change in the app promotes autonomy for the passenger and helps deliver a consistent and continuous experience to drive more loyal customers. 

Mobile apps are key to meeting the needs of future customers
Mobile apps offer travel brands a highly visible way to communicate with the customer far beyond the day of travel. According to industry thought leader, Lucia Rubio Zornoza, mobile apps are key to enabling travel brands to meet the needs of the future customer. Not only can mobile apps simplify the travel process before the journey with useful information and reminders, and during the journey with access to in-app check-in or even as a room key, but also post-journey for rewards, travel inspiration and to solicit feedback. 

Brands can encourage customers to download their mobile app by making it compulsory, or by making it a convenient travel companion for storing their loyalty cards or tickets. However, to achieve long-term success, brands need to be better at activating new app users as soon as they download the app. That includes showing them the benefits and usefulness of the app as part of onboarding communications and within initial app experiences, as well as having a plan in place to continuously engage them throughout the lifecycle. 

Engaging with customers beyond the time of travel is a top challenge
During the panel discussion between Wizzair, easyjet holidays, CheckMyBus and Airship, the audience was surveyed on their challenges when it comes to digital platforms and apps, and 52% of the audience said that keeping customers engaged beyond the day of travel is their top challenge. 

It’s to reward the mobile app customer with appealing experiences throughout the entire customer lifecycle. For example, if the mobile app can make the travel experience significantly better by offering key information or simplifying and speeding processes, it will encourage the customer to want to use this brand again – versus a competitor’s that doesn’t offer such a smooth experience.

SNCF Connect, along with parent company SNCF, is doing just that, by rewarding mobile customers with both SNCF-specific as well as general travel information, incentivizing customers to make wide use of the app while keeping the SNCF brand in mind. 

Driving good customer engagement also requires communicating content that is relevant to the specific customer – the audience of one. This can be done by ensuring collection of first-and zero-party data from customers whenever possible. Karisma Hotels has been doing that well by leveraging surveys and gamification through affinity-based quizzes at different stages of the customer lifecycle and then leveraging the data collected to send customers communications they are likely to find useful. According to Karisma Hotels Chief Marketing & Sales Officer Elizabeth Fettes, they don’t want to push upsells to guests who wouldn’t be interested. To avoid being pushy, they run a room match quiz through the app in which they ask guests to identify what is important to them in a room. Based on results, the guest may receive the option to upgrade the room should the results indicate that they would prefer one. 

By leveraging a mix of interactive quizzes, app messaging and other communications that include useful information or inspiration for things to do, travel brands can make the mobile app customer experience far more enjoyable and useful than just the day of travel. 

Conclusion
If we were to take just one conclusion from this two day event, it is the following: only when brands engage customers digitally with the same level of care as they do in person will they start to convert new guests into long-term customers that truly love the brand.

The post Top 3 Travel Themes that Brands Must Address to Meet the Needs of the Future Customer appeared first on Airship.

In recent years, technology has changed the ways customers purchase goods and interact with retailers. While some consumers have turned to online purchase methods, 44.4% still prefer to shop in-store or pick up their goods from brick-and-mortar locations. As more consumers seek blended digital and physical shopping experiences, retailers have an opportunity to adopt new technology to deliver enhanced experiences that increase customer satisfaction, basket size and bottom-line revenue. 

What makes a positive retail experience?

To begin developing strategies that will drive results, such as repeat business and increased basket size, it’s critical to first define what makes a good in-store customer experience.

In a recent survey, 23.8% of respondents said that they were more likely to give their business to a store that offers a convenient shopping experience; 31.9% of respondents from the same survey noted that they cared most about the availability and variety of products in-store. Another study found that long queue wait times were a major pain point for shoppers.

In the current landscape, consumers value convenience, product availability, personalized experiences and speed. Additionally, omnichannel shoppers make purchases 70% more often and spend over 30% more than customers who only shop in-store. With more choices available than ever before, and many consumers cutting back on spending, retailers must develop stellar in-store experiences to avoid losing customers to the competition.

How can location be used to create positive retail experiences that keep customers coming back?

Location-aware experiences provide personalized, convenient ways for consumers to locate and purchase the products when they shop in-store. There are several of these you can use to provide a positive experience for customers every time they set foot in your store.

1. In-store shopping mode

Retailers can improve the shopping experience and drive repeat business by surfacing in-store-only app options when a customer enters the store. These in-store app modes can offer self-checkout, product locators, store maps and navigation tips, reminders about past purchases, and more. With 60-70% of shoppers doing research and making purchases both online and in-store, retailers must invest in improving the omnichannel shopping experience.  Retailers such as JOANN power in-store offers in the brand’s app with location-based technology.

2. Buy online, pickup in-store

Curbside pickup has become an important channel for customers and retailers alike. However, for too many consumers, buy online/pickup in-store experiences (BOPIS) can be frustrating and time-consuming because of the need to hunt for curbside pickup parking spots and wait for orders. Retailers can make the experience more seamless by using first-party location to power seamless experiences with shorter wait times. By providing live ETAs and arrival detection, location empowers retail brands to enhance staff efficiency – and ensure orders are ready upon customer arrival. American Eagle uses location to provide a stellar experience at curbside and when picking up in-store.

3. Location-based loyalty program prompts and offers

 Loyalty programs drive repeat purchases and allow brands to personalize offers based on past purchases. By using first-party location data, retailers can verify whether a customer is in one of their locations when they open the brand’s mobile app. This verification can be used to prompt users to open their app to check in for rewards or points. Geofences and beacon detection provide accurate, real-time location information that enables retailers to promote rewards and offers when a customer enters the store.

4. Personalized marketing

Brands can surface in-app offers via SMS and push notifications while customers are on-premise. By offering relevant deals while customers are shopping, retailers can bridge the gap between their online stores and the in-person shopping experience, creating a seamless experience. Integrations with customer engagement platforms, such as Airship’s, empower retailers to send targeted messages to customers to drive engagement and conversion. These messages can prompt customers to purchase an item they had previously searched for or saved in their app while shopping online or send a reminder to book an appointment in-store.

5. Location-triggered feedback prompting

Retailers can also prompt location-triggered requests for feedback related to the shopping experience when a customer exits the store. This feedback can be used to personalize a resolution for a customer who had a poor experience – and make operational improvements to ensure future customers don’t run into the same issues. Only 1 in 26 customers will voice their complaints – the others will simply take their business elsewhere. So, it’s important for retailers to provide their customers with a forum to submit feedback about their experiences. In order to ensure retailers are getting the most value from location without a significant development burden, retailers must work with a provider that seamlessly integrates with existing technology solutions.

How can retailers implement location to deliver better in-store experiences?

Retailers with brick-and-mortar stores have two options when it comes to adopting location infrastructure to support customer experiences: building or buying location infrastructure. Native iOS and Android geofencing capabilities often present limitations and require additional technical resources in order to fulfill business needs.

While some companies choose to build their own infrastructure, brands, such as JOANN and American Eagle, choose to work with a trusted provider to provide location infrastructure.

When retailers integrate location technology into their app, the app becomes a much more powerful tool for delivering engaging experiences to customers. That’s because it takes effect in the moments when customers are most likely to make a purchase decision – when they’re inside a store. 

Get in touch with Radar’s sales team to learn more.

The post 5 Ways Leading Retailers are Exceeding Customer Expectations with Hybrid In-store Experiences appeared first on Airship.

For more ideas, check out our 50+ Ideas for Optimizing Your Mobile App e-book.

Simplify Sign Ups 

To get the most from your mobile app, your customers need to register. However, the prospect of creating and remembering yet another account and password can be a real barrier. 

Simple sign-up options with Facebook, Google, Apple or other major platforms can help. In one survey, 88% of U.S. consumers said they have used social logins, and the number one reason was to avoid filling out online registration forms.

Optimize Onboarding  

A seamless onboarding experience is key to driving adoption among new users. That’s why it’s important to test content, layout and onboarding flows to learn which approaches drive registration and premium upgrades. 

Simple steps like adding an image, adjusting your paywall layout or reducing steps in onboarding can deliver valuable results. For example, the photo editing app Instasize increased premium conversions 16% by testing and optimizing their app onboarding flow. 

Improve Your Opt-In Ask 

Getting your customers opted into notifications and location services is essential to delivering personalized, timely and relevant news and alerts. But what if they decline? When should you ask again? The only way to know is to test! 

For media apps, try asking again after a specific number of sessions, views or articles read. You can use Airship’s event-triggered automation to make that ask at just the right moment. And be sure to give them a reason to opt-in, like not missing essential news or gaining access to exclusive content.

Test CTA Copy

You should also experiment with your CTAs to see which messages move the needle. Test for metrics like start today button clicked, email and password creation, or start free trial.

One of our media partners recently tested a CTA variation that referenced a $14.99 per month cost after a free trial vs. another that touted “less than 50 cents a day.” Customers loved the second option, leading to a 9% increase in conversion on subscriptions! That’s huge! But even a small increase in conversions can have a big impact on your bottom line.

Run Tests with Trials

If you offer trials for your subscription-based or freemium app, you may be uncertain about what those trials should look like. There’s no one-size-fits-all answer, but you can take guesswork out of the equation with A/B testing.

Experiment with different trial lengths to determine what drives paid conversion and decreases subscription opt out rates. You can also identify specific segments of your user base to convert on certain trial lengths, which helps drill down on the preferences of those segments.

Optimize In-App Ads

If you monetize ads in your app, A/B testing the placement, length, and type of ads can help maximize your ad revenue. The goal is to determine if adding or changing placement of ads has an impact on retention or impressions.

Areas to test include placement, length and ad type. And if you’re adding ads to your app for the first time, test them with a small segment of your user base to ensure you don’t see a negative impact on engagement and retention.

Try Feature Flags

Feature flags are a great way to test and iterate your app through rapid learning. Rather than launching new features to all users simultaneously, you can use feature flags to target a segment of users. By gradually rolling features out to a select group of users, and quickly rolling them back if needed, your team can ensure that the release goes smoothly and reduce the likelihood of unfavorable app store ratings. 

Airship recently launched a free version of Apptimize’s Feature Flags solution, making it easier for mobile app product owners to confidently roll out new services to meet changing needs.

With an ongoing strategy to optimize your media app, you’re ready to deliver massive value that helps acquire, retain and grow your customer base. For more inspiring mobile app optimization ideas and case studies, check out our ebook: 50 Ideas for Optimizing Your Mobile App. 

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The post 7 Mobile App Optimization Ideas for Media Brands appeared first on Airship.

How can retail brands meet this challenge and build better experiences that boost sales and retention? Our latest Airship ebook takes those questions head-on with insights and use cases specifically for retail. Read on for a preview. And to learn more, download the full ebook, Mobile Strategies that Boost Retail Sales & Retention!

Using Customer Journeys for More Effective Retail Onboarding 

To retain your customers, you need to show them value at every touchpoint. That starts with a great onboarding experience on the channels that matter most to each customer. And it continues through the retention and growth phases, where retailers can use intelligent customer journeys to offer real value that builds loyalty and retention. 

Creating Great BOPIS/Click & Collect Experiences

The demand for contactless, convenient mobile experiences is higher than ever, with 50% of shoppers saying they plan to continue using services like curbside pickup after COVID-19 restrictions are lifted. We look at several use cases showing how channels like Mobile Wallet and SMS can help retail brands respond to this key trend.

These are just a few examples of what you’ll find in the new ebook. We hope this collection of insights and strategies will help you meet your retail brand’s goals. Check it out by downloading the book here!

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Give your retail customers the personalized mobile experience they want

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The post How to Build Better Mobile-First Experiences for Retail appeared first on Airship.

That’s why Airship is excited to announce a new integration with Shopify! Brands who use Shopify to host their eCommerce sites can now use the power of Airship web notifications, email and SMS. By sending personalized and targeted messages based on real-time Shopify shopper data, sellers can dramatically increase conversion rates and decrease abandoned carts.

Here are just a few of the ways you can use this new integration to meet your conversion goals:

Increase Retention with Real-Time Segmentation

Every moment a customer interacts with your site or completes a purchase-related event is an opportunity to engage them further and provide them with real-time information they need. Shopify users can now send these events, such as cart created, purchase completed or order fulfilled, from Shopify to Airship to trigger and target web notifications, email, SMS, including Live SMS Chat for real-time sales and support conversations, such as answering product questions or helping with shipping issues!

Make Every Message More Engaging with Dynamic Personalization

Making each message personalized for your customer is one of the most important parts of engaging and retaining customers. By using Shopify shopper data sent to Airship, brands can personalize each message with the relevant item information, such as what the customer left in their carts or what their order number is, helping to reduce abandoned carts and increase ROI.

Integrate Shopify into Your Cross-Channel Campaigns

Airship Journeys is unique in its goal-based and data-driven approach. By setting end goals such as purchase or abandoned cart reduction, marketers can track how every Journey (and every message within that Journey) impacts that goal and optimize them accordingly. 

Brands can now integrate the personalized web notifications, email and SMS triggered by Shopify events into these cross-channel Airship Journeys, coordinating them across channels to create an end-to-end experience delivered on the channels that make the most sense for every customer. You can then see the direct impact of the messages on your conversion goals and optimize when and how your notifications are sent.

As always, we want to help you meet your messaging goals and deliver customer experiences that create loyalty. Contact us today and let us know how we can help! 

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Give Your eCommerce Customers the Personalized Experience They Want

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The post Increase Conversion Rates and Decrease Abandoned Carts with Shopify and Airship appeared first on Airship.

Yet, to implement a successful strategy, brands must revamp elements of operations and customer engagement to deliver a seamless experience that meets high customer expectations. Inspired by our recent Radar + Airship webinar, here are 5 key questions brands must ask to help address that challenge and shape a BOPIS program that drives customer satisfaction and business impact.

Making the Business Case

How can you build internal momentum? 

61% of retailers say BOPIS is at the top of their omnichannel plans and investments. But, before making that investment, you need to pull together all the right pieces to make the business case. Airship Director of Technical Services Ramsey Kail suggests several focus areas. First, identify key teams such as in-store operations, ecommerce, order management, marketing, the app dev team and potentially impacted supply chain sources. Next, determine which systems are impacted, including ecommerce, inventory, and internal systems such as POS or in-store mobile apps. You’ll also need to plan for measurement and get alignment around the metrics you’ll use to measure ROI. We’ll take a closer look at measurement later in this post.

Communicating with Customers

How will you ensure customers are informed and engaged?

Next, think about the channels, touchpoints and messages that will keep customers informed and engaged throughout the BOPIS process. What do they need to know at each stage, from order confirmation to post-pickup? What channels make the most sense? And are you able to identify your customers across those different channels?

Several specific channel pairings are ideal for BOPIS customer communication. One is Email + Mobile App. If you email an order confirmation with a link encouraging a customer to download your app, you can then trigger a push message when their order is ready for pickup. Another perfect pairing is SMS + Mobile Wallet. Send a SMS order combination with a link to a mobile wallet pass so customers can find order info and pickup details anytime on their mobile devices. Plus, consumers tend to hang onto those mobile wallet passes, giving you another way to stay connected.

Building a Great Pickup Experience

How will you ensure a great experience once customers arrive?

Long wait times, unclear instructions or poor communication between customers and your associates can derail any click and collect experience. Simple solutions like signage can help (even the most humble of BOPIS efforts benefit from clear signage letting customers know where to go and what to do). However, according to Radar CEO Nick Patrick, consumer expectations for more seamless experiences are driving brands to invest in what he calls a V2 approach. BOPIS V2 experiences are digitally enabled, leveraging tech like Radar’s location tracing and Airship Live In-App Chat to facilitate clear instructions, two-way communication and greater value for customers (and staff!). Brands that get it right see dividends in the form of increased engagement, repeat purchases and improved operational efficiencies.

Keeping Customers Engaged Post-Purchase

How will you leverage post-purchase opportunities?

Follow-on messaging is an essential and often overlooked opportunity for getting customer feedback, upselling and cross-selling, and building customer loyalty. 

Use SMS, email or in-app surveys to understand customer sentiment from your digitally engaged customers. Drive add-on and repeat purchases by deploying post-purchase customer journeys with personalized offers or other tailored content. You can also enhance CX through automated messages with valuable information like assembly instructions, preparation details, or by educating customers about your loyalty program. 

Measuring Your BOPIS Service

How will you measure success?

BOPIS 2.0 spans physical and digital experiences. That’s why effective measurement requires looking at both customer engagement and operations metrics. 

From an engagement perspective, you’re likely to incorporate existing methods and metrics such as customer satisfaction surveys, repeat purchase behavior, average order value or loyalty sign-ups. On the operational side, focus areas include wait times, order quality, and order prep timing. These data points can help drive a virtuous cycle that generates improvements in both CX and operational efficiency. For example, adjusting when you trigger order preparation to ensure customers’ meals are fresh when they arrive can drive improved customer satisfaction.

For more ideas on how to create BOPIS experiences that deliver incredible value for your customers and brand, check out our How to Build Better BOPIS Experiences blog post as well as the webinar with Radar and Airship.

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The post 5 Key Questions to Shape a Winning BOPIS Strategy appeared first on Airship.

Vaccine passports on mobile devices have become an important topic in New York and around the world. While New York state and Israel have already developed a vaccine passport, the European Union, the United Kingdom and Japan are reportedly considering making their own.

New York City, like many others locations around the world, experiences broad-reaching benefits of tourism, and with summer months coming, it may be wondering how the state’s Excelsior Pass is going to work since the vaccine passport is a brand-new concept. If people hope that Excelsior will lift the local economy, they’ll be happy to know that shifting consumer behavior in recent years toward mobile wallets indicates such passports can be an all-around success.

The travel industry offers a mobile-minded guide for how vaccine passports can enable in-person experiences. Two years ago, 21% of Americans had an airline app on their phone, and 1.5 billion digital boarding passes were used. What’s more, around 2 million Americans used the Transportation Security Administration PreCheck every day in 2019.

The vaccine passport will be similar to the digital boarding pass and TSA PreCheck experience, centering on a scannable QR code that verifies the individual has been vaccinated or has recently tested negative for Covid-19. With mobile wallet usage established in the marketplace, significant adoption should follow.

Why It’s Secure

For New Yorkers, it’s worth noting that the Excelsior Pass can now be stored in Apple Wallet for iPhone users or Google Wallet for Android devotees. A vaccine passport that’s stored in a mobile wallet is easily accessible and will not require Wi-Fi or a cellular connection to use it.

Mobile wallets are tied to a user’s Apple or Google ID, so they will only be accessible by the owner of the phone with a security code or biometrics login. While vaccination data is medical and private, more and more people entrust their mobile wallets with sensitive information, including credit and debit cards—contactless mobile payments grew 29% in 2020. Storing vaccine passports in mobile wallets isn’t a big leap when you consider their importance in more quickly returning our lives and the economy to normal.

Getting Better

Government and health care providers might have been better served by skipping the dedicated app altogether and going straight to mobile wallet for the broadest possible adoption. Instead of asking people to download an app, enter their information and find their pass, they could have just sent a single link via email or SMS immediately on administering the first dose, enabling citizens to add a personalized pass to Apple Wallet or Google Pay with a couple of taps.

And that pass could be updated automatically by the issuer over time with no manual app update required. Mobile wallets are just that handy, which is something government and health care leaders should keep in mind for future digital needs of this scale.

Prepare for the Future

Want to learn more about how you can use mobile wallet?

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The post Why Mobile Wallets Can Make Vaccine Passports a New York Success appeared first on Airship.

We sat down with Scott Dargis, NBC Sports’ Manager of Mobile Notifications, at our Elevate event. He revealed how NBC Sports has been able to keep people engaged during a wild year. 

Here are three lessons from NBC Sports’ strategy.

Test Your Notifications as Much as Possible

When you send notifications, you want them to feel organic. Importantly, you don’t want users to feel like something’s being pushed on them. To find a healthy balance between the two, NBC Sports A/B tested a wide variety of notifications. 

The result: NBC found that “tease” type notifications—messages that provide users with a nugget of the content within, but not the whole story—performed the best. These cliffhanger-style notifications have helped NBC Sports keep their direct open rates strong.

In testing, the NBC team found that notifications with emojis in the subject line outperformed those without. One or two emojis was the sweet spot for engagement. Icons, graphics, and other rich notification elements encouraged better engagement as well.

NBC Sports also gave their writers more control over the voice and tone of messages, particularly for individual team content. Personalizing team content in this way helps NBC Sports keep their notifications relevant and relatable.

Insight: Experiment with notification approaches and understand that your users want to see something interesting. Personalize whenever you can, and always give users a reason to engage.

Reconsider How Many Notifications You’re Sending

If people feel bombarded with notifications that they don’t find interesting, they’ll tune out. NBC Sports realized this when the pandemic hit. Because live sports were mostly shut down, their volume of notifications decreased — and so did their app uninstalls and opt-outs.

Now, NBC Sports uses a careful, analytics-backed approach to notifications. They segment their users with lists and groupings according to league divisions, common fanbases, and more. This way, NBC is able to send fewer notifications —and the ones that they do send feel more personal.

Insight: Focus on what you’re sending, not how many notifications you’re sending. If you can find a way to send fewer notifications and accomplish the same goals, do that.

Timing Is Important 

NBC Sports learned that when they send their notifications can be nearly as important as what they’re sending. People want to receive notifications at times when they’re interested in interacting with that content. NBC found that, for their app, lunch and dinner times (early afternoon and mid-evening) worked best.

It makes sense: People want to watch sports when they’ve got free time. As sports fans are scrolling through their phone at lunch or after dinner, they’re often looking for something to watch. NBC Sports capitalizes on this by sending timely messages during the periods when their users are most active.

Insight: Look at the analytics and figure out when your users want to receive notifications. Try to send your important notifications during that time frame.

The Bottom Line

2020 forced NBC Sports to reevaluate their strategy. They’ve emerged on the other side with an even more effective framework for sending customers notifications that they truly want to see. If you want to learn more about how Airship’s Push Notification platform can help your business, click the button below to get in touch. 

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The post 3 Lessons from NBC Sports’ Mobile Retention Strategy appeared first on Airship.