eMarketer's latest report, "Push Notifications 2018: How to Win Opt-Ins, Develop Metrics and Get the Creative Right," explains the best practices surrounding push notification use for marketers.
“There’s a very uncomfortable moment every time you newly interact with a brand’s app when you give the app invasive permission to your stuff. Are they allowed to access the GPS location data? The media on your phone? That’s the moment when users are stuck in—'If I don’t do it, it won’t work. But if I do it, I’ve basically given up access to my information,'” said Sophie Kleber, global executive creative director at digital agency Huge.
“You definitely don’t want the first thing they see to be the opt-in request,” said Aaron Sawitsky, director of product marketing at mobile app marketing service provider Localytics. “They haven’t even interacted with the app at all, and they’re already seeing a dialogue box asking, ‘Do you want to enable push notifications?’ How can you possibly know if you want to at that point?”
Instead, those overseeing an app's push notification strategy should take the time to build a relationship with the user to demonstrate the value of opting-in. In-app messaging can provide a useful means of communicating that value before asking for permission to send push notifications.
Research shows that there are significant differences in the opt-in rates of Android and iOS users.
According to Accengage, the average worldwide opt-in rate for push notifications was 67.5% in H1 2018. That rate was significantly higher among Android devices (91.1%) vs. iOS (43.9%).