There are two types of notifications via Firebase: notifications (push-notifications) and in-app messages. Both of them are a powerful tool in mobile app marketing that allows direct communication with the user. The key to successful marketing is personalization, and creating custom audiences for notification campaigns in Firebase can help you do that. As notifications can be seen as intrusive, it's crucial to ensure they are not irrelevant to the user, or risk frustrating them. By targeting your audience with Firebase, you can enhance your mobile marketing strategy and increase user engagement. In this article, we'll walk you through the differences between push- and in-app notifications and the process of creating custom audiences for push notifications in Firebase.
First of all, let’s define what push-notifications and in-app messages are:
Push-notifications are a more common, standard version of the mobile notifications. Users can see push-notifications without actually opening the app: they are shown typically on the lock-screen or in the notification-list.
In-app messages can be received only when the app is opened. This is a banner with more specific information, designed for a particular group of customers.
Other differences:
Secondly, you need to create an audience in Firebase. How to do this?
Firebase is deeply integrated with Google Analytics, providing all statistical data available in Firebase Analytics. Armed with this knowledge, you can leverage this data to create customized and relevant notification campaigns for your users.
Step 1. Follow the instructions and open the window
Firebase >> Analytics >> Audiences >> New audience
Step 2. Choose one option for your campaign
Firebase gives you two options:
Create a custom audience from scratch;
Use one of the suggested options.
In the “Suggested audiences” block, you can see different subsections such as General, Travel, Templates and Predictive. In these subsections, you can choose an audience that might work for you.
If you want to create a custom audience from scratch, check out the instructions here.
Step 3. Choose a duration for your audience
You can choose how long users stay members of this audience.
You can also set up a trigger event which logs the event when the user becomes a member of this group. For example, it could be the event “First_order”.
There could be thousands of variations, so continue experimenting with the settings.
Amazing! When you have established your target audience, you are ready to launch the campaign.
Step 4. Follow the instructions and open the window:
Firebase >> Engage >> Messaging >> New campaign
Choose one of the options: to create a Notification campaign or an In-App Message campaign.
If you want to launch a notification campaign, click “Notification” button and fill in the necessary info:
The "Notification" block allows you to customize the appearance of your push notifications. Create notification title, text, add an image. We also recommend you enter the notification name, to recognise each campaign in the list.
Choose an app and an audience for the campaign in the "Target" block.
Schedule the campaign: set up when the end user should receive this notification.
The push-notification can be received once per campaign.
Insert conversion events, if it is necessary for this campaign in particular.
Insert additional options, if it is necessary for this campaign in particular.
If you want to create a push-notification campaign, which leads an end-user to a particular restaurant, exact dish or a custom CMS page, follow the instructions here.
If you want to launch an In-App Message campaign, click “In-App Messaging” button and fill in the necessary info:
The "Style and content" block allows you to customize the appearance of your push notifications. Choose message layout, fill in message content, add images and a primary button.
Create and insert a clear campaign title, choose an app and an audience for the campaign in the "Target" block.
Schedule the campaign: set up when and how often the end user should receive this notification.
Insert conversion events, if it is necessary for this campaign in particular.
Conversions are the most important actions your app users take, like buying something or subscribing. When you mark an action as a conversion, it helps you track and analyse how many users completed that action. This helps you understand how effective your app is at getting users to do what you want them to do. You can add up to 30 different conversion events to your app project, in addition to the five standard ones with Firebase. When you designate an event as a conversion, it gets uploaded immediately so you can act on the information quickly.
Insert additional custom data or skip this part.
Push the “Review” button and check the settings.
Push the “Publish” button.
Remember: testing different options and selecting the most effective is the only way to know what works for your business.
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