Push notifications how they work. How to increase the effectiveness of a campaign. On your computer and even on a regular mobile phone

Pop-up windows have begun to appear on websites more and more often. And these are not advertisements, but requests to send push notifications addressed to you as a subscriber. We decided to figure out what these messages are and how they work.

Browser push notifications appeared in 2013 for Safari in OS X, but this technology began to gain popularity only in April 2015 after the Google Chrome browser began supporting Push API. Today this function is also available on Firefox and Yandex Browser browsers for all OS. In addition, Android mobile device users can also receive messages from websites.

New type of mailing

Push notifications are short messages sent by website owners to users. This could be information about discounts, new product releases, or blog articles. The advantage of such notifications compared to E-mail or SMS mailings is that an Internet connection is sufficient to receive information. The user does not need to go to the site or check email, and does not even need to open a browser. When you receive a message, a pop-up window will appear on the monitor with the text of the message and a link to the site.

Push notifications arrive instantly to the subscriber's computer, making them great for sending urgent or important messages.

How it works

The subscriber database is collected through a browser. When you first visit the site, a pop-up window appears asking you to display messages. By clicking on the “allow” button, the user actually subscribes to the newsletter.

The new subscriber is assigned a token. This is a special encryption code that depends on the browser, the type of device used and the domain of the sender's website. The site owner is required to obtain an SSL certificate and connect the API. The information necessary for this can be obtained from the documentation of the browser of interest. There is a simpler option - use the services of special services.

What are push notifications used for?

Push notifications encourage users to visit your site again. Information on a computer monitor has a greater chance of being seen and read. Even if the user is not interested in your message, he will still remember the company, and this increases loyalty and brand awareness. Due to the instant receipt of messages, push notifications become useful when it is necessary to convey urgent or important information to the client.

Push notifications may be most useful for news portals and blogs (for example, sending interesting news and articles) or online stores (sending advertisements, notifications about discounts and promotions, as well as information about order status).

When and how often to send push notifications?

You can analyze website traffic during the day using the search engine services Google Analytics and Yandex. Metrics.

You shouldn’t remind your subscribers about yourself too often. It is enough to send one notification per day during peak activity, otherwise your newsletter may irritate users and they will prefer to unsubscribe from the news.

And in conclusion

Sending push notifications is a promising direction in marketing, which is quickly gaining popularity in the Russian-speaking market.

According to statistics, the conversion rate of user subscriptions to push notifications is almost 30 times higher than to other types of mailings. And in combination with E-mail and SMS mailings, push can provide maximum coverage of your target audience. You can find such a solution in the SendPulse service. This platform allows you to combine these three types of mailings and, with the help of automation, save your time and increase conversions.

However, when deciding to use push notifications, it is worth considering that some site visitors will perceive a pop-up window as a threat to the security of their computer and their personal data. Moreover, many may perceive this type of notification as spam. So before you decide to use this type of marketing, make sure it's right for you.

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You probably receive notifications by email: go to your email client and look at the incoming letters. In this case, this technology is pull technology, i.e. you go to the site and “pull” data from it when you need it.

In the case of push notifications, the resource pushes new data to you itself. At the same time, you immediately receive the latest data, because this technology does not have a specific data verification period; it comes online. Using push notifications you do not necessarily need to receive notifications. Using push technology, you can, for example, synchronize data if it has been updated.

Notifications are:

Browser - via push api or via add-on
Mobile - via mobile application
On PC via application, regardless of browser

You can immediately start creating a Push Notification channel,

Browser (web) push notifications

They come to the browser from the site to which the user is subscribed. They can arrive both on a computer and on an Android device in the Chrome browser, but iOS devices cannot receive web pushes under any circumstances.

This is what different types of notifications look like in the Chrome browser

First the notification is made via the standard Notification API, second done via Push API. These alerts don't go away - but they don't have image smoothing applied on many platforms. (you can see by the quality of the pictures)
Third push was made via Rich Notification. These notifications come through extensions, they may contain additional information, buttons, or an image under the notification. There are more possibilities - but they are automatically hidden, although perhaps in the future they will be available from “pinning”.
These are notifications in Chrome, but there are also notifications in Firefox and Safari.

Firefox

Safari

Many web push notification services provide these types of alerts. However, we want to explain to you that sending notifications itself is free. These alerts are sent via:

GCM: Google, completely free, you just need to create a key in the developer console
APNS: Apple requires any developer you know with a certificate, or for $100 a year you can take it yourself
MSP: Mozilla Push Service, completely free. You don't even need registration. Open standard.

We warn you that you do not need to pay several thousand rubles for the number of alerts or subscribers. Since the mailing service itself is free (unlike, for example, SMS, where you need to pay the operator), you can only charge money for intermediary services, convenience, statistics, etc. But it’s not worth several thousand rubles, especially as the number of subscribers grows. Yes, the load of a million alerts per hour will be significant - you can pay money for such numbers, because your server may not be able to handle it. But believe me, sending even 100 thousand notifications per day is nonsense. Through GCM you can send more than 5-7 thousand push notifications in 5-7 packets in a second. Many web push services require 1000 rubles per month or even more for this. In 1 second of a small script.
PushAll supports all these types of notifications and allows you to send newsletters absolutely free and without restrictions.

Mobile push notifications

These are alerts that come to your mobile phone from various applications.

For example, notifications on Android through the PushAll application look like this

And this is how it is on iOS in our application

You will not be able to attach these alerts “natively” to your website. It is possible to receive browser notifications on Android via Chrome, but these notifications are very cumbersome and of poor quality, the difference can be appreciated in the example below:

Alert comparison

For example, you can send an alert via telegram (1) , but then you won’t have an icon for your site, and when clicked, the user will be taken to a dialogue, and not immediately to your resource. (2) This is just a browser notification on Android, not so noticeable in this screenshot, but the image is of lower quality, an extra button with settings, and a line with the site address. Plus, due to content updates, an unnecessary notification may appear. (4) . Native solution through the application (3) is the most attractive solution for the user.
Push notifications on Moto 360 smartwatches:

The difference is most noticeable on smart watches. Top web alert, bottom app alert

Also, notifications on Android in the latest version of our application can be grouped by channels:

Grouping notifications on Android

Android

History inside the iOS app

Exotic Alerts

You have already seen above that notifications from our service can even come through telegram. Due to this, users who actively use Telegram can easily connect. We also send alerts by email. In this case, notifications arrive “in batches” at set intervals.

As a result, it turns out that we provide a secure “bridge” between the user and a third-party service. The user can entrust his email account to an intermediate party in which he is confident and not be afraid that his email account will be compromised or it will end up on the spam list. At the same time, the sending site also does not pay for mailings as well as for all other types of notifications.

Letters arrive in the style of notifications

What types of alerts are most popular?

We have extensive experience in sending push notifications, we have sent over 60 million of them. Below is data on the 33,214 devices in our system, as well as which devices and connection methods users prefer:

11936 35% - Android application
6992 22% - Chrome add-on
6204 18% - WebPush
3514 11% - Telegram
2688 8% - Email
1465 4% - SocketPush
227 1% - iOS
188 1% - Safari

As you can see, about 60% of users choose native solutions that are installed on their devices. Simpler doesn't mean better. Only 18% of users choose one-click alerts, most likely due to previous bad experiences on other sites. 11% of users use Telegram - most of them are iOS users who were previously waiting for a native solution.

As a result, we want to convey to our readers that implementing web push notifications on your website will cover only 18% of the needs of your audience, you are losing mobile users, losing those who had a bad experience with web push notifications, and much more.
Also interesting is the high share of Email and SocketPush. For the user, this is the most secure method when he can open a site and receive notifications from services, and then close it and they will stop bothering him. At the same time, you need to understand that the same principle works here as in other Push notifications - when the user appears online - all missed notifications come. For some reason, many web push notification services present this function as an innovation, but this is already included in the GCM and APNS protocols.

It's interesting to see the statistics for the last 2 weeks, the fact is that we recently released an application for iOS, and we updated the application for Android and everything has changed somewhat.
It should be taken into account that no new large channels have been added during this time - that is, this is a purely passive influx of new users - 950 devices.

202 20% - WebPush
72 8% - iOS
38 4% - Email
3 about 0% - Safari
1 about 0% - SocketPush

These statistics show that WebPush is growing passively as the easiest subscription method for a small number of channels. However, 70% use a native solution. Moreover, iOS applications are installed more often than a bot is added to Telegram.

What if I still need clean web push notifications on my website?

Let's start with what you'll need:
1. SSL certificate. It can be obtained for free, but its main problem is not that it can be bought or obtained. The main problem is the load. The fact is that when making an encrypted connection, a lot of server resources are consumed. This means that if your server could handle the load without SSL, but was loaded at 50%, most likely you will have to buy 2-3 more servers, or carry out a lot of optimization. Also, during mailings, you will need to give the content (header and text) of the notification to all users who accept it. That is, if you have 100 thousand subscribers, then several thousand requests will come to your server in 10 seconds and all of them will require SSL Handshake.

2. Device control and database. You will need to record each user and their key, make sure it is new (it is updated sometimes), discard old data, collect statistics yourself, etc.

3. The key for GCM in the Google console is free. To send notifications on Safari, you need a developer account - it costs $100 per year.

Inept use of notifications, especially if you call the request window immediately when the user enters the site, can lead to disastrous consequences

iGuides users 'really excited' about alerts

The fact is that many users activate alerts without understanding what they are. In fact, if the user has not confirmed his desire to receive mailings from you (in his right mind), and you send him content, then by law it is spam. That is, any user who accidentally clicks “Allow” on your website, and you do not warn him on your website that you will be sending him notifications, can sue you for spam.

You can implement alerts yourself, and we will not completely rewrite it here (only if later, in detail, the instructions themselves with code)

Are there ready-made solutions for browser notifications?

If you yourself cannot implement notifications, but you need browser notifications on your site, you can try, for example, OneSignal. They provide decent alerts, and the free plans should be enough.

Never use services that ask you for money for the number of subscribers. The point is that over time, more and more users will disable these alerts on your site. You'll find that a certain percentage of your alerts don't get through. At first it will be 30%, then 40% and can even reach 80%. In this case, they will demand from you the amount for the full number of subscribers.

Also pay attention to small text - some services limit notifications. For example, a limit of 30 notifications per month per user. What does it mean? This means that you can send 1 notification per day to all users. If you have articles on your website, this is not so bad - you can highlight one important one and send it. If you need to send personal messages and sometimes more than 1 notification per day, this is unacceptable. Such services will require you to pay the full monthly fee for every 30 alerts - for free alerts.

Results

Push notifications are a useful tool, but you need to know how to work with them and know the pitfalls. This market is now just developing, services are appearing that demand money “for novelty.” But in fact, throughout the civilized world, notifications have been used for a long time, and there they are already, for the most part, free. You also need to take into account the interests of users and not limit them in choosing methods for receiving notifications.

We've provided you with compelling evidence that alerts are used across multiple platforms and that users love the approach. And if users are happy, then notifications will be perceived in a positive way. Users will receive the most useful information from you in a form convenient for them, which will expand the active audience of your resource.

In this article we will try to explain what push messages are.

Today, many sites offer you to subscribe to push notifications right from the door. And every day there are more and more such sites. Let's start with the theory.

Push notifications are short messages that come directly to your desktop. Such a message usually contains a site icon and a text field; in rare cases, a large image and buttons are added to it. When you click on this message, you will be taken to the specified page of the site that sent the notification.

What does push mean?

The name of this technology translated means push. When sending a message, the site forwards the installed texts and images to browser companies such as Google. Then, with the help of a push, this message is delivered to your browser, which displays its contents on the screen. It should be noted that you are not required to leave any personal data, which makes this channel extremely safe.

Push is a new channel that allows sites to send you information about news, special offers, or simply inform you about the status of your order.

Here are some examples of notifications that sites send:

Travel agencies can offer you the best deals:

And airlines can notify you about the status of the flight for which you checked in.

Push messaging technology is a new era of communication between sites and you. By subscribing once, you will always be aware of the latest news from the resource.

Push messages have a number of properties:

They arrive regardless of whether you are on the site or not, are delivered instantly, and your subscription cannot be used on other resources, unlike email messages.

It’s as simple as allowing them to be received. We have already talked about this on our blog.

The bottom line is.

Browser messages are a great tool for modern marketing and are extremely safe for the user. The technology prevents spam from entering the message channel. But you need to be selective and allow notifications only for those sites whose content is interesting or useful to you.

In conclusion, I would like to add a few lines for companies that are taking this opportunity into circulation. By doing everything, you will be able to maintain the loyalty of your audience, and your messages will always be welcome on the subscriber’s desktop.

To improve its own service, Sberbank created a virtual telecom operator that sends notifications to clients via the cloud. Such messages do not depend on the SIM cards of mobile operators; Push notifications are generated in Sberbank Online and are sent to those subscribers who have activated this service. It will be discussed in more detail in the article.

What it is

Push notifications are short messages that pop up at the top of the smartphone screen. To display, you do not need to install a special program; just download the Sberbank Online application. It works well on both iPhones and smartphones with the Android operating system and allows you to perform transactions in real time.

Push notifications in the Sberbank Online service are provided free of charge. Internet connection services are provided for a fee.

This format of notifications about completed transactions is not suitable for some clients. They prefer SMS messages and try to block or completely remove the push themselves. The correctness of performing such procedures will be discussed below.

Blocking, deletion

If necessary, you can block the receipt of push notifications from Sber. Depending on the operating system of the smartphone, the sequence of actions will have some differences:

If your mobile device is based on Android, then you must first go to “Settings”. Then on the “Device” tab, go to “Sounds and notifications”, click on “Application notifications”. Go to tab. Then find “Sberbank” in the list, open it, opposite the “Block notifications” line, move the slider to the right to the “on” position. If you activate Do Not Disturb mode, messages from all installed applications will no longer appear on the phone screen. In this status, information about incoming calls will be unavailable.
On iPhone the principle of operation is similar. In the settings you need to find “Notifications”. In the list of applications, find “Sberbank”, go to the “Allow notifications” window that appears, move the slider to the “off” position.

In order to delete push notifications, you need to log into the mobile application. Open "Notifications". Press and hold the message for a few seconds until a trash can icon and a square surrounded by dots appear. If you need to completely clear the list, you should click on both buttons. To delete one letter, click on the first one. Depending on your decision, either all letters will be deleted, or the list will be reduced by one unit.

Conclusion

Thus, push notifications from Sberbank are short messages that pop up at the top of the phone screen. Each of these alerts contains information about transactions performed with the card. In order to delete or disable incoming notifications, you need to set the settings of your phone and the Sberbank Online application correctly.

Modern technologies do not stand still, and new ways to attract audiences are constantly being created. The most popular tool for this today is push notifications. Many people wonder what it is. And this despite the fact that they receive them literally every day.

What are push notifications and what are they for?

Translated from English, “push” means “pushing.” Regarding notifications, this term is considered as a way of disseminating information to the general public.

The history of the technology dates back to the nineties of the last century, when the Point Cast service delivered messages about stock market news. Subsequently, push notifications began to be sent via Internet Explorer and Netscape Navigator browsers. But in those years they gained popularity because not many people actively used the Internet, or the connection speed was extremely low.

At the moment, “push notifications” are an easy way to attract visitors to a site while monetizing it, which implies actions aimed at making a profit. These alerts can be browser or mobile. They are presented in the form of pop-up windows containing various information.

When entering a resource, a push notification prompts the visitor to enable or disable (block) notifications from the source. If the user subscribes to the newsletter, he will receive them whenever they are generated on the server.

Push notifications and SMS mailings: differences and advantages

Despite the similarity of push notifications with sending via SMS or email, these technologies have differences. Moreover, push notifications have more advantages. So, what are the differences and advantages:

Notifications in a browser or mobile app have a title, a small block of text, a link to a landing page, and sometimes an image. Thus, the user receives maximum information from this short message.
This message is displayed on top of all open windows, even if the resource or browser is closed.
By clicking on the pop-up message, the user is immediately taken to the target site.
Subscribing to push notifications is quite simple, you just need to press the “Allow” button. The visitor is not required to fill out any registration forms or worry about how to set up push notifications.
Blocking is just as simple, you just need to press the disable button, unlike SMS and sending advertising by e-mail. In the latter cases, unsubscribing will not be so easy.
Setting up push notifications does not require any extensions or special software elements; you just need to install the Yandex browser or any other.
When creating an alert, you can use any text, as long as it does not violate moral and ethical standards.
Sending push notifications, although not free, will still cost much less than via SMS or email, the price of which cannot be considered affordable for owners of new, not yet promoted, sites.

In other words, with the help of push notifications it is not at all difficult to attract new visitors to the site or bring back existing ones. And in order to retain them, you will need to work hard and develop a number of appropriate measures

Where are these notifications used?

Owners of websites on WordPress or other platforms use push notifications for Windows and other operating systems, pursuing the following goals:

Retain the visitor. If he subscribed to notifications, this means that he was interested in the information presented on the resource. But to prevent this interest from being lost, it is worth notifying about the posting of new materials and other events.
Advertise goods or services. The advantage in this case is the absence of intermediate steps. A potential client clicks on an advertising message and is immediately taken to an order form.
Notify the buyer about the status of the order. Quite often, this tool is used by online trading platforms so that the client can track delivery. The cost of push notifications, as mentioned earlier, is lower than notifications via SMS or email.
Notify the audience about the ongoing webinar. Learning platforms that conduct online conferences can notify users in this way that the broadcast has begun.
Notify about activity on a social network or game. When a new message arrives or any event occurs on the gaming platform, push notifications are the best way to notify the user about it.
Promptly submit new information. This is relevant for business resources, whose users must receive timely information about current quotes of currencies, exchange instruments, etc.
Spread the "hot" news. Push notifications allow you to quickly notify users who have subscribed to the news portal about the receipt of information.

If you install Push notifications on your website, this will solve the problem of how to notify people about new events.

Such a tool will help you not to lose subscribers, and, therefore, maintain the popularity of the resource. reliable services and operating principle of Push
If the site owner is convinced that he needs to enable push notifications, and their cost is acceptable to him, the question arises of how to do this. The sending of such messages can be configured through special services. The most popular of them are:

ViaPush. This service is considered one of the most “advanced” today. Here you can use a large number of convenient tools, as well as the services of a personal manager. A company employee will assist in developing a mailing strategy and creating notifications.
Sendpulse. Using this platform, not only push notifications are sent, but also messages by email and SMS. You can configure the service in Safari, Chrome and Firefox browsers. There are also advanced settings that help you set the type of notifications. There are no restrictions on the number of subscribers and the intensity of mailings.
Push.world. The advantage of this service is that it works on almost all browsers. In addition, it is possible to use ready-made notification templates, and the number of mailings and subscribed users is not limited.
PushExpert. This platform is perfect for beginners, because it has a free plan that allows you to send 500 notifications. In addition, there are no fees for accessing the API or collecting analytics data. To provide services on a paid basis, 6 packages have been developed.
PushAll. This service with a Russian interface is considered controversial due to some features. There is no charge for using the service, and the platform is maintained through user donations. In addition, there are some additional offers that are available for a fee. However, subscribers can only receive notifications from this platform through their Google account. In addition, there is a Chrome browser extension and a mobile application.

How it works:

First, register on the service server. Subsequently, people who visit the site will see a proposal to connect alerts from a specific resource. If the visitor agrees by clicking the appropriate button, he is assigned a unique number and registered on the server.
We receive the identifier of a new subscriber to the server of our site.
We make a message with the required text. You can include reply buttons, images, links, audio, etc.

After performing these steps, the server will send the generated notification to all clients who have agreed to receive

Attention! To collect subscribers and send them notifications, the resource must have SSL certification. There are services for which this condition is not necessary, but in this case, push notifications will be sent on behalf of the subdomain, as a result of which they will remain slightly unfinished.

Installing push notifications is not difficult at all, but you should understand how to use this technology through any service to avoid mistakes. The main principle when working with push notifications is that they should not be intrusive, otherwise it will alienate subscribers.

In addition, it is worth choosing your target audience wisely. For example, set settings dividing people by gender, age, location and other criteria.

Another rule is that the content must be relevant. That is, you need to provide only the latest information, otherwise it will be perceived as spam.

It is also worth considering how timely the notification will be delivered. Many people set a beep on their devices when any messages are delivered, and few people will like it if it sounds after midnight.

You still need to dose out the information. This rule has something in common with the first one; subscribers should develop a loyal, but not negative, attitude towards the mailing source.

To summarize, we can say that the competent use of push notifications rests on three pillars: relevance, unobtrusiveness and timeliness. By following these rules, you can attract a large number of users and constantly maintain their interest in your site.