With Apple’s iOS 12 released – and with it, key changes to notifications – financial services apps need to adopt customer-centric messaging best practices. This is to accommodate new user behaviour, improve notification visibility, and maximise the value that their app can deliver. Mike Herrick, senior vice-president of product and engineering at Urban Airship, writes
Granular user controls over notifications, new grouped notifications and provisional authorisation – a historic move by Apple that enables apps to offer a trial of “quiet” notifications prior to obtaining opt-in consent – create valuable opportunities if approached strategically.
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There are five key areas where businesses can use the new features of the newly released Apple iOS 12 to their greatest advantage
- Evaluate opportunities for greater reach
Choosing notifications no longer has to be a binary decision made prior to understanding the value they will offer. Financial services firms can choose to implement provisional authorisation, which allows them to reach all app users with notifications delivered to the Notification Centre without a sound.
Users that are already opted in, or those that choose prominent delivery, will continue to receive notifications on lock screens with an audible alert. If 50% or more of users are opted out of notifications, this automatic notification trial may offer a better approach to get more users to understand the glanceable value that notifications deliver.
With every message, users will be given the opportunity to turn them off or continue receiving them – with the choice of prominent or quiet delivery.
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By GlobalData- Run opt-out users through a funnel
Preference centres are now deep-linked to notification settings in iOS, in ‘manage’ buttons within notifications, and in ‘turn off’ buttons served via provisional authorisation. This tight integration between an app’s preference centre and iOS notification settings will expose more users to granular controls that they may not have even realised existed.
Allowing users to easily toggle notifications on or off for various categories – low balance alerts, potential fraud alerts, payment reminders, deposit confirmations, retirement planning – can help retain a greater level of audience opt-in to notifications. Additional controls can be provided around the frequency of messages, or which topics they would rather have delivered to in-app message centres or via email.
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Get tuned in to users, as visibility is in their control
The more relevant and timely an app’s notifications, the more likely people will be receptive to them audibly arriving on lock screens. Prominent or quiet delivery is an either-or choice with iOS 12, which both banks and users need to realise.
For many firms, being able to flag potential fraud with real-time alerts is inherently valuable, while deposit and payment confirmations take customer service to the next level. The impact of these timely notifications is diminished if relegated to arrive quietly in the Notification Centre.
Financial firms must re-examine their features or focus areas that are worthy of interrupting users on their lock screen. Allowing users to select alternative means of delivery – email, message centre, in-app message – for content they are more passively engaged with can help retain prominent delivery for more time-sensitive notifications.
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Offer great user experiences that also maximise your share of screen
iOS 12 uses grouped notifications to condense the display of an app’s notifications on the lock screen and Notification Centre, which can be dismissed as a group.
Ensure important messages are not missed by setting up groups for different types of message: educational, account activity, fraud alerts or cross-sell offers.
Users can easily swipe through each group to get all caught up, or easily dismiss notifications on a topic, leaving your other grouped notifications to consume.
Firms that do not set different groups will have all their notifications stacked on top of each other, leaving only the most recent message immediately visible, which may result in users missing key updates that are important to them.
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Realise notifications are an app feature, not a marketing channel
This is likely where the famously user-first Apple is coming from in creating provisional authorisation: real-time, relevant notifications are now a feature of apps – to be experienced – and too many people approach notification opt-in prompts as a binary decision, likely with an old frame of reference like email subscriptions.
Highly targeted notifications see engagement rates more than three times higher than messages broadcast to most app users, and financial services firms have a wealth of opportunities to make messaging responsive to individuals in-the-moment behaviours across channels.
They can also elevate transactional relationships to garner greater customer loyalty by drawing greater visibility to financial management services and member benefits, with everything from helpful tailored hints to surveys that further refine what is most relevant to individuals.
