Join us for this live webinar on Wednesday, August 26 at 10 a.m. Pacific, 1 p.m. Eastern. Register here for free.
Mobile-first isn’t just a sound-bite mantra; today 64 percent of Americans own a smartphone, up from 58 percent in early 2014. If you’re targeting households with an annual income of $75,000 or more, smartphone ownership jumps to 84 percent. Similarly for young adults between 18 and 29, 85 percent own a smartphone.
As a result, companies are experiencing the shift to a mobile-first reality at lightening speed. Take Listia, for example, an online marketplace for selling stuff you don’t need and buying stuff you want using credits earned through the site. According to Founder and CEO Gee Chuang, even a year ago, Listia’s traffic was mostly web-based. Fast-forward to 2015, and most of their traffic is on their mobile app.
At the same time, the company still has considerable presence on the web, so reaching customers in the best way depending on their behavior is a priority.
That’s exactly why this webinar comes at a critical time for marketers who are racing to understand the best automation tools and strategies to reach consumers at the right time, and right place, on the right device. Omnichannel marketing is no longer an option.
Chaung points to a simple use case of a customer selling an item on Listia, and needing to know if someone has a question about it, or if it’s sold. “The challenge these days is not to overcommunicate these things,” says Chaung. “So we track if this person is mostly a web user or mostly a mobile user — so you’ll either get a push notification or an email.”
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That said, mobile has become a primary channel for much of LIstia’s commuication with customers — and, in some cases, the only one that makes sense. For example, if a customer has just been outbid on an item, Listia will send a push notification to reach the consumer quickly — there’s no gurantee they’re sitting in front of their computer.
On the marketing side of things, push notifications are relied on extensively. “We might remind you that you have 5,000 credits to use — and give you a suggestion where you can use them,” says Chuang.
“For example, if we see that a member is buying a lot of children’s clothes, we’ll send a message saying, ‘Maybe your kid has outgrown their clothes recently. If you want to earn some credits quickly, find some clothing that no longer fits your children and you can trade up for other things, like clothing, toys, or video games.'”
The mobile channel is also a great way to reach collectors — a very active user base on the company’s platform. A notification announcing that 10,000 new coins (or cards or stamps) were listed today gets great click-throughs.
But for Chuang, today’s success can be tomorrow’s failure — and the way to avoid that, he says, is through testing.
“One trap that a lot of people fall into is taking a month to set up all these automations and marketing messages and then next month you see a nice uplift — but you never really know if you could do much better unless you continually test.”
Listia continually tests types of messages as well as copy and timing, retaining those that not only deliver an obvious increase in usage — but also result in a decrease in the number of uninstalls or push notification opt-out’s. That last point is key for Chuang.
“You definitely don’t want to overpush to people, but if you do it right, and set a good pace, you get people to opt out less. And that’s when you know you’re doing it right.”
Join us for this not-to-be-missed webinar as we talk about how best to collect and utilize the data essential to an omnichannel approach, how to achieve a unified profile of the customer, and what kind of messaging is appropriate for different devices, on different platforms — all with the aim of maximizing ROI.
In this webinar, you’ll:
- Why today’s marketing automation solutions fall short of customer expectations
- How winning omnichannel marketing strategies balance push notifications, in-app messages, email, and social communications
- Why understanding users on a person level, and not device level, is critical in mobile
Why “Marketing” is evolving to “Communicating” and how to prepare for that transition
Speakers:
Doug Roberge, Strategic Services Consultant, Kahuna
Gee Chuang, CEO and Founder, Listia
Jon Cifuentes, Insight Analyst, VentureBeat
This webinar is sponsored by Kahuna.