{"id":13,"date":"2020-11-07T18:13:44","date_gmt":"2020-11-08T00:13:44","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/45.55.41.203\/?p=13"},"modified":"2021-03-28T13:47:17","modified_gmt":"2021-03-28T19:47:17","slug":"push-notification-strategy-for-universities","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.eventus.io\/blog\/push-notification-strategy-for-universities\/","title":{"rendered":"Student Engagement Trends: The case for push notifications"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><em>The new rules of engagement. Students will give you access to their notification bar which sees&nbsp;<strong>much higher engagement than email<\/strong>; but you must adhere to their strict expectations.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&#8212;&#8212;-<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>The below graphic visualizes why push notifications are beginning to see more widespread use for more personalized, impactful communications for students.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img src=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/eventusio-static\/frontend\/blog\/notifications.png\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><em>As you can see, email notifications can easily get lost in the noise whereas a targeted push notification offers greater relevance, brandability, and urgency.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2>Students check their push notifications at a far higher rate than email<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>The shortcoming of email as a method of student engagement is no secret.&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.eab.com\/daily-briefing\/2017\/06\/29\/students-dont-open-your-emails\">A 2016 survey<\/a>&nbsp;revealed that 39% of students don\u2019t always open emails from their academic advisors, 50% don\u2019t always read emails from academic departments, and 72% treat emails from student organizations like spam.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Email\u2019s weaknesses can be plainly stated. Students do not use email amongst themselves to communicate. They also have inboxes already spammed by dozens or hundreds promotions and notifications on a daily basis. It\u2019s not a natural place for them to be checking routinely.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>As universities modernize their technology, other methods of engagement have started to emerge. SMS messages have become a more reliable tool particularly for emergency notifications, but their intrusiveness and 160 character limit means they cannot be used as a method of routine communications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>Another emergent avenue of student engagement is push notifications.<\/strong>&nbsp;While more difficult to initially set up, a department that has successfully established a push notification channel with its students sees benefits such as:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Appearing in a students\u2019 notification tray, where today\u2019s youth check dozens of times&nbsp;<strong>daily<\/strong><\/li><li>Advanced analytics including profile-based open rates, which enables data-driven iteration of a communications strategy<\/li><li>The ability to feature a branded icon, unlimited text, and an associated image<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<hr class=\"wp-block-separator\"\/>\n\n\n\n<p>University centers have much to gain through the addition of a push notification channel. Not only will many students prefer it to email, but push notifications can see much higher open rates, see much better analytic capabilities, and in general be moving in the right direction when it comes to the future of student communications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2>Push notifications require extra considerations to stay effective as an engagement tool<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>All that said, a student\u2019s notification tray is a space to be treated sacredly. Students are sensitive about what kind of providers they allow to send notifications to their tray. Ignoring this and blindly sending out too many low quality push notifications can lead to:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Students becoming annoyed at a single app sending so many notifications, and ultimately uninstalling the app.<\/li><li>Students associating your universities\u2019 communications with spam, and unconsciously ignoring and dismissing anything you send.<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Yeah\u2026 definitely don\u2019t be these guys:<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img src=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/eventusio-static\/frontend\/blog\/article\/pirates-recruitment.jpg\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<h2>Increase Engagement through sending Push Notifications, but devise a strategy first<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p>Universities should accept the reality that the most successful engagement campaigns with students in the future will involve a combination of SMS, push notifications, and emails.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For push notifications, here are steps to increase the likelihood of a successful campaign strategy.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Understand what qualifies as a meaningful push notification and what doesn\u2019t<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Your team must agree on what kind of content should go through push notification channels. As a general rule of thumb, unimportant communications should go to email, emergency notifications should go to SMS.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>For push notifications, you should aim for a mix of content that is either immediate or interesting. Below are some great examples:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li>Important reminders on upcoming deadlines<\/li><li>Important notice that an events\u2019 location or time has changed<\/li><li>Notice that there\u2019s an event going on today on campus related to a students\u2019 interests<\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<h3>Define a Limit per Student per Week<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Every student has a threshold on how many push notifications per week constitutes spam. Go above this limit and risk losing that avenue of communication.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>According to a\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/helplama.com\/what-do-consumers-think-about-push-notifications-in-2021\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">2021 HelpLama survey<\/a>, you can see the following data:<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img src=\"https:\/\/helplama.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/angraph-04-04.png\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Your limit will be different based on your needs and your students, but as a rule of thumb, we recommend sticking to 2 or 3 per week.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Create Notification Groups<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>If a notification is relevant only to freshmen, it makes no sense to send it out to the entire student body. By creating notification groups, you can send notifications filtered to certain specified demographics of the student body.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Shameless\u2026 but informative plug: You can see how a solution like Eventus can enable you to send notifications only to the students it matters to (below image).<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img src=\"https:\/\/s3.amazonaws.com\/eventusio-static\/frontend\/blog\/article\/create-push-notification.png\" alt=\"\"\/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>An ideal push notification management system will allow you to define segments along multiple dimensions. Some dimensions that are definitely worth creating are:&nbsp;<strong>Year, Residence Hall, Demographic, Home Country.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Give Students the Ability to Opt Out<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Students will take to your notifications more receptively if they know they have the ability to opt out of certain kinds of notifications.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3>Coordinate and Moderate Sources of Notifications<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p>Depending on your setup and solution, it\u2019s likely you won\u2019t be the only group sending out push notifications. Even if your group is sticking to a two notifications per week limit, if another group is sending out two or three a week as well through the same channel, you risk coming across as spam to your students.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The new rules of engagement. Students will give you access to their notification bar which sees&nbsp;much higher engagement than email; but you must adhere to their strict expectations. &#8212;&#8212;- The below graphic visualizes why push notifications are beginning to see more widespread use for more personalized, impactful communications for students. As you can see, email&hellip; <a class=\"more-link\" href=\"https:\/\/www.eventus.io\/blog\/push-notification-strategy-for-universities\/\">Continue reading <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">Student Engagement Trends: The case for push notifications<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":9,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v15.0 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Student Engagement Trends: The case for push notifications - The Eventus.io Blog<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.eventus.io\/blog\/push-notification-strategy-for-universities\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Student Engagement Trends: The case for push notifications - The Eventus.io Blog\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"The new rules of engagement. Students will give you access to their notification bar which sees&nbsp;much higher engagement than email; but you must adhere to their strict expectations. &#8212;&#8212;- The below graphic visualizes why push notifications are beginning to see more widespread use for more personalized, impactful communications for students. 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