Create app push notifications

  • Updated

Use Optimizely Data Platform (ODP) to create and send app push notifications for iOS and Android devices. Push notifications can help provide real-time, personalized updates to enhance customer engagement and satisfaction.

Prerequisites

  • Subscription – Access the marketing package and enable the App Push feature.
  • Mobile SDK – Configure the ODP mobile SDK by navigating to Data Setup > Integrations > Mobile Apps.

Collect app push subscribers

Use app push notifications to communicate with your customers and collect opt-in events. Your reachable audience is determined by the customer's consent. iOS and Android devices have different ways of getting opt-in consent.

  • iOS – iOS apps send push notifications to users who agree to receive them. 
  • Android – Android apps send push notifications automatically. Users can opt out manually by disabling the app's permission. 

The following images show how to opt in to push notifications on iOS and opt out of push notifications on Android:

Create-app-push-1.png

Confirm opt-in events

Customer opt-ins send an event to ODP, confirming the customer's app push subscription and providing analytics and app push values. To view an example event, complete the following:

  1. Go to Settings > Event Inspector.
  2. Click Start Inspector. The inspector records your API calls for up to 15 minutes.
  3. Click Refresh to see the results.
  4. Click Deactivate Inspector to end the inspector's event collection after refreshing the page and loading the desired timeframe of events.
  5. Look for the following values in the JSON-formatted event:
    • Event Type = push
    • Action = add_push_token 
    • User Agent Information (UA)

You can also see the app push event in the event history feed of the customer profile.

Use app push token value 

  1. Go to Customers > Profiles.
  2. Search for your customer by name, ODP ID, or identifier, or click Customer Profiles > Show All.
  3. Click Customer Details to view the app push token for iOS or Android. Chrome_push_token_on_profile.png
  4. Click Event History to view all web push events. 

    Push_token_on_feed.png

If you know a customer's app push token value, you can reach them. This can help you create a segment based on push token attributes to target app push customers or create a campaign that only uses app push messages. When customers opts out of the app push channel, ODP removes the token from their customer profile and captures a Remove Token event. 

Add app push touchpoints in a campaign

After customers opt in to receive app push notifications, you can use the channel in your campaign touchpoints.

Review app push audience

  1. Go to Activations > Overview. 
  2. Click Create New Campaign and select a One-Time or Behavioral campaign.
  3. Choose or create a standard segment to include the customers who have opted in for app push notifications. 
  4. View the reachable audience beside the mobile icon. 

Create-app-push-2.png

Create app push touchpoint

To create an app push touchpoint after determining your campaign audience, complete the following:

  1. Go to Activations > Overview > Create New Campaign.
  2. Select or create a One-Time or Behavioral campaign.
  3. Select a customer segment with app push notifications opt-ins. 
  4. Configure the Enrollment Rules. 
  5. Edit the campaign touchpoint and select the App Push channel. To add additional channels to an existing touchpoint, see Create an omnichannel campaign.
  6. Go to Push Delivery > Deliver Push To and select the app display name. Depending on your integration configuration, ODP selects iOS Sandbox, iOS, or Android by default. You can keep the settings or choose between them. Create-app-push-3.png
  7. Design the push notification content.
  8. (Optional) Expand iOS Options or Android Options to define additional settings.Create-app-push-4.png

iOS options

  • Alert Title – The headline used to display the alert. This is the minimum recommended option. You can use a dictionary to write the alert title. If you specify a string, the alert displays your string as the body text. For example, title, subtitle, launch image, and more.
  • Key/Value Pairs – The specific values that are called in your application if you have a dictionary. Consult your developers to understand the options.
  • Custom Sound – The name of a sound file in your app's main bundle or the library and the sounds folder of your app's container directory. Specify the string default to play the system sound. Use this key for regular notifications.
  • Badge Number – The number to display in a badge on your app's icon. If there are any badges currently, specify 0 to remove them.
  • Mutable Content – A notification to your notification service app extension before delivery.
  • Launch Image – The name of the launch image file that displays when the user launches your app.
  • Action Loc-key – The key to a localized action. Consult your developers to understand the options.
  • Loc-key – The key for a localized message string. Use the loc-key instead of the body key to retrieve the message's text from your app's Localizable.strings file. The value must contain the name of a key in your strings file.
  • Loc-args – An array of strings containing replacement values for variables in your message text.
  • Title Loc-key – The key for a localized title string.
  • Title Loc-args – An array of strings containing replacement values for variables in your title string.

See Apple's documentation on generating a remote notification for information on these options and iOS app development.

Android options

  • Key/Value Pairs – The specific values that are called in your application if you have a dictionary. Use a title and associated title value with the body of your message. Consult your developers to understand the options.

See Android's developer guide for information on these options and Android app development. 

Preview, test, and activate your touchpoint

  1. Preview and test your touchpoint. Preview lets you see the touchpoint on-screen, while Test lets you send a test notification through the touchpoint channel.
  2. Select the campaign's name from the breadcrumb trail, then click Save.
  3. Click Go Live to activate the campaign.

Review performance

Review the performance metrics associated with an app push touchpoint. 

  1. Go to Activations > Overview.
  2. Select the campaign you want to review.
  3. Click the eye to expand the performance metrics page for the touchpoint with the app push. For information, see Campaign metrics.