How to Send Push Notifications on Android Apps with FireBase

How to Send Push Notifications on Android Apps with FireBase

One of the most influencing factors that affect the success of an app is the marketing approach. An app should be maintained properly all the time to attract its users. If you make your app properly and you market it using proper marketing strategies, then the app can become successful and it can lead to earning the revenue.

Push notifications can be considered as one small technique that can make a big difference regarding the success of an application. Now you must be wondering what exactly a push notification? A push notification is a message. This message is usually sent to the user who downloaded the app on his device. Many times, the app specifically asks the users if they would like to receive different messages and updates about the application. If the user agrees to receive different kinds of messages from the  app, then the developers can easily send different types of push notifications to the users according to the content of the application.

Why are push notifications important?

You cannot simply deny the importance of push notifications in an Android application. If you think that you can ignore this small feature in your app and your app will be successful than you are wrong. Notifications allow businesses to convey their messages to their clients. In this way, different business apps can add value to their services. The push notifications also help the customers to maintain their interest in the products and services offered by the company. One of the most important benefits of using the Android app platform for your app Is that the Android platform is automatically prompted to use opt-in push notifications. The push notifications work automatically in Android unless a user manual turns off of the option of receiving push notifications in Android devices.

Before creating push notifications in your Android  app, I will suggest that you invest your time in some research about how push notifications work in apps and how you can make the best use of them in your Android application. You should not underestimate the worth of push notifications for an application. Some of the most important benefits of using push notifications are as follows:

1. Push notifications will result in returning more customers for your business.

You should consider sending the push notifications to the clients once in a while. If you will send too many push notifications to the clients, they will get annoyed. You should use push notifications in your app very cleverly. You should make engaging content for your app that will grab the attention of the users. Provide compelling push notifications so that the users attentively use your app and enjoy its use.

2. The push notification that you will create for your app should not only grab the user’s attention, but it should also prompt the users to act.

If you simply provide information to the user in a push notification, then the user might forget about it in a while. If you provide useful information in the form of new offers and coupons etc to the user then it will prompt the user to further use your app and perform actions in case of e-commerce applications. 

3. There are two types of push notifications.

Some push notifications work when the users of the Android device are online. The other type of push notifications that are known as real-time push notifications works even when the user device is offline. In this way, you can consume real-time push notifications to keep your audience updated about the latest activities of the app even when they’re offline.

One other kind of push notifications is known as segmented mobile push notifications. This kind of push notifications is considered as personalized texts. You have to do thorough research regarding your target audience before using segmented push notifications. for using segmented push notifications, you should divide your target audience according to their behavior, locations and age groups, etc. In this way, you create personalized messages for every set of the audience of your application. By segmenting your target audience into different groups, you can create more compelling push notifications. The segmented push notifications increase the growth of the app exponentially.

4. The main goal of creating an Android app and making it successful is to earn revenue from it.

You can only make your Android app successful by increasing user engagement for your application. Push notifications can help you to increase user engagement for your application. Make sure that you send push notifications once in a while in your Android apps and you always post your push notifications with engaging and compelling content.  This combination of sending push notifications frequently with attractive content is what will make your Android app successful in the longer run.

5. Keeping the interest.

According to some statistics, if the users of an app get less than five push notifications every week then they will keep using the Android app with interest.

6. The push notifications that you will create for your app should never annoy the customers.

If you make the mistake of sending uncompelling content and a lot of push notifications to the users then the users will simply uninstall your app and your business will be affected.

Before publishing your app over the Google play store, make a proper strategy about how you will use the push notifications in your Android application. As a rule of thumb, you should send less number of push notifications in the first month of release of your Android application. First of all, create a great strategy for your application’s marketing and then start sending the push notifications regularly.

How to send push notifications in an Android App with FireBase

If you are concerned about creating push notifications in your Android  app, Then look no further. All you need to do is to sign up on the Appsgeyser platform. This platform makes it very easy for users to create apps by using different templates. A template is present over this platform for making push notifications in an Android application. Follow the following steps for sending push notifications in an android app by using the Appsgeyser platform:

  1. Before using the push notification option on this platform, you should have a separate project that will consist of the .APK file of your Android project.
  2. You must have your android app ready before inserting push notifications inside it.
  3. If you use Visual Studio for creating your Android  app, then create a .APK file from it.  
  4. If you are using the Appsgeyser platform for creating the Android  app, then this platform will give you a signed .APK file at the end of the project. Save this file in a secure location on your laptop. You will have to upload this file in the firebase console for inserting push notifications inside it.
  5. For using push notifications inside your Android app, go to the firebase console. You must click the “Get started” button on it to start the process of inserting push notifications in the application.
  6. In the next step, You will be asked to add your project in the firebase console. Remember that I asked you earlier to keep your signed .APK file of Android app around?. Load that file inside the Firebase console.
Send Push Notifications on Android Apps
  1. Enter the name of your app along with the region of your app from where you are creating the application.
FireBase to send push notifications
  1. After this click the “Create project” button.
  2. You will have to provide server key and server ID for finishing the process of sending push notifications.
  3. Go to the project setting option.
  4. Select the option of “Cloud Messaging”.
  5. You can get the server key and server ID from the section.
Copy server key to set up push notifications
  1. After saving the file, you will wait for 30 minutes before your first push notification will be sent on your target devices.

Summary

We cannot simply ignore the importance of push notifications if you want to make your Android app successful. Creating an Android app is one process but marketing it correctly is what will make your Android app successful. Using the option of push notifications within an Android app is a very small step that will make your app successful. Sending push notifications within an app essentially means sending messages to your users that are using your app on their devices. Try to use real-time push notifications along with the segmented type of push notifications to provide personalized push notifications to your target audience. If you are worried about creating push notifications within your  app, then you can simply use the AppsGeyser platform for embedding the push notifications in your application. Upload the signed .Apk file on firebase console for embedding push notifications inside the Android application. Send the push notifications to your audience frequently with compelling content to grab their attention.