Mobile notifications were once simple—your phone vibrated to let you know someone texted you or let you know that an app had something important to say. This feels like ages ago. What started as a simple way to notify has since become one of the most effective means of reaching consumers in recent years, changing the mobile marketing game completely.

When it took place, it did not happen overnight, but it was undeniable. Banner ads failed miserably, social media advertising skyrocketed in pricing, and overnight push notifications were available as a means to send information right to people's locked screens without having to compete against any other messages.

Why Banner Ads Failed Miserably

Mobile banner advertising hit a few large snags that caught marketers off guard. For one, the mobile platform was already difficult for consumers to maneuver, making banners awkward. Yet, the implication that ads would be no big deal faded quickly when people lost the ability to see them entirely.

Users conditioned themselves to ignore the rectangular spaces. Click through rates went in the gutter.

Ad blockers happened. Millions of people use software that can eliminate banner ads entirely. Millions. When entire campaigns become invisible to millions of people, there exists a high cost opportunity risk associated with this form of marketing. The worst part? The people who use ad blockers are the same kind of customers advertisers hope to entice—savvy adults with disposable income.

Social media marketing stood a chance for a while until more and more platforms changed their algorithms and pricing models. Businesses saw their marketing dollars double while their viewership halved. Reliable platforms fell victim to red tape money-hungry decisions.

How Push Advertising Solves This Problem

Push advertising networks figured out how to sidestep all these issues by working completely differently than traditional ads. When businesses partner with the best push ad networks, they can send mobile-friendly notifications that show up right on users' devices without needing special apps, subscriptions, or complicated setup processes. These work across iPhones and Android devices, so there's no worry about missing people based on their phone preferences.

The difference is that push notifications cannot be ignored like banners. They pop up on lock screens and in notification features where users will see them instead of trying to compete for space in something they might be reading. There's no competition for web space where people are trying to read an article and see a push notification as an unwelcome distraction.

Timing is everything, too. Push notifications come through during those moments when people check their phones and aren't really looking for anything in particular. That's when they're most adaptable to learning about something new—not when they're halfway through an article and a banner becomes annoying.

Why Push Notification Feel Different to Users

Push advertising works organically because it coincides with how people naturally access their phones. Everyone looks at their phone hundreds of times per day at small moments during transitional times. That's when push notifications pop up. Not when people are trying to do research and fall upon a banner ad by mistake.

They feel important, too because they take precedence in the same place as your text messages and app alerts; people treat it with a relevancy that they don't treat blatant advertising efforts. The formatting creates value.

Good push campaigns do not feel invasive because they're timed well and relevant to what people actually want, instead of interrupting something that they're trying to read—unless there's helpful information about how to save money somewhere else that's better than what they were initially doing.

What Networks Do That Regular Advertising Can't Provide

Networks can do things with messages that regular banner advertising can't. They send time-sensitive messages whenever anything is needed, including flash sales and limited-time requests without waiting for someone to go on an elusive website at the right time to facilitate their needs or a business's endeavors.

Targeting has become incredibly powerful. Businesses can target specific device types, geolocations, interests, patterns while including responsiveness from patterns from engagement in the past—messages that matter to someone else—that make single-subject based banners look stupid and ineffective by comparison.

Cross-platform compatibility legitimizes campaigns consistently without concern for who has what phone or operating systems or what updates change web browsing abilities since it doesn't matter; everything is streamlined so easily that gone are the stressful compatibilities that come with standard display advertising efforts.

Why They Moved Money away from Social Media Network Marketing

Push advertising networks leverage significantly better pricing structures than social media pushes or banner ads could ever provide for those looking for value—and why wouldn't someone? When advertisers see that engagement rates skyrocket simply for exposure and agreeability instead of competition, it makes every dollar worth it—and that translates into per customer costs that lower expenditures to acquire new customers and greatest overall value within—because why wouldn't they have free reign over consumer interests?

Pricing makes sense as well; push networks rarely charge per impression but instead charge based on engagement. Why throw money down per view that's never seen? This aligns costs with results, making performance merchants ecstatic instead of finding unknown variables associated with regular display opportunities charged per view despite eventual insights and feedback still making little sense along the way.

It's easier to start small and build up with push campaigns; learn the waves with modest budgets before getting aboard; find what's successful before it's too late or money is wasted trying to implement something from the first go round without any major successes upon first implementations of ideas.

How Push Fits Into Other Marketing Efforts More Effectively than Other Banners

The best push campaigns work best with other efforts, not by themselves; they're fantastic for active immediacy, which means they're more powerful for those who know about the brand than those who have yet to be connected.

Retargeting opportunities can follow website visitors who came in but didn't purchase anything—the second reminder works better than the original ad that brought them in there in the first place, sometimes.

You can help those on a longer decision pathway instead of eliminating sales while actively engaging—sending them information over time until they're ready, instead of trying to rush the process prematurely and scaring them away forever instead of just for now while better information can be received down the line.

Real Measures of What Works 

Push advertising gives you much clearer data than most traditional advertising formats. You can see exactly which messages get people to take action, without all the guesswork that comes with banner ads where you're never quite sure what drove results.

Real-time adjustments become possible because you get immediate feedback on how messages perform. No waiting weeks to figure out if something worked - you can tweak targeting and messaging based on what's actually happening with users.

If you want to build a relationship over time instead of looking for immediate sales success, engage regularly from push networks to create an existing audience instead of fleeting one-time opportunities through banners where people will never see your idea ever again once it's scrolled away from sight eternally!