Easy push for all apps

[martaaay]

Long time reader.. first time poster.

I've created a free web service that helps add Push to your app quickly and easily (and it manages all communications with apple as well). It is completely operational -- just working on pretties now.

I'd love feedback:
iPhonePusher - Home

The basic idea is that you can leverage all of your customers when a new product comes out or you start a sale. The site allows you to broadcast a message to them via Push. For instance, if 5000 people have downloaded your lite version, you can push a message to their phone telling them that the full version is on sale for this week. Their phone buzzes in their pocket, and your message appears front and center on their phone.

I haven't worked out future monetization schemes, so if anybody has opinions, I'd love to here them.

[gshaviv]

Originally Posted by martaaay

The basic idea is that you can leverage all of your customers when a new product comes out or you start a sale. The site allows you to broadcast a message to them via Push. For instance, if 5000 people have downloaded your lite version, you can push a message to their phone telling them that the full version is on sale for this week. Their phone buzzes in their pocket, and your message appears front and center on their phone.

Wow, is that going to be annoying to users. It's the worst kind of advertising. So now the user will get a dialog he has to click, it's hardly an unobtrusive ad. It's so bad, I think the best use of it is for anti-cracking. So if the app finds it is cracked, it registers with the server, and the user gets an alert once a day reminding him to buy the app. Now that would discourage piracy!

For legit ads, I wouldn't use this without explicit user opt-in.

[martaaay]

Originally Posted by gshaviv

Wow, is that going to be annoying to users. It's the worst kind of advertising. So now the user will get a dialog he has to click, it's hardly an unobtrusive ad. It's so bad, I think the best use of it is for anti-cracking. So if the app finds it is cracked, it registers with the server, and the user gets an alert once a day reminding him to buy the app. Now that would discourage piracy!

For legit ads, I wouldn't use this without explicit user opt-in.

I thought hard about this issue. There are 2 reasons I think push advertising will naturally not be abused. First is that it is absolutely not anonymous. The push message is associated with the app. It's in the app owner's best interest not to irritate the customers with Pushes. I suspect that two or so pushes during the lifetime of the app is not unreasonable. Naturally there will be opinions one way or another.

The second reason abuse will be limited will be pricing. Right now it's free to get through a beta period, but eventually it will cost money to send the message. This differentiates it from pop-ups on websites and email spam.

[gshaviv]

Originally Posted by martaaay

I suspect that two or so pushes during the lifetime of the app is not unreasonable. Naturally there will be opinions one way or another.

Two messages a lifetime is not much. Two messages a lifetime per app can potentially become way too much, in particular if you become popular

I wonder when admob or any of the other iphone ad services will pick up on this and start push advertising. This has the potential of ruining the iphone experience.

[gshaviv]

Originally Posted by martaaay

Long time reader.. first time poster.
For instance, if 5000 people have downloaded your lite version, you can push a message to their phone telling them that the full version is on sale for this week. Their phone buzzes in their pocket, and your message appears front and center on their phone.

You would need to find another example, your first example is prohibited by Apple. This from the developer agreement:

2.1 You may not use the APN for the purpose of sending unsolicited messages to end users or for the purpose of phishing or spamming, including, but not limited to, engaging in any types of activities that violate anti-spamming laws and regulations, or that are otherwise improper, inappropriate or illegal.

2.2 You may not use the APN for the purposes of advertising, product promotion, or direct marketing of any kind (e.g. up-selling, cross-selling, etc.), including, but not limited to, sending any messages to promote the use of Your Application or advertise the availability of new features or versions.


Note you can't use APN for ads and the user has to agree to receiving notifications.

You can still use your idea as an easy way for developers to send other messages

[westes@mac.com]

This service is pretty good. I tested it with my app and it worked seamlessly. You can send any message you want and set any number badge to your app! If you have a sound in a xcode project, you can play that sound!

Its pretty good!

BTW, can you please tell me how to use push notifications in a app?

[GhostDog]

Originally Posted by gshaviv

Two messages a lifetime is not much. Two messages a lifetime per app can potentially become way too much, in particular if you become popular

I wonder when admob or any of the other iphone ad services will pick up on this and start push advertising. This has the potential of ruining the iphone experience.

Ruining the whole iPhone experience? That's a pretty tall task. I think it has the potential to ruin the Lite experience at best.

[ipodtouchmaster05]

How does this ruin teh experience?? If you dont like push from a certain application, you can disable it for that application, not difficult.