With Twixl Publisher 19, we moved the sending of push notifications to Google Firebase. By doing this, we automatically provide a number of capabilities for sending messages to a subset of your users. We call this 'segmented push'.
1. To start
When an application links itself to Firebase, Firebase will automatically collect a number of characteristics about the user, which can be used to target push notifications.
Within a Firebase push notification one can readily limit the target with these parameters:
- The app: iOS and Android can be targeted individually
- App version The versionName (Android) or the Bundle version (iOS).
- Language: The language setting of the device OS (such as en-us or pt-br).
- Country: The country from which user activity originated.
- Region: The geographic region from which user activity originated.
- First Opened
- Last App Engagement
The UI would then look like this:
The push notification can be scheduled now, later, or recurring (daily or custom).
For instance, for daily, you can further customise like this:
2. Other Firebase properties
Next to the options mentioned above, Firebase in itself tracks other properties of the users.
These include:
- App store: The store from which the app was downloaded and installed.
- Browser: The browser from which user activity originated.
- City: The city from which user activity originated.
- Continent: The continent from which user activity originated.
- Device brand: The brand name of the mobile device (such as Motorola, LG, or Samsung).
- Device category: The category of the mobile device (such as mobile or tablet).
- Device model: The mobile device model name (such as iPhone 5s or SM-J500M).
- New: First opened the app within the last 7 days.
- Established: First opened the app more than 7 days ago.
- Operating system: The operating system used by visitors to your website or mobile app.
- OS version: The operating system version used by visitors to your website or mobile app (such as 9.3.2 or 5.1.1).
- Platform: The platform on which your website or mobile app ran (such as web, iOS, or Android).
- Subcontinent: The subcontinent from which user activity originated.
On the basis of these properties, it is possible to create audiences. Users become members of an audience based on predefined behavior, and remain member of this audience for a predefined time.
For instance, one could define an audience of Spanish speaking people living in New York. With an audience you can target a push notification specifically to these people.
3. Integrating Google Analytics 4
If you also gather analytics in your app, using Google Analytics 4, you even have more filtering options for selecting your audience.