Hello, I'm Mi. I work as a Product Designer at One Mount Consumer company, specifically in the Marketing Targeted Platform (MTP) domain. Here, we build Marketing Technology (Martech), Advertising Technology (Ad-Tech), and Customer Data Platform (CDP) to provide a comprehensive solution for all marketing activities, advertising, customer relationship management (CRM), and business data exploitation.
In 2021, with the strong development of e-commerce platforms and the ongoing heavy impact of Covid in Vietnam, the number of food delivery and shopping apps has been increasing. The competition to win users for these apps is quite fierce and expensive, and of course, the budget for sales and marketing activities by companies is substantial.
At One Mount Consumer, we are proud to own VinID, a super app that addresses the daily needs of Vietnamese people. VinID customers have various touchpoints throughout their user journey, including offline (shopping at Vinmart) and online (Social Media Marketing, Email Marketing, Display Advertising, etc.).
With an increasing number of touchpoints, ensuring a consistent user experience while keeping customers engaged in the app for longer, aware of more promotional programs, and making purchasing decisions quickly becomes a challenging task for us. To deliver effective and timely marketing to customers, we have chosen In-app messages as an advertising channel.
1. What are In-app messages? How do customers interact with them?
In-app messages are a type of advertising channel where advertising messages and visuals are sent to users while they are using the app on their mobile or computer devices.
In-app messages can take various forms such as modals, slide-ups, full screens, carousels, etc. Today, I will focus on the most common type: Modals.
Limitations of in-app messages
For some users who do not frequently use your app, applying in-app messages for advertising can be annoying. This may lead them to develop the habit of closing ads and ignoring the content. Over time, this behavior will make them tend to dismiss in-app messages and continue their journey within the app. Just think about pop-ups that ask you to rate the app every time you open it for the first time. It can be quite bothersome, right?
Despite some limitations, in-app messages remain the most effective advertising channel to increase customer interaction. According to a study by Braze, users who receive in-app messages have an interaction rate over 131% higher than those who do not receive them. In 2019 alone, 29 billion IAMs (In-app messages) were sent to users 😱.
Source: Braze
2. The practical use of In-app messages at One Mount Consumer
At One Mount Consumer, we use the services of a third-party company to set up ads on the VinID app. However, the services we have hired do not fully meet our usage requirements, and the operations team has not yet optimized all the services they provide.
Regarding the product: The feature provided by the third-party company does not meet the business requirements. Marketers want to set up campaigns using animated images (.gif) and images with transparent backgrounds. The third-party product is not reliable, and sometimes the responsiveness of the ads is compromised, leading to limited customer experience due to missing text or images on some devices. The feature provided by the third party only supports single events, while marketers need to handle more complex cases such as multiple events and triggered user timing.
Regarding security: All campaign information and data are pushed to the third-party company, which increases the risk of data exploitation and loss. Additionally, with a growing user base and fast development, data synchronization incurs costs and delays. Developing an in-house product helps us collect complete 360-degree real-time customer data and utilize it within the entire corporate ecosystem.
Regarding costs: To maintain and use the features, the company also incurs monthly expenses for hiring the third-party company.
Regarding opportunities: At our company, we have a mobile squad to manage and ensure the quality of the app, directly connected to the "in-house API." Moreover, the product team is fully capable of developing new features for in-app messages. Additionally, we have design and marketing teams that always ensure the content quality of in-app messages, meeting the visual requirements when releasing them on the app. For the above reasons, we have made the decision to develop and manage in-app messages in-house, which is the best solution to meet our usage needs and business requirements.
3. How were In-app messages created?
The ideation process of the team lasted for about two weeks, during which we had to prioritize which layouts to work on and determine how much customization would be available to serve the common cases of the operations team. Setting up in-app messages also required convenience, simplicity, and time efficiency.
Sketching the ideas for in-app messages
The most challenging part was synchronizing information between teams. While the Marketing Targeted Platform team was responsible for implementation, in-app messages are a part of the app, so we needed to collaborate extensively with the App Platform team. In-app messages are displayed on the VinID app and must comply with the app's design guidelines, requiring review with the design team. Working collaboratively with multiple teams resulted in several meetings and numerous adjustments to requirements.
After multiple meetings and reviews, the modal design for in-app messages was finalized, consisting of 6 elements. For each element within the modal, marketers can customize the style to enhance brand recognition and meet the color and image requirements of each campaign.
Once we had some basic information, we started writing design specifications for in-app messages. Writing design specs at One Mount Consumer is meticulous and time-consuming. This part is crucial because the Product Owner (or Business Analyst in some other companies) will use it as the "first document" to write product requirements, developers will rely on it to code according to the design's intent, and Quality Control can refer to it for bug checks.
During the development and coding process, we continuously worked with Quality Control for testing and adjustments. This process was repeated until the in-app messages were displayed correctly, aligning with the designer's intentions.
Left: Test version; Right: UAT version
Setting up In-app messages on the MTP Platform
4. How have Marketing Targeted Platform's In-app messages benefited our marketers?
The Marketing Targeted Platform's in-app messages developed a feature called "Send sample" that the third-party service lacked. After creating a campaign, marketers need to clone another campaign to send a test version. The "Send sample" feature allows them to create a sample campaign and send it to testers without the need for duplication or additional cloning, saving them 20% of working time.
Send sample feature
With each feature developed, we have feedback notes that are recorded in the backlog for future sprints to improve. We promptly acknowledge and communicate any requirements to the entire product team. Developing an in-house tool within the same company has the advantage of providing timely support and upgrading according to user expectations.
Final thoughts
Modal in-app messages were created within two months, and we completely cut off the use of the third-party service, replacing it with an "in-house" tool that meets 80% of the expectations of marketers and CRM Ops within the company.
Below are some screenshots from the VinID app using In-app messages as an advertising channel for different campaigns. Quite impressive, right? 😎
During each feature development stage, the product team encounters many challenges, and each team member with different roles faces various obstacles. As a Product Designer, my biggest challenge is to come up with a design solution and, more importantly, to defend that solution among stakeholders.
By working on in-app messages, I have gained more experience in a new field: Customer Relationship Management 😎 and received an award. See you in future articles.
Take care and stay positive 💪
P.S. At the end of the post, I would like to thank Mr. Duc, Ms. Thuy, artist Hoa Cua, Ms. Yen, Ms. Khanh Pham, and Ms. Van for their enthusiastic support in completing this article.
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