1. Direct Engagement with Players
Apps give you direct access to your players. It’s more personal than your players just visiting and scrolling your website every now and then. Apps allow for more personalised interactions, especially via push notifications.
The push notification options are endless. You can use them to announce your competitions, what prizes are up for grabs, a competition coming to a close soon, and so on. Any type of notification will help engage — and re-engage — your players.
How? Because people carry the block of endless information (read: a phone) with them wherever they go. People check their phone all the time nowadays. Americans alone look at their phone 205 times a day. The bottom line here is, you gotta meet your players where they’re at, and that’s usually their phone screen.
Another thing is, apps allow you to track user preferences and behaviour. You can use this data to add to the personalised experience you give to your players. This will make them feel valued, and excited to keep coming back for more.
2. Great User Experience (Yup, It's Better Than the Browser!)
An app should be fast, stable, well-designed, and easy to navigate. Once you have that (and we can assure you that with our apps, you will), you can be confident that your players will have a great user experience (UX).
Apps should provide a better UX than web browsers. They should be seamless, smooth, and reduce cognitive load — as in, they shouldn’t overwhelm the user, otherwise you risk them leaving. That’s a no-no. You don’t want them heading to your competitors!
Also, for an app to have great UX, it should be intuitive. A ‘mobile-first’ design goes a long way — not just for SEO purposes, but also for said UX.
If you have a fab UX, then the result is very straightforward, almost like a mathematical question: amazing UX design + happy player = retained player (who keeps entering your comps).
3. Access to Exclusive Competitions
Apps make players feel like VIPs. Just by having your app, they get access to exclusive in-app competitions. That means they can enter competitions both on your website and your app, boosting their odds of winning an epic prize.
This will also give those players who don’t have your app yet serious FOMO. They’ll want to be a part of the ‘app community’ and feel like a VIP too. This will give you app downloads a boost.
Ah. We can’t forget about community.
It might not seem like it, but apps can actually create a community feeling among your app users. This is because of their shared ‘VIP player’ experience, and their shared experience of having your app too. It helps them build relationships with each other (and keep the talk about your comps going!), but also with your brand.
Want to Retain Your Players? Zap’s Apps Will Do the Job
In the competition industry, there’s no other business better suited for the job of building you an app than Zap. We are experts in the industry: we know all about what your players want, and what you should be giving them in order to engage and retain them.
Our apps are fully-integrated versions of your website. They will boost your conversions, give you greater visibility, and keep your players playing.
Want to learn more? Contact us today.
