What is geofencing?
Technology that groups users based on their geographic location. Marketers and app developers use geofencing to target users based on their location to deliver relevant promotions and advertising. Geofencing has far-reaching applications and enables businesses to engage with users in a more personalized way.
Geofencing is a location-based marketing strategy used by mobile marketers to target certain customers within a specific geographic location. It involves the use of technologies like radio-frequency identification (RFID), wifi, GPS, or cellular data to create a virtual boundary (fence) around the specified area.
An example of geofencing is when a person strolls by a Starbucks and receives an app notification that reads: “Today only! Earn 50 stars on your next iced coffee purchase!”
Geofences can be set up in a variety of places and can be configured to target a specific place, demographic market, business category, brand location, city, or state. When any person with a device enters or exits a geofence, a variety of alerts can be triggered, including text messages, search ads, or in-app notifications.
Geofencing provides an easy and cost-effective way for marketers to personalize their advertisements and promotions to locals, share relevant information, or ask for feedback.
Benefits of geofencing
- Increase customer engagement and response: With geofencing, marketers have the ability to send highly relevant, personalized messages and ads to customers at the right place and time.
- Optimize data and analytics: Geofencing can provide data and actionable information about ad campaigns in real time using metrics like clicks and impressions. Marketers can observe customer response rates and change campaign content, targeted location, timing, etc. on the fly.
Mobile marketing tips for geofencing
- Create the right size of fence: When creating a geofence, it’s a good idea to keep it small and concise so that your ad reaches the customer at the right time and doesn’t lose relevance. Ideally, your geofence should cover no more than a 4-5 mile radius.
- Make your ad specific and actionable: Catch your audience’s attention and inspire action with push notification promotions. To make your content more action-oriented, use things like urgent CTAs and personalized offers.
- Respect customer privacy: If your app uses tracking services, it’s important to maintain transparency with your users about how location-based targeting affects them. Users will likely be more willing to have their location tracked if they are educated on how it can benefit them.