From a couple of excellent new-to-me sites
I was doing some reading this morning about current thinking and best practices around website push notifications. I pretty quickly came across this great guide from early last year:
Lee Munroe, “The Ultimate Guide To Push Notifications For Developers,” Smashing Magazine, April 18, 2022, https://www.smashingmagazine.com/2022/04/guide-push-notifications-developers/
Under the “Prompting Mistakes” heading, Munroe includes an intriguing pull quote:
“Push notifications became yet another way to artificially re-engage users and force content down their throat. That’s why so many of them hate it. But there are some interesting use cases for it.”
— The Ultimate Guide to Not F#!@ing Up Push Notifications, Stéphanie Walter
I clicked through and read Walter’s excellent article, from which this quote is literally just part of her TLdNR at the top. It’s very much worth reading the whole thing. I really liked her sections about when and how to ask for push notifications permission, asking for permissions in context, and remembering to give users control. Finally, she closes with links to five excellent resources by others: four articles and a video of a presentation.
Stéphanie Walter, “The Ultimate Guide to Not F#!@ing Up Push Notifications,” UX Research & Design (blog), September 3, 2019, https://stephaniewalter.design/blog/the-ultimate-guide-to-not-fck-up-push-notifications/
Walter has a lot of other great stuff on her UX Research and Design Blog. Clear thinking, strong opinions, authoritative and fun voice. Here’s somebody who knows what she’s talking about—and shares generously! Her FAQ is brilliant as well. I am definitely following going forward. (From yesterday’s Pixels of the Week post alone, I’ve already got at least two more articles by others I have to read: “Table of Contents: The Ultimate Design Guide” by Huei-Hsin Wang and Matt Brown and “You’re All Set: Casual Language, Embedded Advertising, And The Decline Of Human-Centered Design” by Jon Kolko.)
Will also be following Smashing Magazine.