Aimtell Review

Detailed Reviews

Push Notifications are one of the best ways to earn audience flow on your website. It makes sure that a visitor who visits the website once will surely come back. However, they could be annoying as well. Therefore, a good application should include multiple ways by which it can benefit the website without making the interested buyer feel irritated. Let’s check whether Aimtell has that quality or not.

Pros

• Numerous ways to create segments.
• For the plus and premium plan, you can add unlimited websites.
• You can get analytical information for customized dates.
• You can add an icon as well as an image to the push notification.
• There is an autohide option for push notifications which will save your subscriber from getting annoyed.
• You can even add two-factor authentication for your Aimtell account which is required to keep the sensitive data of subscribers safe.
• There are a good number of integrations to which you can directly integrate using the Aimtell account.

Cons

• They can add more options related to formatting such as font, background color, and font size.
• The installation will require you to make some effort.
• The opt-in prompt can only be placed at the top-left or top-center of the screen.

Installation

Getting something unlimited by paying a limited price can make someone tickled pink. Aimtell provides the opportunity to embed push notification on unlimited websites for the plus and enterprise plans.

The application asks to follow a few steps while creating the account to the add push notification subscription dialog box. Instead of this, you can choose to skip it and add the websites later.

Under the website and setup heading, there is a tab with the name “Websites” which you need to open to add a website. As you can see, the subtab appears on the surface of the application. Therefore, reaching the “Add Website” option is pretty easy.

There is a table on the screen which shows all websites which you have added along with the status of “push-notification prompt.”

Clicking on “Add Website” will open another webpage with the title “Let’s get started!” Now, a user just needs to follow the steps, and it’s all done.

The steps are not easier in comparison of PushEngage and PushCrew, and we will explain you the difference in detail.

In the first step, you need to add the site name and provide its URL. Now, one limitation we found here is the website’s protocol.

Aimtell only permits the inclusion of websites which use HTTPS protocol. It is always preferred that a website uses HTTPS protocol, but in case you do not have the SSL certificate, you will not be able to use Aimtell’s service straightforwardly.

In the case of HTTPS, you need to contact customer support, and they will set up everything for you. For PushEngage, we were able to add websites having HTTPS protocol without any trouble.

You can also upload an icon which will appear on push notification subscription dialog box.

The second step is to integrate the Aimtell on a website. For Wordpress and Shopify, Aimtell has a plugin which you can install using the Apps sections of the respective websites.

The other option is to input the push notification code in the website code. Doing that would require basic technical knowledge. If you are new to this field, you can take the help of a video tutorial provided by Aimtell on their website.

You need to copy the code and place it before the end of the body tag. Be careful while doing this is as you need to embed the exact code without even making the mistake of a single space.

After you input the code, download the ZIP file containing a JavaScript file. You need to copy this file and place it in the root directory of your website. After that, move to the third step which will verify that the installation is done properly or not.

In the case of PushCrew, we only need to copy and paste the code in the website code or the website editor. It requires somewhat lesser effort, and it would be better if Aimtell also follows the same process.

After you verify it, the push notification subscription box will appear on the website in the top-left corner which is the by default position.

As we have mentioned already, all the added websites will be present on the “Websites” screen. There is an edit option which users can utilize to alter the behavior of the subscription box for the added website.

Clicking on the edit window will open four tabs. By using those tabs, you can change the name and image of the site, add a particular user to manage its push notification, or place public and private security key for it.

There are some miscellaneous settings as well which we will discuss in detail. Most of those settings are related to tracking of the user information.

You can choose to track the IP address, user agent, subscription URL, and notification clicks. One other feature is data retention length specification. The states how long it will keep the data of the subscribers who have unsubscribed to their push notification service.

Push notifications can help you to earn engagement, but at the same time, they may also annoy the users. Therefore, it is always suggested to put a cap on the number of push notifications you send to a user every day.

Such settings are available here. Just remember that if you put the cap as “0” then it means there is no limit.

The issue with this feature is there is no way to know which posts are reaching to a particular visitor. For instance, there are three posts: A, B, and C, and you have limited the number of push notifications as “2.” Now, we can’t select which two posts among all three posts will reach to the person.

Therefore, they must improve the usability of this feature.

After adding a website, the next job is to make the opt-in prompt or the subscription dialog box more engaging. For that, Aimtell has added an immense number of features which we are going to discuss in the upcoming section.

Editing Opt-in Prompt

Making a user click on the “Allow” button present on the opt-in prompt is the toughest part of the complete process.

As we mentioned earlier, push notification may annoy users by appearing on the screen without warning any time of the day. Therefore, people usually avoid allowing the website to send them push notifications.

The only medium to convince them is the appearance of the opt-in prompt which must appear at the correct time.

Aimtell has offered their users two types of opt-in prompts- the one is native opt-in prompt which doesn’t offer any customization, and the other is custom opt-in prompt which has options to edit the behavior and appearance of the subscription box.

First, let’s choose native opt-in prompt which will appear on your website by default after you embed the code in the website code. The position is a top-left corner, and you can’t change it.

However, there is one behavioral option included here which is related to the time when the prompt appears on the screen.

Usually, the websites either offer the choice of showing it immediately after website loads or else provide a user with an option to set a time after which it appears manually.

Both of these options are present in the case of Aimtell, but it has many more options to offer. We must say that Aimtell has a better attribute to handle the timing of the prompt’s appearance.

You can set a page scroll percentage. For instance, you allowed the prompt to appear after 20% of the page scroll. Now, if a user visits your website and doesn’t scroll down, it will not show the subscription box.

Even he scrolls down, he needs to scroll more than 20% and only after that it will appear.

There is another way by which you can handle when prompt should be shown- after a user views X pages where X stands for the number of pages which you set.

In case a user visits your website and view multiple pages, that means he is genuinely interested in your offers and content. So, it increases chances that he will allow you to send push notifications.

These options can provide you with good engagement, even if the subscription box remains simple. However, if you have ideas to get more engagement through customization, you can go for custom opt-in prompt.

It is preferred to view all attribute-related settings under one window. But, in the case of Aimtell, creating a prompt is a step by step process.

The first step is to provide a name and type for your prompt. You can choose between ‘top left dropdown prompt’ and ‘right middle prompt.’ The type actually defines the position of the prompt.

There is one more major difference in both of these options. The right middle prompt allows you to add an image as well. But when we tried to use this option, the subscription box was not visible on our website.

After a few more trials, it appeared on the top-center of the window.

Clicking on ‘create prompt’ will open another window from where you will be able to edit the appearance and content of the subscription box.

As you have already provided a name, now you need to enter content and set the headline, message, text, and button. One notable addition is the test prompt where any change made to the subscription box becomes visible at the same time. This helps a user to judge the appearance of the subscription box while the time of editing.

Another major benefit of creating prompt using Aimtell is no character limit. While using PushEngage, we found the character limit because of which we were not able to add the desired text.

After you click on the update prompt, it will bring you to the ‘view prompts’ window.

We can think of many more settings related to various aspects. When positioning is concerned, you only have two choices, and thus user control is diminished in this particular case

They could have allowed to set an offset from all the sides of the screen, different placement for mobile and desktop, etc. which will allow the user to govern where the applications should be placed.

In case of color options too, a little bit more effort can be expected. You can’t change the background of the opt-in prompt. Now, let us explain you how it could cause an issue.

As we do not have much control over the position of the opt-in box, it will either appear on the top-left corner of the application, or top center of the window.

In case, the header of the website is white, the opt-in prompt will not appear clearly. Therefore, they must allow adding an option to change the background.

The user would also like to set a contrast between the background and image he is including. For that purpose, changing the base color is required.

Creating an opt-in prompt is easy, but one can’t control the appearance to a great extent.

Creating a manual notification

After you set an opt-in prompt, visitors will start allowing you to send them to push notifications. Sending push notifications is a continuous process which could be annoying as well as engaging; it depends on how you utilize this feature.

Too many push notifications may make the visitor feel irritated, and eventually, lead him to the push notification unsubscribe widget. Thus, sending the correct number of push notifications is necessary. Along with it, what matters is the content and appearance which could make them more appealing.

Let’s hope the application has all that we desire. For creating a push notification, you need to click on ‘create campaign’ button. Under five tabs, various options will be placed. The division of options under different tabs aids to the easy creation of push notification.

The first tab contains features related to appearance. The general elements, such as adding title, body, and URL, can be found. However, there is a character limit for title and body. You can also include emojis to it.

Furthermore, there is the provision of adding an icon and also an image. The image may make the push notification look ugly. It will cover a significant part of a user’s screen which the user may not like. Therefore, you must include an image carefully.

You can add one or two buttons too, which will redirect the viewer to different or same URLs depending upon the URL that you have provided.

Although they have made so many additions, they disappoint us with the color options which they could have added. The background is set to white, and text appears black, with no way to change it. Thus, you need to deal with this limitation here. Besides this, customization options are good enough, and even the character limit is placed high.

The Next comes the ‘Targeting’ from where you need to select the subscriber segment whom you are planning to send the push notification.

There are a few settings placed under a separate tab related to the push notification which you are creating.

When you create a campaign, you can set a frequency for it. Whether you want to repeat it daily, weekly, or monthly. Also, you need to set an end date after which the campaign will become inactive.

However, there is no provision of adding particular weekdays for which you want the push notification to function.

For instance, you can’t send the push notification only on Monday and Saturday. You can either select all the days or else once in the week.

There is an autohide feature which is not only helpful for the website but also its subscribers. You can choose after how many seconds the push notification will disappear from the subscriber’s screen. If he is genuinely interested, then he will visit the URL when the push notification appears. But in case he doesn’t want to visit it, it will be annoying for him when the notification stays on the screen.

You need to set the time in seconds. A minor improvement can be done by adding an option for entering time in minutes and hours.

There is an expiration time for push notification after which the push notification will be disabled.

After you alter the settings, you need to move to the final tab which is the scheduling tab. All you need to do is to set the date and time. From that day, the push notification will be sent to the selected segment at the time entered.

Clicking on create campaign will schedule the post and bring you back to the list of created campaigns. From there, you can filter the campaigns- draft, scheduled, auto/repeat, sent, and paused. There can not be any more ways to filter the content. Thus, in our opinion, the filter options are sufficient.

It is not even necessary that you need to select one particular filter option. There is a checkmark option that allows you to select multiple filters.

In addition to filters, there is one show/hide option too. Now, that remarkable as these options make it effortless of a user to find the required push notifications.

It may not be required when there is a limited number of a push notification, but in case, you have a lot of subscribers and segments, that time you can use it.

Although CTR is not visible in the dashboard, one can check it from here for the push notification. For analysis, the user can sort the CTR from maximum to minimum or vice versa.

There are some options related to the push notifications. These are actually the basic actions which you can take on the created push notifications. From the list of options, you can pause, resume, duplicate, copy, paste, or delete the campaign from here.

There is an option to download all details about the campaign as a CSV file from the options list.

Subscribers and segmentation

Information of the subscribers is very important data as it aids in the growth of the website. The details, such as geolocation, explain where your market lies.

For instance, you are getting a huge number of clicks from the visitors of California then you can direct your attention towards them.

It is just an example, and there could be several ways by which these details can push your business in the right direction. Based on devices, geolocation, browser, etc. you can create segments and target a particular audience.

Clicking on a subscriber will provide immense details about the person. You can get opt-in information, pages which he has viewed through the push notification, attributes, notifications sent to him, etc.

You can download all his information and even create a specific push notification for the subscriber you are viewing.

We have seen that there are show/hide options for push notifications. Similarly, you can choose to show or hide particular information of subscribers.

After getting subscribers, you need to categorize them based upon various factors. In PushEngage, there were predefined segments according to browser, device, and country. However, Aimtell doesn’t offer any predefined segments.

For creating a segment in Aimtell, you need to start from scratch. Click on ‘create segments,’ and an option will appear: ‘Add new Segment Group.’ Choosing the option will let you to input data according to which condition will be generated.

There is a long list of actions such as you can create a segment of subscribers who have visited a specific URL.

You can also create separate groups for the people who subscribed on a particular day or hour. Similarly, based on location, device info, and custom events, the application will create segments.

Here also, Aimtell has performed up to the mark by providing so many ways to distribute the subscribers.

Overview screen

The overview page acts as a dashboard as well as the analytics page. Clicking on view section will open a list from where you can select the details which you wish to view and analyze.

As they are not showing all details at the same time, it eliminates the chance of making the user interface messy.

One can concentrate on one aspect at a time. After you select the detail which you wish to view, you will find a graph appearing below it.

The graph shows the information for specific dates. You can even choose to set a custom date by adding a start date and end date. You can go for larger date ranges, but it will make the graph look muddled.

Therefore, we would suggest that one should not use it for date ranges larger than four months. Instead of relying on the graph, you can also go through the table added below the graph.

One can also download a CSV file, providing him particular information about the selected date range.

Using dashboard, you can know about the rate in the increment of subscribers, the notifications sent, notifications clicked, opt-in rate percentage, unsubscribed, inactive, custom events tracked, and custom attributes tracked.

It will be appreciated if they add an option of CTR also. In this case, one needs to manually find out the CTR using the notifications sent and notifications clicked.

Talking about the filter options, you can view the information about a particular segment or a selected site. However, it is not possible to select more than one segment and more than one site.

For instance, you created two segments- segment A and segment B. Now, you want to view the combined data for both the segments, then it won’t be possible using Aimtell.

Apart from this, the analytics provide an easy-to-learn insight into the application. As they are providing segments under the filter option, there is no need to add any more.

Creating various other notifications

Welcome push notification is one of the most common features most of push notification services provide. However, the level of customization differs depending upon the application.

Aimtell has kept it simple by only providing a provision of adding a few elements. You can add a title, message, and a destination URL. To make it more engaging, you can use emojis, icon, and image.

It will immediately appear after the person allows the website to send him push notification. There must be a feature which could let a user set the interval between the acceptance of push notification and sending of welcome push notification. Again, in this case, as well, there is no option to background settings.

You can also add Triggered Notifications whose process is similar to the one which we reviewed in case of manual notification.

Just the major difference is instead of scheduling, the notification works based on triggers.

For manual scheduling, you need to add content. The same input boxes appear in case of trigger notifications. However, you don’t target the subscribers based upon a segment. Rather than that, you select a particular trigger or the activity which the visitor conducts.

Whenever a visitor conducts an activity such as visiting a specific URL, the application will send him a dedicated push notification for that activity.

You can also adjust time between the activity conducted and push notification sent. The autohide feature is also present for this type of notifications.

The last one is RSS notifications which usually the applications include. Therefore, there is not much to discuss here. You can add the RSS feed and add notification’s content accordingly.

You can select particular segments which you wish to send the feed. A notable setting which we found missing in many other applications the ‘time specific limit.’ Using this option, you can set a limit on the number of push notifications application is going to send in a particular period.

Account Settings

There are not many options present under the settings. However, we must let you know about every part of the application. 

From the update account section, you can adjust the time zone. The two-factor authentication can be used to place advanced security to your account.

The account is already protected by the password you provided. However, it is always better to have another layer of security.

For that reason, you can add your phone number to the account. Whenever you or any other user makes a login attempt, he will need to enter the OTP sent to the number.

Other than these options, you will also find an option to add team members. You need to add first name, last name, email, and password for a member. You can choose to notify him through email.

Here, significant improvement is required as they have not added any access levels. A user whom whose email and password you add may have complete access of your account.

In case, you only want to provide him the access of ‘manual notification window’ so that he can create push notifications and run campaigns for you, then it won’t be possible.

Therefore, there are no chances of conducting selective sharing. The account contains sensitive data as well, such as subscriber’s information, logs, etc. He will also have access to add other members. Therefore, it is somewhat risky to add other users in Aimtell. This issue will only get solved when they provide multiple access levels.

Other tools and logs

From the tools section, you can generate an API key for different integrations. Whenever you install Aimtell as a plugin in various integrations, you need to add the API key generated through the application.

Without entering the API key, you will not be able to proceed further. That decreases the security risks if someone gets the password of your integrated account.

Taking about integrations, there are fifteen integrations to which you can add Aimtell. You can even link it with your Twitter and Facebook accounts. It will then send your social media activities and updates as push notifications to your subscribers.

There are a few more integrations which you can view in the added image. However, for various other websites, you can provide push notifications using an RSS feed option.

Another tab which contains important data is ‘logs.’ From the window, you will get details such as subscribers activity, notification logs, and pageviews.

Logs can be further used for analytics, but you need to conduct it manually as there are no options available to transform the logs into graphs. It will be appreciated if they allow converting logs into segments.

Conclusion

Aimtell has focused on providing clear segmentation. The dashboard itself gives insight about the application. One can even learn about the performance of push notification of custom dates.

For segmentation also, they have developed many ways to target a specific audience. These segments can be targets using engaging push notifications. Small improvements are required about which we have already provided them the details.

Other than push notifications, you can also generate welcome notifications, trigger notifications, and RSS notifications. These all notification types have their settings which you can utilize to control their behavior.

Improvement is required in features provided for team member addition. There are no access levels because of which the added users get control equal to yours, which can be harmful.

Overall, the application has some exclusive features as well as some shortcomings. Hence, we would suggest before purchasing it, take the benefit of fourteen days trial which will render you with a concrete decision.