Facebook, Wells Fargo and Bank of America are among the best at communicating with their users, while many brands fail in this respect because they send too many and irrelevant notifications.

These are the key findings of a study looking at consumer sentiment toward brand communication commissioned by multichannel engagement platform Leanplum. 1,000 mobile phone users in the US were polled for the study.

The number one reason people delete apps is because they receive too many and irrelevant notifications to their inboxes and notification feeds. Across all generations, from Gen Z to Baby Boomers, the most common reason to delete an app was because of copious notifications. Over 75 per cent of Millennials are deleting apps that annoy them with unnecessary notifications. Brands are consistently having to navigate the fine line between keeping their users informed and notified while being sensitive to over-communicating.

Perhaps surprisingly, respondents reported that the brands best at communicating with their users are social media and financial companies. From a list of popular companies, people selected Facebook, Wells Fargo and Bank of America as being the best at communicating with their users. Users who consistently disregard and are unenthused by notifications find that social media and financial brands send the most helpful notifications. Over 30 per cent of people reported that they like to receive notifications for financial alerts and over 25 per cent of people think that Facebook does the best job at communicating with their users.

Interestingly, respondents said they prefer email notifications to other forms of app communication. 46 per cent of respondents reported that they prefer to receive notifications in the form of email, while only 15 per cent prefer push notifications.

Even across generations, email is the most preferred form of communication for brands on mobile devices. 43 per cent of Millennials prefer to receive emails from brands, compared to 28 per cent of Gen Zs. As email transitions to being easily accessible on mobile devices, it has re-emerged as the most liked form of communication from brands.

“Through our research, we are finding more and more that email is stronger than ever before,” said Momchil Kyurkchiev, CEO and founder of Leanplum. “Because email is so accessible on our phone, it is being used in combination with push notifications, allowing for brands to craft communications with their users that are thoughtful, personalized and based on the unique characteristics of each customer.”

Other findings:
60 per cent cent of people have a preference for what time of day they receive notifications. Of those who have a preference, the split between morning (27 per cent), afternoon (38 per cent) and evening (34 per cent) was fairly even.

72 per cent of Gen Zs (compared to only 43 per cent of Gen Xs) like to receive messages/updates from friends/followers on social media.

The least annoying push messages to receive were from email/messaging apps (9 per cent found them annoying) and financial apps (only 13 per cent of people found these annoying).

49 per cent of people find financial/banking alerts helpful.

54 per cent of people say they are most likely to open emails from messaging companies, and 41 per cent are likely to open financial emails.

You can download the full report here.