From access to experience: how today’s apps are adapting social to their platform

In an increasingly competitive app market, where 25% of users tend to abandon an app after one use, app developers have sought solutions to engage and eventually retain users. And seeing the success social media apps are experiencing, companies realize that bringing social into their application might help increase engagement and retention, and at the same time, increase their downloads and beat their competition.

Nowadays, it's pretty standard for utility apps to come with social features. For instance, financial apps now have integrated in-app messaging to connect users to other companies and other customers. Retail applications, which used to be only for e-commerce purposes, have also started incorporating social elements like feeds, groups, and user-generated content (UGC) as a part of their features. 

Here’s how some of today’s apps did that:

Google Pay

In 2020, tech giant Google updated its digital wallet platform, Google Pay, to include features built with human connections and experiences in mind.

“The new app is designed around your relationships with people and businesses”

- wrote Caesar Sengupta, General Manager and VP, Payments and Next Billion Users at Google, in a blog published late last year. 

In the redesigned app, Google adds an in-app messaging experience where users can chat, send money, and split bills privately and securely. With this feature, users no longer need to download several applications to do all these things. All they need to do is download Google Pay and make sure their family and friends are also using it to pay and manage their expenses in one platform conveniently. 

Sephora Beauty Insider

Meanwhile, beauty retail company Sephora transformed its platform to make it more intuitive and customer-focused. Through their Beauty Insider Community, Sephora added social elements such as community and UGC, where users can exchange reviews, best practices and reach out to other beauty enthusiasts. 

“For our Beauty Insider Community, we set out to take all the things that were working really well across our various digital platforms and combine them for a unified, mobile-friendly experience,” said Mary Beth Laughton, SVP of Digital at Sephora, in an article published on BusinessWire. “Community is for those clients who crave a deeper level of beauty connection and inspiration from people just like her, whom she can trust,” she added. 

TrueID 

For True Digital Group, it is crucial to provide their users a way to engage with others on their app, TrueID. As the number one media streaming app in Thailand with 27 million monthly average users, the company wanted to provide the best possible experience for their users and boost in-app engagement and community interaction. 

TrueID added a live chat system that lets viewers of any sports match chat and comment while watching a game. The chat UI is elegantly integrated into the video player, allowing the user to watch the match and follow the discussion simultaneously. “Everyone wants a voice,” said Bryan Clarke, Chief Product Officer at True Digital Group. “You want to have that feeling that you’re something more — and with social [features], you can actually connect with other people and be bigger than yourself,” he added. 

And with the addition of social experiences on their app, Clarke is optimistic that TrueID is on its way to becoming a 'Super App' with TrueID's exclusive content, coupled with engaging social features that will bring millions of users to download their application. 

Looking at the success of social media apps, companies now see the potential of adding social features to their platforms. The current situation opened opportunities to expand their products and services and add more value to their platform to keep their users engaged and hopefully retain them.

Enable social with Amity

However, not all companies have the capacity to create such integrations. Developing such features require numerous resources — a skilled team of developers and a considerable amount of time and money to get an app up and running on the market.

This is where Amity can help you achieve that. Amity Social Cloud is a suite of powerful plug-and-play social features designed specifically for companies looking to upgrade their current app and drive better engagement without the hassle of software development. 

The four modules combine the essentials of today’s top social platforms. They include features such as Chat, Feeds, Groups, and Videos to deliver the best social experience to the end-users. Each module is scalable, customizable, and easy to integrate, so it can easily suit your needs.