Growing a two-sided marketplace is difficult.
VC firm Sequoia Capital studied two-sided marketplaces, broadly defined, and found that buyer and seller engagement is the key to growth:
"Engagement is key to the success of any product...engaged users return for repeat experiences — driving stronger retention and ultimately helps a product grow in a sustainable way. Ultimately, engagement drives stickiness, which drives retention — and that, in turn, drives growth. Therefore, systematically understanding and improving engagement will increase a product’s health."
The study goes on to differentiate tactics such as push and email notifications which are designed to bring users back to a marketplace, versus native experiences that drive retention within a product.
Marketplaces that want to grow should focus on retention building experiences that increase stickiness. In this article we will share seven in-app notifications you can add to your marketplace to make it more engaging for buyers and sellers.
7 in-app notifications for marketplaces that drive growth
For each in-app notification use case below, we will tell you which notification type it pairs well with. Read this article to learn more about types of in-app notifications, including feeds, inboxes, cards, modals, banners, and toasts.
1. Buyer/seller communication
In busy marketplaces, sellers struggle to efficiently manage multiple conversations. And buyers want fast responses from merchants, or their interest will shift elsewhere. Most marketplaces rely on sending transactional email about buyer/seller communication, but email alone fails to preserve context for sellers or promptly alert buyers.
The in-app notification solution
Instead of just email, marketplaces can use in-app notifications to facilitate conversations between buyers and sellers.
Bounce, a marketplace for luggage storage uses this tactic. Bounce’s website includes a dedicated notification area for messages between travelers and storage partners. Travelers can message storage partners with questions, and partners can quickly respond to inquiries in a unified view, keeping communication flowing.
In addition to a dedicated notification inbox, marketplaces can use temporary toast notifications to ensure new messages are seen immediately. This inbox and toast combination lowers friction and increases engagement, something that email alone can't achieve.
| In-app experience | Pairs well? |
|---|---|
| Feed | |
| Inbox | ✅ |
| Cards | |
| Modals | |
| Banners | |
| Toasts | ✅ |
2. Order Status
Marketplaces lose sales when shoppers abandon carts and/or experience buyer’s regret. Many marketplaces already send cart abandonment emails and shipping status texts. However, to keep a buyer engaged and happy a marketplace must send immediate, contextual information and guidance during the entire purchase cycle.
The in-app notification solution
To reduce abandoned carts, marketplaces can use timed in-app notifications to help buyers finish a purchase while they are still in the app.
Post-purchase, a marketplace can provide in-app order confirmations and shipping updates. Combined with email receipts, this multi-channel approach reduces anxious customer service requests about the shipping status of an order.
Learn how the right notifications architecture can reduce the customer service load on product engineers.
| In-app experience | Pairs well? |
|---|---|
| Feed | ✅ |
| Inbox | |
| Cards | |
| Banners | ✅ |
| Toasts | ✅ |
3. Fraud prevention
The core value of a marketplace is the creation of trust between anonymous buyers and sellers.
However bad actors exploit marketplace trust and can cause financial harm to buyers and sellers quickly. Fraudsters often run their schemes during the delay window of email notifications, knowing that marketplace users won’t check emails early enough to take preventative action.
The in-app notification solution
Marketplaces can use in-app notifications to alert users to suspicious activity in real-time, enabling an immediate response.
Modal windows are ideal for flagging significant threats, like new device logins or high-value transactions that demand attention. Toast notifications can subtly flag smaller anomalies, enabling the user to take action or safely ignore.
By empowering users with anti-fraud messages while they browse, in-app notifications safeguard marketplace trust and security.
| In-app experience | Pairs well? |
|---|---|
| Feed | |
| Inbox | |
| Cards | |
| Modals | ✅ |
| Banners | |
| Toasts | ✅ |
4. Inventory updates
Marketplaces struggle to align supply and demand in real-time. Buyers miss out on sold-out items while sellers lack insight into items that are in-demand. Some marketplaces send restock emails, but these messages are easily missed and fail to help buyers purchase items while they are still in the flow of a shopping session.
The in-app notification solution
In-app notifications solve the unavailable inventory problem for marketplaces by capturing demand asynchronously and prompting for sales in real-time. Buyers can subscribe to back-in-stock alerts while browsing, and receive a reminder within the product when the merchant has the item for sale.
Discogs, a music marketplace, exemplifies this with their Wantlist feature. Buyers add out-of-stock records to their Wantlist, then receive in-app notifications when copies are listed, staying on top of rare finds.
By capturing interest and demand for products even when they’re not available for sale, in-app notifications for inventory keeps buyers engaged and unlocks sales.
| In-app experience | Pairs well? |
|---|---|
| Feed | |
| Inbox | |
| Cards | ✅ |
| Modals | |
| Banners | ✅ |
| Toasts |
5. User onboarding
Drop-off during user onboarding is a problem for every product, but is especially an issue for marketplaces. In order for a buyer or seller to experience value from a marketplace they must complete a series of steps, like listing a bank account to receive payments, or a credit card to make a purchase.
Email reminders are easily ignored, so a marketplace must also use in-app notifications designed for new users.
The in-app notification solution
In-app notifications can guide users through onboarding while they're first engaged. Modal notifications can drive completion of critical milestones like adding payment methods or filling out user profiles.
Card notifications can offer guidance near the place where the user needs to take action. Contextual nudges like this can propel onboarding completion more effectively than external notification channels like email.
| In-app experience | Pairs well? |
|---|---|
| Feed | |
| Inbox | |
| Cards | ✅ |
| Modals | ✅ |
| Banners | |
| Toasts |
6. Price changes
Buyers are attracted to marketplaces because of the promise of rare or high quality items at discount prices. However monitoring listings is time-consuming and notification emails often arrive too late for limited-time deals.
The in-app notification solution
In-app notifications can deliver price alerts to buyers instantly so they can take immediate action.
Interactive card notifications can let buyers set custom price thresholds (e.g., "Alert me if this drops below $200"). Toast notifications inform buyers of price drops or matches on saved items in real-time, prompting purchases.
| In-app experience | Pairs well? |
|---|---|
| Feed | |
| Inbox | |
| Cards | ✅ |
| Modals | |
| Banners | |
| Toasts | ✅ |
7. Reviews
Reviews are important to both buyers and sellers in an online marketplace. However, even when a transaction goes well for both sides, a buyer and seller can lose motivation to give a review if they are not prompted immediately.
The in-app notification solution
In-app notifications can boost review response rates by requesting feedback immediately after a successful transaction.
Modals can guide users to give a review as part of the purchase experience. Or if you want to be less obtrusive, cards on order pages can prompt buyers and sellers to rate their interaction.
In either case, well-timed in-app requests capture more feedback than delayed emails.
| In-app experience | Pairs well? |
|---|---|
| Feed | |
| Inbox | |
| Cards | ✅ |
| Modals | |
| Banners | |
| Toasts | ✅ |
Start building better marketplace experiences
In-app notifications drive marketplace engagement and sales more than just email alone. From helping buyer-seller communication to preventing fraud, well-designed notifications keep users informed and active within your marketplace.
Adopting Knock's in-app components is the easiest way to build these experiences into your marketplace. Our toolset can help you create the inboxes, modals, toasts, cards, and feeds that make for engaging, real-time experiences for your buyers and sellers.
Read more about our in-app components and signup here to get started for free.