Could Mobile Apps be the answer to GDPR data worries?

Firstly a confession - I am not a GDPR expert - I don't understand all the intricate parts of what it means but then I think a lot of people don't know exactly how their business will be affected post May 2018 when GDPR comes into force. This is more an observation on the basic concepts when it comes to holding and using customer data for marketing, the concerns I am already seeing from companies big and small.

But first a story.....

Back in 2017 J D Wetherspoon decided that they were going to delete their entire database of customers - no-one really knows how many this is but it would be close to 1 million records. Why did they do that? They mailed all their customers telling them they were doing it and informing them this was the last email they would be sending and customers would no longer receive a monthly newsletter. Wetherspoon would be communicating to them in other ways.

The reason for this was two fold. They had built this database up over a number of years but had lost track on who had and hadn't given consent. They had also been fined for a data breach and stated it was too risky to hold that amount of data. A spokesperson told WIRED: “Following the data breach in December 2015 Wetherspoon has been reviewing all the data it holds and looking to minimise.

“We felt, on balance, that we would rather not hold even email addresses for customers. The less customer information we have, which now is almost none, then the less risk associated with data.”

OK so what has all this got to do with Mobile Apps?

Well conveniently they launched their food and drink table ordering app just before and they know they can push out details of offers and their newsletter to anyone who has downloaded it. The customer gives permission (or not) when they download the app and this permission is controlled by Google and Apple – they can delete the app or turn of notifications at any time. The fact is as you are sending the push notification to the app and not the individual you aren’t holding any customer data.

The Wetherspoon app on the apple store has over 140,000 reviews so they have probably got 10x that amount of downloads so they probably have access to an even bigger customer base than before!

They are probably get a much bigger engagement than they were before too as a push message has much higher read and response rate compared to email or social media.

So can a mobile app be a solution for your business? Do you have a database of customers or potential customers who you want to send regular messages to, whether that be a newsletter or latest offers and promotions? Are you not confident that they opted in to receive communication from you or cant prove it?

Then a mobile app could help - of course you need to get people to download the app in the first place so there needs to be an incentive to do so. This something I will talk about in my next blog post.

If you want to find out more or have a chat about how a mobile app could help your business, please get in touch.

Martin Haley, Director, App Developer, Eazi Apps

Email: [email protected]