Users to Communities: Leveraging Social Feature SDKs to Boost User Engagement

Software development kit (SDK) has long been an indispensable tool for developers everywhere. SDKs have saved tons of developers creating software applications for different operating systems, platforms, and programming languages. Providing the necessary building blocks, including libraries, documentation, code samples, processes, and guides, SDKs have made it easy for developers to integrate specific functionalities into their applications. 

So it comes as no surprise that SDKs have also been a valuable solution for app developers looking for answers to their most pressing in-app challenges. Instead of creating a specific functionality on their own — which would take more time, resources, and money — developers opt for ready-to-use app SDKs to easily and quickly solve these issues. 

Engaging users, the main concern for developers

One of the specific challenges SDKs can help solve is to ensure user engagement on various platforms. 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.

According to a study, users abandon 80-90% of mobile apps after one use. Among the reasons is that apps fail to make a connection with their users. So more than the excellent user interface and frictionless in-app experience, app developers should look into integrating features that will ensure user engagement to guarantee they keep coming back for more. 

It’s more than the user engagement

In the quest to ensure user engagement, app developers should know how to develop emotional connections beyond the transactional aspects of their relationship with their users. To solve this challenge, they should incorporate features that contribute to building trust and loyalty. 

A survey found that 80% of customers say the experiences provided by a company are as important to them as its products and services. In other words, the quality of your user experience directly impacts their satisfaction and loyalty.

Further to that, establishing trustworthy relationships with users not only encourages engagement but also boosts revenue. Engagement fuels app retention — which in return drives profits and growth. In a study, researchers found that a 5% increase in user retention will result in a minimum 25% increase in profit. 

As such, engaging users to make them loyal to an app is even more crucial. Aside from the profit, the cost of attracting new users outweighs the cost of keeping the current users satisfied and engaged. If app developers can keep existing users, they’ll save money on marketing costs since the cost of marketing to existing customers is about $7. Meanwhile, it's about 5x more expensive to find new customers. 

Boosting user engagement with in-app communities

As applications explore more methods to ensure user engagement, it’s also crucial to examine another significant factor that keeps the users coming back to a platform. With app developers getting more serious about establishing a long-term relationship with their users, they should also examine how they can give their users a way to foster connections in the platform through in-app communities. 

Creating a relationship between a product, in this case, an app and its users is the first step, but connecting them to form an in-app community is what really makes the difference. Groups thriving within an app unleashes an untapped potential for any platform, as it plays a vital role in enticing users to keep using an application. 

According to a study, 2.7x users feel more loyal to an application when they feel they belong to the community. By bringing their offline community online, app developers close the distance and lead users to form more personal relationships. When users start making connections and share with like-minded people, they will start engaging more in the platform, creating more reasons for them to keep returning to an app. 

Integrating social features to form in-app connections

Looking at which apps have leveraged the power of building in-app communities, there’s one category that clearly stands out. Considering today's most popular applications, social media apps are at the top of the list. Last year, 7 out of the 10 ten most downloaded apps were social media platforms. 

But it was not just in 2020. In comparison to other categories, social apps have seen success throughout the years. In the last 10 years, social media apps have been dominating the most downloaded applications worldwide, with 9 out of 10 most downloaded apps have been social media platforms in the past decade. 

Humans are inherently social beings and wired to form connections and communities, even if it is virtually. That’s why it’s not surprising that social media apps, where the primary purpose is to connect people, are immensely popular.  

As a result, developers should look into adopting social features to enhance the user experience of their apps. A good app needs to provide reasons for users to keep coming back — and integrating a social experience can ultimately turn casual users into communities. 

By implementing social features, app developers do not only help users forge relationships with one another. They can also enable them to cultivate in-app groups that help build loyalty, enhance app stickiness, encourage users to keep using the platform. 

How can social feature SDKs help?

Given that developing an app can be challenging, plug-and-play social solutions can help ease the burden on developers. Particularly, utilizing pre-built social feature SDKs can play an essential role in making applications more social. 

Using a chat features SDK, developers can quickly integrate messaging capabilities into their application, enabling users to reach out to one another in one-on-one chats or engage in group conversations. 

Meanwhile, social SDKs which can enable feeds, profiles, and groups — similar to those used in popular social platforms — can help aggregate relevant information tailored to each user in one place. Through video SDKs, developers can replicate live events virtually for their users through live streaming to experience and share live events with their communities. 

Incorporating social feature SDKs into app development allows app developers to develop more engaging in-app experiences for users. By leveraging features that bring people together, applications can build community, connect people from anywhere, and create lasting bonds with users who share their interests. Furthermore, providing their users with these in-app experiences will surely encourage them to spend more time browsing, connecting, and using their app. 

Using plug-and-play social feature SDKs

By integrating social features SDKs, app developers can gain a host of new opportunities, including engaging users, improving chances of increasing retention rates, and opening new ways to grow revenue on the platform.

And the possibilities of building an engaging app are endless! Robust and flexible social features SDKs can allow app developers the freedom to customize their platform easily. At the same time, because they are easy to integrate, app developers can fully maximize their apps with various integrations to enhance user experience that will cater to their users’ needs. 

A powerhouse solution, SDKs can help save a ton of development hours, enabling app developers to launch and scale their applications faster than before. Not to mention that it’s perhaps the most valuable commodity given the ample resources available from fellow developers and their community. In addition, various developer communities provide easy-to-integrate tools for their peers to use, making it possible for developers to evolve and make their apps more engaging in no time.