By Samir Addamine, FollowAnalytics
Retailers are trying to make up for lost time —
and regain lost customers — by creating high-tech offline experiences that match the
ease and convenience of e-Commerce. However, despite the fact that more and
more retailers are focusing on the e-Commerce experience, relatively few have
turned to native apps to try and attract customer interest. As people continue
to get comfortable with the idea of carrying out transactions on their phones,
smart retailers will make sure that every potential purchasing journey, whether
it’s on the mobile web or in a mobile app, is able to give the customer the
personalized, seamless, and cohesive experience they desire.
In 2018, Forrester released a report estimating that
smartphones would be responsible in some way, whether as a research tool, way to
compare pricing, or method of purchase, for over one third of all retail sales
in the U.S. During the 2018 holiday season, the biggest shopping period of the
year, mobile platforms were responsible for 51% of the traffic to retailers’ web sites,
as well as nearly $42 billion of spending.
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But at the same time, mobile users can be fickle. Research
from Google indicates that those who have a negative experience while browsing
a mobile site are 62% less likely to make a purchase from that brand in the
future compared to those who have positive experiences. In other words, it
doesn’t matter how good your marketing is or how beautiful your site looks on
desktop; if you don’t offer your users a good mobile experience, you won’t be
getting their business.
Now, you might be asking, what is the benefit of having a
mobile app versus a web site optimized for mobile? Why spend twice the amount
of money and effort to build two separate things that essentially fulfill the
same function? The answer is that both are equally important. People will most
likely end up navigating to your mobile web site first, but a mobile app can
help encourage brand loyalty while increasing the amount of time that a person
spends engaging with your product. On top of that, having a mobile app will
help retailers make their offline experiences more relevant and engaging to
users, as they will have the opportunity to tap into data on their customers’
preferences and habits.
Let’s take Starbucks as an example. They arguably already
have a good deal of brand equity, along with loyal coffee drinkers who don’t
need any additional encouragement to visit a shop. But those who have the app
are treated to a whole range of exclusive deals and games designed to encourage
them to visit the shops more often. On top of that, the Starbucks app also
allows users to order their drinks ahead of time and pick them up from the
nearest location. It’s possible that Starbucks also could provide such an
experience on their mobile web site, but it’s so much simpler to design an app
that can support such functionality without being limited to the constraints of
a smartphone browser.
In fact, Starbucks’ app, which also doubles as a payment
system, is responsible for more than 40% of in-store mobile payments,
more than Google, Apple, and Samsung Pay; eMarketer estimates that more than 23
million people paid using the app in 2018 alone. While not every app needs to
have that kind of functionality — and indeed, most of them shouldn’t —
Starbucks’ success shows the benefits of having a native app.
Another advantage to having an app available for download is
that there’s a better chance of the brand remaining top-of-mind. Whenever
someone scrolls through their phone, they’ll see the icon and immediately think
of the brand, whether or not they’re looking to make a purchase at the time.
An ideal app helps bridge the divide between online and
offline channels. They also help retailers gather a more complete idea of their
customers’ needs and habits, from the products they’re more interested in
buying to the circumstances that will cause them to go into the store. In the
case of Starbucks, users ultimately have no choice but to go into the physical
location to pick up the product they’ve ordered. But for other retailers, many
of whom are struggling with maintaining foot traffic to their stores, being
able to convince people that there is an advantage to shopping in-store,
whether it’s a financial or experiential one, is vital.
Samir Addamine is a serial entrepreneur driving
innovation in the mobile apps industry. Prior to founding FollowAnalytics, he was a senior
executive at Framfab, part of Publicis, where he built mobile apps and
developed mobile strategies for enterprise companies, as well as a founder of
mobile agency Clicmobile. At FollowAnalytics, Addamine has
overseen the company’s inclusion in Gartner’s first Magic Quadrant report on
mobile marketing platforms, as well as the development of the company’s mobile
data wallet and new mobile app development platform.
