Let me ask you something. Can you actually imagine your life without a smartphone or the Internet? I think it would be pretty easy to guess, that the answer is going to be “No”. Almost the same situation could be seen within a business, and it actually does not matter how big it is. Especially such thing would be vital to those beginning “magnates”, who have just started their own business and have almost an unlimited field for the development of all the features of their resources and actual entrepreneurial potential. In this article, I tried to collect ten of the most vital and useful features of mobile apps for your business. That list is not a top, but just a bunch of all the pros for such a decision. Furthermore, I would be grateful to give a clear response to a question – “Why should I have an app in case of a newborn business?”.
1. Competition
Maybe, that thing is one of the most vital aspects of any business. You, as well as any other person, can claim without a doubt, that the core priorities for each businessman are to protect their business, survive, and prosper. According to Artjoker, one of the most effective tools through which these goals could be achieved (especially in case of a small business) is the creation of a mobile app. Sounds pretty trivial, isn’t it? However, we can rely on the statistics here. According to the data available on the internet, only 40% of small businesses have their own interactive apps, and now I am talking about all the possible industries, not a specific one. Now, you can imagine, what is a possible percentage of the app owning entrepreneurialism in the field of your development. Moreover, there are much more causes to claim that, which are actually those downstream points, which I will show you right now.
2. Geo-targeting
50 or even 20 years ago, each businessman could dream about a special radar to detect the potential customers for their goods. Nowadays it is possible with the usage of a mobile app and a so-called strategy of geo-targeting. It supposes analyzing the location of the users and presentation to them of some special offers, according to their location. So, let us imagine such a situation. You are a user of the “Taco Bell” mobile app living in the USA. One day you are leaving to Vancouver, Canada for some reasons. While “Taco Bell” is the international industry it exists in Vancouver as well as in Brooklin. Moving on, let’s take into consideration that in Vancouver exist some special offers for “Taco Bell” app users, which are not available in the USA. So, the app will automatically send you a notification about the fresh offers, discounts, and other special opportunities. That is how such strategy works. So, it is quite clear, that it is possible to get a pretty good revenue from that kind of approach.
3. Provision of more value to your customer
Obviously, each person may appreciate when someone takes care of them, and that statement is applicable to your buyers better than to any other group of people. You have to accept it as a fact that each customer will be grateful for your positive attitude, presents, discounts, and any other effort like that. Remember, that people will give you money much faster if you treat them well. That is why the usage of mobile apps becomes indispensable in such a situation. There are numerous examples on how to show people that you take care not only of their money but also of their pleasure. However, to make a long story short, we will concentrate only on one of them. For instance, one of the most developed and wealthy coffee-producing industry, Starbucks, which is now going straight to become an overwhelming monopolist, has created a special offer for their customers – focused on the collection of special points, which later could be exchanged for other goods and offers within a cafe. That offer has become of an interest in every center of Starbuck’s such as USA, Canada, and even Poland.
4. Coupons
There is one more tip that you actually have to remember. In case you promise customers that they are going to spend less money, your revenues will probably double at the very end. That notion was adopted in the very first years of the development of the world civilizations, but it does not mean, that it cannot be applicable today and, even more, it does not mean that it cannot be applicable to your mobile app. There is no need to go far in order to find a proper to proof to these statements. Fast-food giants such as KFC, McDonald’s or Taco Bell have adopted the idea of coupons a long time ago. However, it’s got a wide popularity thanks to the development of mobile apps. Because of the all the time growing number of high-quality mobile devices, it has become pretty easy to spread such an idea among people. Furthermore, not only comfortable but also bargaining offers attracted the great numbers of people and brought pretty good revenues to the owners of the highlighted companies and not only to them.
5. Delivery
Have you ever noticed a steady reduction of the use of smartphones as the direct tools for making calls? Probably, you have. Now, let us think, is it going to fit such industries which base their offers not only on providing people with goods but also with delivering them? Maybe, yes. So, let’s make another conclusion: such a decision will not be useless at all for your newborn business. For instance, companies as Domino’s Pizza or KFC in Australia have already developed the apps, which provide you not only with an opportunity to order a delivery but also to stuff your order with anything you need in a multimedia regime: by using the interesting interface, simple functions, and high speed of data processing. Furthermore, if such strong industries did so, it does not mean, that such a decision is impossible for you. Of course, in order to come up with such complicated functions, not only will you spend money, but also time.
6. Building a stronger brand
Creation of strong and reliable relations with your actual customer will be one of the most effective and reliable ways of making business. That actual strategy is called CRM. The best decision will be definitely the creation of an app for the mobile devices. There are several highly fruitful approaches, thanks to which these goals could be achieved. For instance, you may introduce several polls, rates, tops, and other useful features into your app to see what is the clear attitude of people towards your offers, products, and management within an industry. Through the usage of CRM you get an opportunity to show people, what does your brand directly stand for and what are the most basic and important goals for the heading team of a company. Remember, having a non-biased feedback is one of the keys to open the door of success.
7. Boosting strategy
Which advertisement will be more successful? The one that is shown on TV or drew on the billboard with no 100% guarantee that people will see it one day, or that one depicting on a device you keep in your pocket almost all the time? As for me, to be honest, the second one is much more probable. So, we can make a conclusion, that mobile apps allow to promote some goods in a much more successful way. Furthermore, such strategy is even more reliable in case your audience really appreciates what you do and is waiting for some special offers to be released.
8. Mobile payments
Have you ever noticed, how unpopular is cash nowadays? Almost everywhere you now have an opportunity to pay by your credit cards even without a pin code, using contactless technologies. The same things have been existing on the Internet for a few years already, and your business is not an exception. Allowing your customers to pay by card is one of the most popular and successful ways to acquire more audience overseas. For example, Uber has adopted that feature in a highly successful way. You have no need to pay to a driver in cash after arriving to your destination. It is already done even before the car has arrived.
9. Mobile customer service
It is not new that customers usually have several troubles, especially in case you own a delivery company like UPS or DHL. An old-fashioned way of calling to the support center is getting less and less popular. One of the best decision may be to establish a technical support, which would be available 24/7 in the online mode. This will help you to avoid more troubles while providing your buyers with better service. However, it is vital to remember, that such a thing should be done on the really high level. Otherwise, trying to avoid problems you will get more of them, and, as a consequence, you may lose your customers.
10. Mobile notifications
A pretty useful thing in case if you have a salon or a gym. That decision may free people from making calls or arriving to your place directly to arrange an appointment or sign up for classes. Furthermore, notifications will help a customer not to forget about an upcoming meeting, class or something else.
