Does My Business Really Need A Mobile App?

marketingland.com

If you already have a mobile-friendly website, is an app a necessity? Contributor Daniel Cristo says you only need one if you don't want to fall behind the competition.

The single, most popular, mobile strategy question I get asked is, “Do I really need an app?”

The safest answer is always “It depends …” but I hate that answer, so I’d like to try and convince you that you do, indeed, need an app today, even if the payoff happens tomorrow.

Do I Really Need A Website?

Twelve years ago, as a college sophomore, I took a web design course. During the course, a classmate came up to me and told me that he liked my work, and he knew a business owner who was looking for someone to redesign his site. One thing led to another, and the classmate and I soon opened a boutique web design shop.

After we finished the first job, we decided a good way to drum up sales was to go door-to-door to each business in town, asking if they needed a website. We probably stopped by 100 businesses, and not a single one was interested (thankfully, my salesmanship has improved since then).

One of the sales trips stands out in my mind, even to this day. It was a Chinese buffet restaurant on the main street in town. I asked to speak to the owner.

“Hi, my name is Dan. Are you the owner?”
“Yes.”
“Nice to meet you. I run a small web design shop, and I was wondering if you guys have a website.”
“No.”
“Would you guys be interested in having a site created?”
“No.”
“Can I ask why not?”
“We have a sign. We don’t need a website.”

I didn’t want to argue with the guy, and I was pretty nervous anyway, so I just walked out and went to the next store.

I can look back today and chuckle at the owner’s ignorance. Of course he needed a website — he just didn’t know he needed one, because he didn’t understand the potential that a website held.

In all fairness, it was 2002. There was no Yelp. There was no Facebook, Groupon or YouTube. Digital photography was not readily available to the average person; so, most websites looked bad and functionality was worse. But, even so, most savvy business owners knew that having website was a good move.

My point is that while businesses in 2002 didn’t depend on websites and the internet as they do today, those that saw the potential and started building a web presence early benefited the most when consumers finally shifted their behavior to be more digital.

This is exactly where we stand today with mobile apps.

The Potential Of Apps

Those who think they don’t need a native mobile app because their site is mobile friendly are missing the huge potential apps have over websites.

• When was the last time a customer took a picture of your product with your website?
• When was the last time your website notified a potential customer of a sale as they walked by your shop?
• When was the last time your website told you how a customer felt when they saw your product for the first time?
• When was the last time your site told you the name of that customer who just walked through your shop’s door?
• When was the last time your site adjusted the price of an item based on a customer’s social influence?
• When was the last time a customer tried your product on, virtually on your site?

Biometrics, geo-location, cameras, sensors, augmented reality, 3D gaming… these are potential game-changers that already exist natively in mobile apps — features you won’t find on a traditional website. Not only that, but new functionality that we haven’t really thought of is going to be available to apps much sooner than they are for an HTML-based site, if ever.

Even if you don’t take advantage of those features today, just being on the right platform gets you 80% there.

Living In The Moment

You may be sitting there thinking, “Well, if some new killer technology comes to apps tomorrow, I’ll just build an app then. Why waste my time and energy today when it’ll basically do the same thing as my website?”

Let me ask you a question: Which is easier? Getting 100,000 new people to find, download and sign up for your app, or getting 100,000 people who have already downloaded your app to update it?

I hope that you would say it’s easier to update your app. After all, you already have their email address, and the platforms themselves prompt people to keep their apps up to date.

Even if you do nothing more than deliver a native reading experience for the content on your existing website, you can at least start building your app’s install base today. And with that install base will come ratings, comments, feedback and usage metrics that build trust and credibility with the platforms in the same way that aged links do with older websites.

Then when the shift happens and consumers are looking for apps with that killer new feature, you can focus on simply updating your app with the new feature while your competition scrambles to find a developer who can start building them an app from scratch.

Don’t Miss The Boat

I want to be clear about one thing — building an app isn’t all roses. It takes a significant amount of time, money and energy to build an app that people want to download and use. Even after you build the app it will need to be marketed and supported by your company.

These are all elements that need to be figured out at some point and then planned for. It’s how companies stay competitive in today’s marketplace. Look at it this way — if you can’t set aside the budget and resources for an app today, will you be able to do so when your sales are declining because customers “all of a sudden” decided that they prefer using your competitor’s app over your old website?

This is a not a tactical decision about whether $30,000 in app development has a greater return than $30,000 in website improvements. It’s a strategic decision to invest in a platform that can support the business infrastructure of tomorrow’s generation in the same way your website has supported your business for the last generation.

The app boat has already left the harbor. It’s not that you can’t wait for the next one, but if you do, is it going to delay your business to the point where you can’t catch up with the competition when you really need to?

What Do You Think?

Do you think that web technologies will keep pace with native mobile apps, or will apps ultimately force the retirement of its older web cousin?

The Evolving Mobile App User

1to1media.com

Mobile wallets and enterprise apps are just the beginning. Here’s what companies need to know about the evolution of apps.

Mobile apps are ubiquitous. With more than 1.4 million apps in Apple's App Store alone, there's an app for nearly everything. Apps drove the majority of media consumption on mobile devices last year, accounting for about 7 out of every 8 minutes, according to comScore.

However, the average person spends the majority of his or her time using only a handful of apps. Driving app downloads and high engagement rates are harder than ever. To stay ahead of the competition, marketers must adapt their mobile strategies to better serve customer needs and expectations. Here's how to jumpstart your app strategy.

Social media, messaging, video, and navigational apps command a large chunk of time spent on apps, reported Forrester Research. In a three-month study of nearly 3,000 U.S. smartphone owners, the top three most-used apps were Facebook, YouTube, and Google Maps. These results aren't surprising, notes Mark Tack, vice president of marketing at Vibes, a mobile marketing solutions provider.   

"I only use apps that have a lot of utility and this is true for many people, so it can be tough to get [consumers] to download other apps like a retailer's branded app," he says. "Marketers have to look for new opportunities, like mobile wallets."

As an example, Tack points to Men's Wearhouse. Vibes helped the retailer create emails with coupons that could be saved on Google Wallet or Apple's Passbook. Last year, Men's Wearhouse launched about 50 of these email/mobile campaigns. Emails that included the "save to wallet" feature had a coupon redemption rate that was 10 times higher than those that didn't offer the feature.

"We think giving customers something to react to by saving the coupon in a mobile wallet drives engagement instead of just another email that gets pushed down," says Men's Wearhouse Executive Vice President of Marketing Matt Stringer in a webinar. "Email offers mass reach, but the mobile wallet ultimately drives a much stronger take rate." The company is also exploring ways to integrate its loyalty program into mobile wallets and provide a smoother experience, Stringer adds.

Within a few years mobile wallets will be used for more than just managing digitized coupons, predicts Forrester Research analyst Thomas Husson. "Mobile wallets will become marketing platforms," Husson says in the webinar. Payments will be only one of the features that mobile wallets offer, as marketers increasingly use them to reach customers. "We expect some apps to morph into marketing platforms with open APIs" he continues, "that allow you to integrate your services and your brand to enable commerce."

March 2015: Mobile Engagement

Read the related article http://www.1to1media.com/view.aspx?docid=35218&m=n">"Mobile Engagement"

THE APP-STORE MARKETING REPORT: User Acquisition, Retention, And Strategies For Getting Apps To Stand Out

ftleavenworthlamp.com

The total number of apps people are using hasn't changed much over the past few years. This means users are consolidating their app choices, and spending more and more time with a few favorites. This creates added pressure to stand out in the app stores, and develop apps that can gain and keep a loyal audience.

In a recent report from BI Intelligence, we discuss why it is becoming increasingly important that developers field a competitive app-marketing strategy for triggering downloads and encouraging sustained use, and retaining users. There are a number of different tactics, both paid and free, that marketers might use. 

Access The Full Report And Data By Signing Up For A Trial Today >>

Here are a few key data points on user behavior and recommended marketing strategies from the report:

• Per-capita downloads are stalling: US app users downloaded an average of 8.8 apps per month during 2014. But, that's nearly identical to the average monthly download volume three years ago.
• Encouraging retention and usage remain challenging: In June 2014, the average user spent about 70% of app time in their three most-frequently-used apps. About 52% of all apps lose at least half of their peak users after three months.
• The cost of acquiring and retaining users is soaring. The iOS and Google Play app stores are overcrowded, and competition to stand out is at an all-time high. The cost-per-install on iOS soared 59% year over year in October, while the cost to retain a loyal user — defined as a user who opens the app at least three times in a two-week period — is even higher than acquiring a new one, and was up 33% year over year.
• User retention tips: Developers should focus on marketing their apps just ahead of major new phone or operating-system launches. App-marketing costs go up after a new device launches, because lots of apps are competing for the attention of consumers downloading apps to new phones. Apps that are top of mind among users when they first get their phone are likely to retain an advantage, without paying a premium for post-launch promotion.
• The rise of app-install ads: App-install ads have become a popular way to drive new downloads while other app-store optimization (ASO) tactics can help increase visibility through unpaid means. We detail these, and other strategies.
• To retain users who already have an app, in-app messages and offers are often effective. For example, a gaming app might push a user a message offering them a one-time deal on extra lives so they will continue playing.

The “Internet of Things” Won’t Eat Your Job

economics21.org

A popular sport evolving over dinner tables across the United States is the discussion of whether tech is going to kill or create jobs. Behind the boom in tech is the discussion of “The Internet of Things.” The Internet of Things (IoT) is an all – encompassing term depicting the changing landscape of how data is leveraged by big industry. 

No longer will the Internet be simply a network of connected PCs that lets these computers communicate with just one another. The IoT takes advantage of the enormous amount of live information on the web that goes beyond machine–to–machine (M2M) communications. Things, in the IoT, can refer to heart monitoring implants, cars with built-in sensors or coffee machines that can allow, for example, your heating system to talk with your car so that the heating system knows you’re on your way home and can thus warm the house – presumably to the temperature the heating system has learned you like. 

In the innovation economy, the IoT is the race of the human against the machine. My job and your job are replaced by machines. Cost is lowered and efficiency is raised, say the prominent labor economists of the day. What’s important not to forget, however, is that people are the ones who build machines. Also equally important to remember is that society is productive from people doing things together, rather than machines doing things in isolation. 

Machines can no doubt increase efficiency.  However, machines should be thought of as raising the value of people rather than eliminating jobs. For one, machines cannot possibly replace humans in doing everything of value, including eradicating disease, ameliorating poverty or helping to reduce climate change. Machines should (and will) help elevate the power of people to produce goods and services for the betterment of mankind. 

Nevertheless, today there is a focus on task-specific skills and domain expertise for jobs. One can hardly imagine a world where a job does not have a descriptive label such as “programmer” or “dishwasher.” If our self–interest is to create a task–centered economy with machines doing the work of humans, then we get stuck in a Catch–22: our self–interest is actually not in our self–interest. 

But the current tech revolution does not have to be thought of in terms of disruption. Change almost always provides new opportunities for humans to learn new things from each other, as well as to rethink tired processes in collaboration. The hope is that the tech revolution will improve the way we work, not disrupt or replace our labor altogether. We need to think about the economy as a people-centered rather than task-centered economy where machines are used to raise the value of people. 

Automation of the world around us has been a net positive. Since the Industrial Revolution, man’s standard of living has increased considerably, with longer life expectancies, clean air and water, and central heating and cooling. Getting the “Things” of today to pick up some automation and tailor their tasks to our desires leaves us with more time to do the things we like, such as spending time with loved ones or engaging in recreational activities. We might even find more interesting jobs.

Source: Acquity Group (Accenture Interactive). More than two thirds of consumers plan to buy connected technology for their homes by 2019, and nearly half say the same for wearable technology. Smart thermostats are expected to have 43% adoption in the next five years.

A conversation on all things mobile: Banking, payments, and Costanza

mobilepaymentstoday.com

Baby it's (freakin') cold outside, but mobile is hot (or to quote a band I love called The Cure, ‘hot, hot, hot’). In this next installment of ‘Rantings with Ranta’, Dan Ring from ACI Worldwide asks Mark Ranta to look at many things in mobile—from banking to payments to wallets to the growing ‘unbanked’.

Mark, do you know that if you line up 2 billion smartphones side by side, it's close to 95,000 miles. Hold on, I just Googled ‘circumference of earth at equator’: it's about 24,902 miles...so if you line up the 2 billion smartphones, that'll be more than a couple of times around the Earth...and thus concludes our geography and distance lessons. And why 2 billion? Bill Gates predicts that by 2030, 2 billion people who don't have a bank account will be storing money and making payments with their phones.

Two billion is an impressive figure, but quite frankly, not a surprising one. The (developing) regions that we're taking about don't have to rely on dated infrastructure. They're able to fully take advantage of the technological advances we've seen in the last twenty years (dating back to cell phones). And unlike the established banking economies in the developed world, these regions are not required to maintain legacy systems, which hinders progress.

And the developing regions are typically referred to as the unbanked?

The unbanked reminds me of the famed Proclaimers song, but with a twist: I would walk 500 miles and I would walk 500 more…but I wouldn't be the man who walked 1,000 miles to fall down at the bank's door. Mobile and banking are becoming synonymous in the developing world. In these regions, no one has to walk any miles (or even meters) to have access to financial products. They are the 'unbanked,' or better put, the traditionally 'unreachable' due to a lack of infrastructure. And this is why mobile has become or is becoming in some cases so prevalent in these regions.

How are the traditionally unbanked different from the banked when it comes to mobile?

Instead of regionalizing the discussion, let's break mobile up into three areas: mobile banking (think banking apps), mobile payments (money movement or point of sale) and then we can talk about the wallet. Work for you?

Sure, but can I ask why break it up?

Well for starters, I think it's easier to understand mobile if you start looking at the core areas where mobile comes into play. By breaking it up, you can start to hone in on certain areas, but also start looking at a holistic strategy; otherwise it is like standing at the beginning of that 500 mile one-way journey wondering how you are going to get there.

Sounds like a plan, Ranta-man. So where do you start with mobile banking? It's been an area of pretty rapid growth the past few years from what I have seen, heard and read.

When I talk about mobile banking, it's easiest to start with where we are today and the current state of the market, and just as you note, its rapid rise to fame. Mobile banking is the logical (sometimes enhanced) extension of many banks’ online product. If you think about it, up until about the mid 2000s, we were pretty limited with what could be done from a smartphone. The bandwidth of a mobile web browser was rather frustrating, so the idea of going to a bank website was a rather onerous task; that is until Mr. Jobs introduced us to the wonder of apps and kicked opened the door to where we find ourselves today. 

As you noted, folks of all sizes and shapes (and ages) have been gravitating to the mobile device to do a whole series of transactions, but the primary purpose is to simply look at balances or track status or check out particular payment or recent activity. Up until fairly recently, that was really all you could do, and we are just starting to see the sprouts of the next level of functionality, but that growth and demand for functionality will not match the initial rapid demand to just “get mobile.” It will be more evolutionary for the next gen, but to set the record straight, it will be quick, just not rapid if that makes sense.  

Does the Personal Financial Management discussion fit in here?

I do tend to put PFM in this box since it is, to some extent, tracking the status of payments you have made, but to be honest, I think PFM is a much larger discussion. Let's just say that I believe PFM is a driving force in mobile, and one topic that we should discuss in more detail soon.

Duly noted…so I think that brings us to mobile payments. I guess a good place to start is with a definition; how do you define mobile payments?

It's funny, I have changed my stance on this multiple times in the past few years, because I tried to make the net as wide as possible to help the mobile awareness campaign I was running in my head. If you asked me two or three years ago, I would have said that a mobile payment is any payment that is initiated via a phone. So that would have included a purchase on iTunes, an in-app Amazon purchase, any mobile web browser online purchase, and the more obvious group of QR-based POS or SoftCard NFC-based payments, or any of the mobile money movement platforms.

Today, I think I would drop the in-app or in-web browser pieces and limit the definition to 'just at the POS', or to where the mobile device takes the place of the physical cash or card while I’m standing in front of a register or sending money to a friend or family. That’s how I see it today, but again it’s a moving target for me. 

Do you think the cashless, coinless, cardless society is now closer?

Closer is a relative term. Do I think mobile payments are here to stay and on their way to becoming mainstream? 100% yes! Do I think they will replace cash and card? Maybe, but I doubt it will be anytime soon. I look at what mPesa has done in Africa and I have to admit, that gives me some optimism for other parts of the world. But honestly, have you tried to go cashless before? The longest I can usually last is a day or two if I am on the road, so it's hard to even get to the cashless aspect. Throw physical card in there and I don't think I would last more than half a day. I’ve made a mental note to ask each merchant with whom I am in-store this weekend to see whether they can take an NFC payment. I’m guessing it will be two or three stores before I hit the “I'm sorry wall”; I’m looking forward to revisiting that.

Ok now for my favorite (mobile) topic, and based on some of our inane conversations, I'm guessing it's yours too: the mobile George Costanza wallet, have you gotten any closer to solving your lower back issues?

Unfortunately, just like George's wallet, my digital version has only gotten thicker. I think I added at least one swipe in the folder! So now to the reason why I think this belongs as the final capstone to our mobile fireside chat (it's fireside because it’s cold as bollocks and the snow literally hasn’t stopped for 3 weeks, so any warm thoughts we can get out there the better.)

Bollocks? I think the frigid temps have morphed you into a Brit.

'Bollocks' is the least offensive word I could muster.

But I digress; back to your back.

I honestly think the mobile wallet is where this will all come together.

Like One and One and One is Three?

Abbey Road, great album.

While making/initiating a payment from a device is easy, the layers of potential value add you have from a connected payment type is where I see the true potential from mobile. If you can bring together rewards, offers, real time information, historical information and comparisons to people who have made a similar purchase, 'it's gold, Jerry, gold!' All of a sudden the mobile wallet has become way more than what the leather version could offer.  Though based on the considerable amount of VC money being invested here, we haven’t seen too much success coming from the market thus far. But this is an area to keep a close eye on (I’m guessing you are already doing that).

I'm keeping a close eye on my ice dams.

You and me both.

Internet of Things Expected to Quadruple in Size by 2020

govtech.com

Cities will be major beneficiaries from growth in the IoT market, according to a report released by Verizon.

Many local governments are making budgets go further with LED smart street lighting that automatically reports when it needs to be repaired, such as this light pole on Santa Monica Blvd. in Los Angeles

Organizations are seeing measurable benefits from Internet of Things (IoT) projects, and the number of overall IoT connections will more than quadruple between 2014 and 2020, according to a Verizon Enterprise Solutions report released Feb. 23.

State of the Market: The Internet of Things (IoT) 2015: Discover How IoT is Transforming Business Results is based on data from a variety of sources, including Verizon usage statistics, customer insights and third-party research. The report delves into adoption trends and predictions for the future of the IoT market (Verizon defines IoT as to machine-to-machine technology enabled by secure network connectivity and cloud infrastructure, to reliably transform data into useful information for people, businesses and institutions.)

The report also includes guidance for business and public-sector leaders on developing an IoT strategy.

“For cities, it’s about taking data and weaving it together for actionable insight that can add value,” said Toni Oubari, manager of Internet of Things, Smart Cities, and New Product Development and Innovation at Verizon. “For example, if a city can use IoT to improve transportation or public safety, that can translate to more jobs, better economic development and improved sustainability as well.”

For example, said Oubari, local governments are making budgets go further with LED smart street lighting that doesn’t need regular maintenance, but can automatically report when it needs to be repaired. Utility companies are eliminating costly and inconvenient home visits to read meters by introducing smart meters that report more granular usage data without human intervention.

According to the report, IoT growth is being fueled by a mix of technological, political and social factors which are driving more organizations to adopt IoT-enabled solutions. For example, use of social media and mobile technology has transformed consumer and citizen expectations, while the declining costs of sensors, connectivity and processing power has made IoT a more viable proposition to a broader set of organizations.

To date, Verizon experts estimate that just 10 percent of enterprises have deployed IoT technologies extensively. But research commissioned by Verizon from ABI Research forecasts massive growth broadly, with the number of business-to-business IoT connections more than quadrupling between 2014 and 2020 — rising to an estimated 5.4 billion connections globally. Significant growth is expected among car manufacturers and makers of health and fitness tracking devices. Meanwhile, smart cities capabilities will become critical considerations for companies deciding where to invest and open facilities, due to their impact on operating costs and talent availability.

Mark Bartolomeo, vice president IoT Connected Solutions at Verizon, points out that while the core technologies powering the Internet of Things — sensors, cloud computing, intelligent networking — are familiar to most businesses and public-sector organizations, formulating a viable strategy and developing IoT solutions can be highly complex.

Oubari suggests that government agencies that want to start IoT projects start small.

“You don’t have to boil the ocean,” she said. “But you need to look for a visionary – a city manager, a CIO – as long as they have that vision, you can look for a problem and start a trial project, then build on that and get buy-in to move it across the city.”

Other key findings from the report include:

• Machine-to-machine connections in the public sector managed by Verizon grew 46 percent in 2014.
• The declining cost of sensors, connectivity and data processing power makes ROI equations for IoT projects even more appealing. Verizon also predicts that by 2025, organizations that adopt IoT extensively will be at least 10 percent more profitable than competitors that don’t.
• By 2025 smart cities capabilities will become a critical consideration for companies deciding where to invest and open facilities.
• By 2025 more than 10 percent of electricity will be micro generated by consumers and contributed directly to the smart grid.

Google Puts Ads in Its App Store to Court Mobile App Marketers

adage.com

Publishers Can Promote Their Apps Within Google Play's Search Results

Google will start showing ads atop

Google has found a new place to put search ads as it courts an emerging crop of advertisers.

Google will start testing ads within the search results in its Google Play app store, the company plans to announce on Thursday. Similar to Google's traditional search ads, the Google Play search ads will appear atop the results for searches conducted within the app store and will carry a yellow label denoting them as ads.

"In many ways it's very similar to Google search. We're getting users at the point of intent when they're looking for apps, and we're offering them a high-quality way for them to consider other apps via a paid experience," said Jerry Dischler, Google's VP-product management for AdWords.

Google declined to say how many advertisers are involved in the test. The company is still sorting out whether the ads will be sold on a per-click, per-install or other basis and how advertisers may be able to target the ads.

Google's move signals the rise of app publishers as an important advertising segment. King Digital -- the company behind popular mobile game Candy Crush Saga --spent$107.8 million on sales and marketing last year and has promoted its games with ads on TV, as has fellow gaming company Machine Zone. Machine Zone, which makes "Game of War," Super Cell ("Clash of Clans") and UCool ("Heroes Charge") all advertised in the Super Bowl this year.

If app developers adopt Google's app-store search ads, in some cases Google may be making its own money back. Over the past 12 months, the search giant has paid out $7 billion to developers through its app-store sales and in-app purchases. The company claims to have driven hundreds of millions of app downloads through its app store.

Google has been courting this growing advertiser segment for a few years. In 2011 the company introduced so-called "app install" ads that feature links to download a mobile app from Google's or Apple's app stores. The ads were initially limited to mobile search results pages, but last year Google extended them to YouTube and added a way for app developers to advertise to people who had already installed their apps.

But Google isn't the only major online ad seller to take notice of the emerging customer base. Facebook, Twitter and Yahoo offer their own ad products to drive downloads for app developers. Last week Yahoo extendedits own app install ads to run across more of sites, including Tumblr, and added video app-install ads.

To strengthen what it offers app developers amid the rising competition, onTuesday Google acquired Toro, a company that had specialized in Facebook's app-install ads. That company will stop selling Facebook ads, and its employees will join Google's mobile ad team.