Tim Dunn, director of strategy for New Toy, shares his thoughts on the options for developing a mobile strategy in retail: mobile apps or web optimisation for the mobile internet?
Tim Dunn, director of strategy for New Toy, shares his thoughts on the options for developing a mobile strategy in retail: mobile apps or web optimisation for the mobile internet?
Broadly speaking the growth in smartphone penetration, faster mobile internet connections and mobile applications have created a perfect storm where the mobile user experience is massively improved.
One consequence of this is the profound impact on consumers’ browsing habits. Morgan Stanley predicts that by 2013, mobile devices will overtake PCs as the preferred way of accessing the internet.
Tim Dunn, director of strategy for New Toy, an agency specialising in mobile interactivity and part of the Mobile Interactive Group acknowledged that figuring out a mobile strategy for retail brands can be daunting and, sooner or later (the sooner the better), retailers will have to make well informed technology decisions about how to tackle m-commerce. Two routes to market have taken hold: applications and optimising sites for the mobile web. Both, Dunn contended, have a role to play, so why a mobile strategy in the first place?
Market already maturing
“Firstly, your audience is already trying to find you through mobile devices,” he said. “More than 10% of women and 17.9% of men aged 13 to 44 have tried to browse an online store using their mobile handset, according to comScore.
“So it follows that your website should be optimised for the mobile internet. In another YouGov survey, 25% of consumers said, if they cannot browse their preferred retailer’s website via their mobile device, they would look for a competitor and never try to access that site again.”
“Consumer enthusiasm and engagement with m-commerce is also growing,” continued Dunn. “ABI research predicts that m-commerce will grow to $119bn (£75bn) by 2015 in the US. This market is growing solidly in Europe and is expected to outpace the US by the end of 2010.
“Payments are going mobile too. PayPal recently announced that it has seen a six-fold growth in mobile transactions from $25 million (£15.8m) in 2008 to $141m (£89m) in 2009. And it is comfortably predicting that it will end 2010 with over $500m (£316) in mobile payment volume, with more than 5 million members regularly using PayPal from mobile devices.”
Dunn added that analyst firm Juniper Research is also indicating that mobile transactions are taking hold, predicting that the total value of mobile payments around the world will quadruple from $170bn (£107.5bn) in 2010 to $630bn (£398bn) in 2014.
Hedging mobile retail bets
So back to the question: do retailers create an m-commerce enabled application or simple optimise their e-commerce sites for the mobile web? Dunn said: “Each channel has benefits and given the rise in mobile browsing, it goes without saying that all retail brands should make sure they have a mobile site provisioned but not at the expense of creating an application.
“It should be remembered that although apps are perceived as being ‘just’ for iPhone and Google devices, in fact the opposite is true. Nearly every handset can support apps written in Java or BREW. Plus, there are major initiatives from Nokia (Ovi), Samsung (Bada), Microsoft (Marketplace) and Blackberry (App World) that are growing rapidly. For example, Ovi is now delivering over 1.7 million app downloads per day, with users averaging 12 items each. The whole of the mobile industry is behind apps, so retail brands should be also.”
“More than this, the download of an app is a positive statement of intent to interact with your brand,” he added. “Once downloaded your brand ‘lives’ as a piece of valuable real estate on a user’s device. From a mobile internet perspective, the behaviour of bookmarking mobile sites on phones is nowhere near as popular but an app is a bookmark in itself.
Focusing on the customer
“At the heart of applications is the mobile user experience. Devices are getting smarter all the time, and you simply cannot (yet) serve the best experience through the mobile web. An app can create this experience, and make your brand unique, rather than being just another shopping channel, while still pulling in web content so the products are front of mind.”
Dunn concluded: “Currently, app users on iPhone and Android represent the most affluent target demographic imaginable, so why not give them the best experience possible right now?”
