Today, three-quarters of the world population spends at least two hours a day browsing through various business applications. This is the driving force behind the high success rate of businesses with mobile applications. Besides delivering goods and services to your customers, you can use a business app to improve your ROI in multiple ways. From learning more about your customers to brand promotion, there is a great deal of utility you can get from a business app. Here are reasons why you should develop one for your business.
1. Increase brand awareness
Mobile apps are arguably the most effective marketing solution for increasing brand awareness as they guarantee more visibility, and you can easily grab the attention of your target audience. Before potential users can install your mobile business app, however, you must first find a suitable hosting provider and have it hosted, so it becomes available to download and use. With the help of a small business IT support company, you can create a custom business app that can help increase brand awareness in the following ways:
- Keep business and product information updated
- Include news on company activities and events
- Give updates on new products and product features
- List products, services, and available discounts
An outstanding business app should have:
- An excellent logo is the emblem of your business app, and it should catch your target audience’s attention. You can either have a professional designer craft your logo, or use a logo maker to design a logo for free. If you're going to make a logo yourself, it's best to use an established custom logo maker to create a solid and attention-grabbing design instead of basic emblems that customers will pass by.
- Genuine reviews
- App description in app stores
- Number of downloads
2. Optimize business processes
Modern business mobile apps are dynamic. You can have different login categories for employees where you can track their progress and manage teams. These apps come with features that allow the exchange of files, messages, and relevant data. Alternatively, you can create an application solely for employee management to facilitate a remote interaction of employees.
3. Increase customer engagement
A customer can easily find your store if they have your business application on their phone. Additionally, they can interact directly with you from the application through messaging features, not to mention that you can activate the location tag and send essential updates to customers near your locality.
4. Provide better communication channels
A mobile business app allows you to establish intimate relationships with your customers. They don't have to remember your website name, username, or passwords as all will be stored on their mobile applications and the phone's password protector.
5. Boosting revenue
Today, 52% of sales are done through mobile phones, with 90% of those being done through mobile applications. That is the reason why top global business corporations such as Amazon, eBay, and Alibaba have mobile applications to complement their online stores.
According to business experts, mobile business applications smoothen the marketing funnel, making it easier for customers to go through the entire cycle as everything is centrally located. Online is growing in popularity, and you can improve your sales if more customers can go through the marketing funnel without having second thoughts. One way of ensuring that is by setting up a mobile application with an advanced search tab, easy ordering steps, and a secure payment channel.
6. A mobile app is convenient
If you are running a taxi business, a mobile app is an easy and convenient way for your customers to find your drivers. If customers search for taxi services on the internet, your company will appear together with other competitor sites on the search results. However, if the customer has your mobile app installed on their phone, all they have to do is place an order.
7. Better business insights
In this age of big data, mobile applications are an additional source of analytical data that will boost your operations. These apps make it easy to collect valuable data and keep track of important metrics, such as user retention rates, daily and monthly active users, popular geo-location, on-demand products and services, and customer engagement ratings.
By leveraging this data, you will figure out how best to serve your customers by understanding their actual behavior and current market demands. Analyzed data also provides a solid platform for determining your strengths and weak points for better business decision-making.
8. Enhance customer loyalty
The use of mobile devices for online shopping is growing by the day, with studies showing that 65% of all eCommerce traffic comes from handheld gadgets. Mobile apps are responsible for a huge chunk of this traffic as they deliver an enhanced user experience. As a business, you can leverage this to grow customer loyalty by creating a professionally customized mobile app that users will love.
Owning an app also makes it easier to run loyalty programs by allowing you to tailor your offer bonuses and rewards to suit user behaviors. This leads to high customer retention rates, better sales, and increased customer lifetime value as each client gets to make the most from having your app installed.
9. Gain from app marketplaces
Smartphone users typically go through reviews and ratings on app marketplaces such as Google Play and App Store before downloading an app. These are valuable customer acquisition channels that you can utilize by building a business app that will attract good ratings and perform well in these app charts.
You will then benefit from the enhanced exposure as more potential customers will be eager to download the app and try out your outstanding products and services.
10. Attain Competitive advantage
Investing in a mobile app for your business will give you a significant competitive advantage as you get to outshine competitors who do not have one. You will significantly benefit from consumers’ increased reliance on mobile devices and the satisfaction associated with using mobile business apps.
In some industries, such as the e-commerce sector, owning a mobile app is the only way to keep up with your competition. To gain a competitive edge in such a niche, you will need an app that is easier to use, has a neat app interface, and offers a great in-store experience to outshine your competitors.
11. Utilize social media channels
You can easily integrate your mobile app with social media for better marketing campaigns and brand promotion. It is easier to acquire a long-term client from your social circles if you provide them with a link to your app rather than directing them to a product page on your website.
Your app will also have more downloads if customers can sign up with their social media accounts. The best part is that you can take this a notch higher by regularly providing shareable CTAs that app users will use to attract their friends as they unlock more rewards.
Endnote
To drive your business to success, you have to take advantage of the limitless business opportunities available on digital platforms such as e-commerce platforms, business websites, social media platforms, and mobile apps.
