So, at some point, mobile applications for business began to play an important role. The practice has shown that the ability to offer customers quick access to services or information helps strengthen the brand in the market.
At the same time, the prospect of developing a mobile application is not the cheapest option. There is a stereotype that it will be appropriate only for large brands (supermarket chains, cinemas, etc.). Small and medium-sized businesses will not get the profit from a mobile application, given the limited scope of the functionality and the impressive cost of development.
Still, many tasks can be solved using mobile applications. They are used for entertainment, creating records, and communicating with Internet users from other cities and countries. Recently, applications created for mobile platforms have been actively used for business needs.
Why Does Your Business Need a Mobile Application?
There are several good reasons why an application will help you develop your business.
- Additional sales growth
You get a new channel for increasing sales. The growth of income depends on how many people you can attract to the application. Users of the application can be provided with exclusive promotions and discounts. They can be periodically warmed up about it with notifications.
You make life easier! In general, the more amenities and opportunities for the clients you offer, the more interest on their part.
- Close contact with the audience
You can build and maintain relationships with customers who are located anywhere in the world. Interaction is done with a couple of clicks. It is important to understand: with the application, you remain in the users’ sight at all times, maintaining direct contact with them. The app (valuable, relevant, and working) is a powerful branding tool.
- Increase customer loyalty in relation to your company
If you try to do everything to make the use of the mobile application as comfortable as possible for customers, create a loyalty program for them, periodically hold promotions, and give small gifts for placing orders using the application, this increases your credibility in the eyes of the client. A respectful attitude, pleasant bonuses from cooperation, and the ability to track the status of an order via a smartphone attract many people. If it is possible to communicate with representatives of your company through a mobile application, receiving answers to questions and solving problems that have arisen, this will raise your rating even higher in the eyes of the client. It demonstrates the openness of your business to new clients.
- Stand out from the crowd
For small businesses, the app market isn’t oversaturated yet. To create such a product means to detach from the majority of competitors and play on the growth of brand awareness. If you promote the application to the audience and make them install it (even if they don’t plan to use your services right now), what will they do next when the offer becomes relevant? Will they come to you or go to look for alternatives on the Internet? The answer is obvious.
- Receive feedback from the client
But you should be careful with this issue — it is easy to overdo it. Through the application, you can notify the clients about what promotions are currently taking place, and ask if they are satisfied with the quality of the goods and services you provide. But you shouldn’t do this more often than once a week. Constantly appearing notifications will begin to annoy users.
- Gathers information about the audience
Modern people rarely part with smartphones, which means that using the application, you can collect a lot of useful information: where the client is, how often he/she buys goods, which shopping center they prefer, how old they are, what gender they are, what brand of phone they use, which bank they trust, and so on. With this information, you can create an accurate portrait of the audience and use this data in sales.
- Brand recognition
An app can increase brand awareness or build a brand image. An app store is a platform, which now has a lot of organic traffic. It is important that the app store knows about your business and brand. This way, it will show your application to potential users.
So, knowing why a small business needs a mobile application and what actions need to be taken to promote the application at the initial stage, you can decide for yourself whether your company needs such a tool.