M-commerce (mobile commerce) is all about buying, browsing and selling products on our smartphones and tablets. Today, eight out of ten Amercians shop on their mobile devices. The benefits convenience of being having a shop in your pocket isn’t going anywhere any time soon.
As mobile app experience, we sat down with Shopney to as those burning m-commerce shopping questions we’re all wondering.
With acquisition costs rising, many merchants are turning their attention towards retaining their most valuable customers. In your opinion, what’s the most important thing a retailer can do to capture and keep loyal customers?
If you have been in the business for a while, you’d know that loyal customers make a company grow, not just the newly acquired ones. It was the same even when acquisition costs were lows. And, today retaining your customers is more important than ever as ecommerce competition gets harder and harder.
The most important thing a retailer can do to capture and keep loyal customers is knowing your customers’ motivation. You can then sustain the value and benefit that they get from your business.
A store can offer a set of values and benefits like “better price, faster shipping, unique products or an authentic brand story”. But it doesn’t mean that every customer buys every time.
You should know which value-customer group converts faster and returns more often. Then you can invest stronger in that “converting” value of your brand. To me, knowing your customer’s motivation and investing more in it is the core.
Besides, you should always pave the way back to your store for your customers to return. What I mean by this is creating solid reasons for a re-visit. With a well-set-up loyalty program, your customers will generate their own reasons to return. The points and rewards will accumulate. Then, a bell will ring in the customer’s mind automatically saying, ‘’go back and redeem’’!
Research predicts that by 2021, 54% of all retail ecommerce will be generated via m-commerce. What are the biggest benefits for fast-growth ecommerce merchants launching a mobile app?
As you said, mobile commerce is rising and there is still room before it gets saturated. Before we answer your question, we should first understand why mobile commerce is rising.
Commerce happens where the audience’s attention is at. Period. Before it was on the desktop, now it’s on mobile. According to Shopify, more than 70% of all Shopify-based ecommerce stores’ traffic is on mobile. So, as I mentioned earlier, offering the best mobile shopping experience is key today.
The number one benefit for the merchants is being able to offer the best possible mobile shopping experience with native iOS and Android apps.
There is no doubt that the customers will treasure this. Especially because most think ‘’If you want me to buy from you, you have to make it easy for me’’! Every single one of our clients observed an increase in their mobile conversion rates with their mobile apps. Some increased their revenue by 70%, like Lumia Coffee.
The second most important benefit is push notifications. With push notifications, you no longer need to pay for digital ads to deliver your brand message to app users. It’s free with just a click of a button.
Lastly, having a world-class mobile app will contribute to your brand image. It will indicate that your brand is well-established, reliable and strong enough to offer the best quality mobile shopping experience.
Mobile shopping is notoriously noisy – social media marketing, emails and push notifications are constantly being put in front of consumers. How can merchants build deep connections with customers despite the distractions?
With my 8 years of global branding and marketing experience, I can say only one word; story!
The audience loves authenticity and we buy things with emotions. A well-narrated brand story is the single best-triggering factor to build long-term, deep connections.
We all know that 99% of the products and services resemble each other. What makes brands stand out is their story. As a merchant, you should use your unique narrative. It’s a valuable asset that’s uniquely yours.
Let Seth Godin wrap it up with this great quote;
‘’People don’t buy the products and services. They buy stories, relations and magic!’’
Some would say that shopping on mobile is inconvenient. What are the most important ingredients of a smooth mobile shopping experience that increases repeat purchase rates?
During COVID-19, we have seen grandmas turning to Zoom and Whatsapp and who, at the start, complained that they were inconvenient. Although the lockdowns are now loosening, these grandmas are still using the platforms. They have seen the other side of the coin and realized the convenience and benefits.
Why did I start with this example? Because we, as humans, are managed by our habits. We need an opportunity or necessity to break them. COVID-19 has served as the necessity for these “new” techs to break grandmas habits of being shy to tech. But the young generation was already in the know.
When it comes to mobile shopping, the ones who already experienced it know how easy and convenient it is.
I believe that some just haven’t been introduced to the comfort of mobile shopping yet. Because the portion of mobile sales in total ecommerce sales is now more than 50% it proves this isn’t for nothing. Customers from all around the world prefer mobile because of its convenience. And merchants invest in it due to its superior conversion rates.
Coming back to your question, mobile app engagement is a key way to ensure repeat purchases. As a merchant, you should create reasons for your customers to engage. You should:
1. Refresh your mobile app’s content and design regularly. So the customers are always amazed by the new content they see on the app and will feel it’s worth their valuable time
2. Sending the right push notifications at the right time. This is crucial to remind your customers of your brand, to drive traffic to your app and to sell more from it
3. Enabling a loyalty program on your mobile app. Merging the power of your mobile app and loyalty program will be a merchant’s best bet repeat sales
How would you recommend that an ecommerce merchant report on the success of their mobile marketing tactics?
Reports are valuable when you have data to compare. For most of the merchants, their previous mobile web data before launching their mobile app is a great place to start. This way, they can compare it with their current mobile app performance. This is the first step of measurement.
Then, you will record performance periods solely of your app. Then you can compare the results of your mobile marketing tactics for the month compared to the previous months.
At Shopney, we offer analytics integrations with Google Analytics, Facebook andUXCam to give merchants have a complete understanding of app user behavior and mobile commerce performance.
Measuring key indicators like app installs, push notification engagements, revenue and cart abandonment rates will help merchants understand the user meaning they’ll be able to react with appropriate tactics.
Who are the mobile trend-setters – which retailers and their approach to m-commerce are you most excited at the moment?
As mobile commerce is relatively new, there is no technological domination at the moment, we are hearing great innovations from all around the world. One of them is “mobile commerce live-streaming” which is emerging from Asian markets.
It is basically a live in-store (mobile or web) product presentation stream. The companies unleash the new collections, tell the benefits, and get customers to feedback. Of course, it encourages a first order too. All in all, this brings a human touch to ecommerce. I believe it will become a world-wide trend very soon.
Besides this, the ecommerce giant Shopify’s very own Shop App is also really exciting. It helps merchants to gain more visibility in a marketplace-like field served by Shopify itself. I believe it will become very very common soon.
Before you go, tell us about Shopney and the services you provide for ecommerce merchants.
At Shopney, we build top-quality mobile shopping apps for Shopify and Shopify Plus stores.
As providing great mobile shopping experience is no longer optional — it’s essential for any ecommerce business to survive, we offer a great value to Shopify merchants from all around the world.
If you want to find out more about Shopney, check out their site today.
This article originally appeared in the LoyaltyLion blog and has been published here with permission.
