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Every firm wants to make money on their investments, and mobile applications are no exception. With 38% of retailers already adopting a mobile strategy, managers and business owners now have to measure the performance of their mobile initiatives. Retailers need to complete an expansive gap analysis, covering all customer touch points. The goal of this exercise is to show how their mobile initiative is impacting their customers, as well as to find the gaps in their mobile strategy which need to be filled by innovative mobile features inside the applications. By taking such an approach, a retailer can see both the value of the strategy and future opportunities for improving their customer’s experience. Based on a recent Aberdeen study of 129 retailers, three key benchmarks are used to measure a mobile ROI:

• Improved Customer Targeting Based on Conversion Rates


• Improved Brand Image/Awareness


• Customer Satisfaction

The study also shows that these benchmarks are directly correlated with mobile innovation and related investments. However, by just focusing only on these three metrics, retailers are missing some other benefits of their mobile initiative. I would suggest looking at these elements as well:

• Customer Stickiness / Increase of Repeat Purchase


• New Customer Acquisition


• Viral Marketing of Social Media Inside the Applications


• Product Differentiation


• Up Sale Opportunities Created


• New Services offered as a result of the Mobile Initiative

Customer centric retailers are now looking to expand their mobile offering looking to offer customers new features on their mobile applications. Innovative features such as:

• Proximity and Non-proximity Payments


• Dynamic Location Based Messaging


• Line Busting


• Mobile Phone Based Reviews/Video


• Service and Repair Functions


• In-store Interactivity

The development of mobile software is forecasted to eclipse development of computer software and reach sales of $30B a 3800% increase by 2013. Innovative application developers like Smartsoft Mobile Solutions will continue to push the technological envelope, helping our clients improve the experience of their customers.

For More Information Check Out:

Best Practices: How Should a Retailer Select a Strategic Mobile Partner?

Mobile Marketing Trends

Mobile Couponing: Uses in Mobile Shopping Applications

Best Practices: Mobile Business Strategy

Does your business have a mobile strategy? This is a question posed to many executives these days. Given the dynamic and changing landscape in enterprise mobility, many companies are scrambling to define a mobile strategy that enhances their business, and fills the needs of their customers. There are several common mistakes being made in industry on a regular basis,

First, businesses are thinking short-term and rushing to keep up with an industry (mobile) that they do not fully understand. This is not based on ignorance, just the simple fact that mobility is not a part of their core business. This short-term thinking of filling the enterprises mobility needs, such as work order management, business intelligence, inventory management, just to name a few, causes firms to work with products that are inflexible and do not fully meet the needs of their business. The end result of this quick action, a company having to either replace mobile enterprise software, or even worse being locked into a solution that is not achieving the intended business goal. This problem can be solved before it starts by partnering with mobile application development firms that bring through leadership and a strategic partnership at the beginning of a enterprise mobility project. This allows for the following benefits:

• Platform and Device Knowledge


• Business Requirements Gathering


• Back-end ERP Blueprinting


• Knowledge share of where technology is going (short-term and long-term)


• Custom Solution Proposals (get you what you need, not what a firm has to sell you)

The benefits of taking the proper first steps when developing a mobile enterprise strategy are staggering. Lets take inventory management for example. Each business has different inventory management needs, just in time production creates the need to monitor and move inventory and parts rapidly through a warehouse. Workers on the floor, can keep track of movement of goods, via RFID technologies and track that movement throughout the production process all on a rugedized mobile device currently used. Inventory stock-outs can be eliminated by alerts sent to workers mobile devices. Once received the worker can locate the needed stock in the warehouse, request the stock, get the right product in the right place at the right time. Reducing not only stockouts, but inventory caring costs, and meeting production goals. The impact is a major return on your mobile investment in the short-term.

Looking out to the long-term, you can port a mobile application to multiple devices all consumer grade, and use bolt on technologies to reduce the high costs of rugedized mobile devices. The addition of enhancements such as speech recognition, scanning and signature capabilities the technology becomes viable for your business through software updates is a via a road-mapped software development life cycle.

A partner in mobile strategy not only saves you money in both the short and long-term, but tailors solutions to provide your firm with a real and quantifiable competitive advantage. Some say this is only for large corporations, but many small and medium size businesses can implement a mobile entrise strategy, getting the same benefits as larger companies. This can be done reasonably by simply using the consumer grade mobile devices their employees already have such as Blackberry, iPhone, Droid, on Windows Mobile phones. While many mobile application developers for the enterprise offer an out of the box solution, the failure to take into account the current situation of an individual business makes this out of the box solution a mess. Working with a strong mobile development partner, will pay for itself over and over. Bottom line is by implementing this approach from the begining your mobile enterprise solution can not only reflect your business needs, but grow and change as your business does.

To say the current landscape of mobility is rapidly evolving is an understatement. However, forward thinking mobile application developers can use this changing ecosystem to achieve a competitive advantage. First, the platforms: Apple ,Microsoft, Google, and RIM all when when they diverge. This divergence differentiates the companies product offering, increasing customer stickiness, and further monetizing applications for their specific platforms. Software OS are also diverging; thus forcing developers expand their skill-sets to develop to specific OS. A good example of this is WinMo vs. Windows Phone 7. To a skilled mobile application developer, these are essentially two separate platforms. If you now throw all the hardware manufacturers such as HTC, Motorola, Apple and their respective competitive interests you get a dynamically changing landscape for sure.

Due to the rapid adoption of mobility by consumers, this mobile revolution as well as the monetization of the new mobile universe has corporations and developers drooling. Mobility itself allows for convergence, giving information at the point of performance (right in the consumers palm). Mobility allows for the sharing of information in a safe and secure manner. The key is to build rich native applications whether you are building a business to business applicationwith SAP integration, or a business to consumer app. Focusing on the user experience, and as a result adoption of the application into the daily lives of the user. The challenge is not to build to the lowest common denominator (web browsers), but to leverage the hardware/OS interaction and set the creative spirit of developers free! This will facilitate the growth of mobility, innovation in application design, and the experience to the end user regardless of the applications purpose...

At Smartsoft Mobile, this forward thinking approach to mobile application development is used daily. www.smartsoftmobile.com

There has been much chatter of the "proposal" presented yesterday. The big picture is search giant Google and wireless provider Verizon want to keep the desktop Internet neutrality, but consider the rapidly growing mobile web another story. The two giants want to monetize the mobile web, and are leaders both jockeying for position. Revenue potential is staggering, but here are some benefits that this scary proposition brings to mobile developers:
• Monetization= Greater Technological Innovation
• More Device Power = Ability for Mobile Application Developers to Use the Advancements
• Enhanced User Experience
• More Rich Native Applications
• Real-time Integration of Partner or SAP Data
While only time will tell if the government gives this a second look, this is a pretty eye opening proposal! We look forward to hearing your thoughts.