Do you need a mobile consulting service? The world has gone mobile. You get text messages and friend requests from your kids instead of phone calls. Your post-office box is only ever filled with flyers. Every time you go to a trade show, your competitors are bragging about their latest app. How do you know whether your business should follow suit? Is branching out into the mobile world something that will really benefit your business, or is it just a passing fad? If you don’t, will you get left behind?
Whether or not you feel like your business is doing fine as-is, mobile has dramatically changed the expectations of users. According to Forbes, nine out of ten mobile searches lead to action, and more than half lead to sales (source: Forbes, “Fifty Essential Mobile Marketing Facts”, http://www.forbes.com/sites/cherylsnappconner/2013/11/12/fifty-essential-mobile-marketing-facts). With 25% of users (and climbing) conducting all their online searches with mobile devices, this is a market segment that business owners can’t afford to ignore.
You need to assume that a good portion of your potential clients will be looking at your company’s website on a small screen. For this reason it’s critical that your website be either responsive. The other option is to have an alternative mobile version of your original website designed. Responsive means that the website will shrink and expand according to the screen size of the user’s device. You should also take a look at your website’s functionality and stats to see which pages are visited most often. On small, mobile screens, there’s only space for the higher priority items. You’ll want to ensure that the most accessed content is easiest to find.
It’s helpful to think of mobile consulting as an extension of your business model. Sure it’s nice to have a fancy app to brag about, but unless you’re in the business of providing seed funding to developers to play around with new technologies, you’re going to want to see a return on your investment. A good mobile consulting service will ask you detailed questions about your business goals, and suggest products to will support these goals. You’ll know that you’ve hired the wrong mobile consulting company if they push you to fund the development of an app, which is not aligned with your company’s goals.
There are many apps competing for space in the Apple store. Yours isn’t likely to get noticed or used by clients unless it is of direct and obvious value to them. Pizza apps that make it easier for repeat customers to order pizza make sense, and are popular. An app for a heavy-equipment supplier whose average customer makes one purchase per year doesn’t. The big push in app development lately has been towards business-facing apps; applications that streamline and assist with internal processes. Your mobile consulting service can help you decide on the option that is best for your company. Ignoring the importance and ubiquity of mobile would be the equivalent of taking out billboard ads on a closed highway. Many customers expect be able to interact with your business on a mobile platform. Getting a good mobile consulting service may be the best way to help your business grow.