The worst of the covid second wave is over! But is your business reeling from the after-effects of the second wave? The second wave of Covid was severe, leaving long term scars in employees and businesses alike.
As the world struggles to move past Covid, brick-and-mortar retail is struggling to keep up. With consumers discovering the convenience of online shopping and mobile apps during the pandemic, the trend is expected to continue in the post-Covid-19 world.
Here’s a graph depicting the development of e-commerce contribution in total retail sales before and after the Coronavirus Pandemic.
Consider some of the statistics here:
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During the lockdown, ecommerce saw a higher sales proportion around the globe as retailers made the shift to digital
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Ecommerce sales grew by 50-100% in many countries across the globe
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Ecommerce sales still remain well above the pre-pandemic levels in all major countries
All these stats suggest that ecommerce online purchases have risen across geographies, and it is expected that consumers will continue with this practice even if brick-and-mortar stores reopen.
The massive popularity of ecommerce has been driven by mobile commerce. The rise of PWA, mobile wallets, and the potential to buy practically anything online made it easier for people to shop on their phones. In fact, with the rise of mobile internet users, 73% of ecommerce sales came from mobile devices.
It's clear enough that m-commerce has become the preferred channel for online shopping. It's high time that you choose the consumer's beloved medium to grow your business.
Table of Contents
How mobile commerce can build opportunities for your business during pandemic
1. Enhancing your accessibility
There are about 480 million internet users in India. Of these, 390 million users access the internet via their mobile phones. As mobile internet spread its roots throughout the country, everyone with a mobile device is now a potential customer.
During the lockdown, there was an increased dependency on mobile internet. M-commerce became the most popular touchpoint in lockdown. New buyers from the hinterland jumped on the bandwagon, leading to the rise of the digital buying trend.
Besides the increase in individual buyers, m-commerce saw the addition of retailers wanting to sell online. With the help of mobile-ready solutions, it has become easier to create Android and iOS apps. You can create mobile applications quickly and in a less expensive manner on reputed ecommerce platforms.
2. Increased client visibility
During the lockdown, people were usually restricted to their homes. However, with time on their hands, people regularly spent more than two hours scrolling their smartphones.
The transformation of mobile phones from merely a communication device to a crucial part of our daily lives has truly been dramatic. As people couldn't access your store during Covid, a brand presence on mobile has become a must.
With the help of mobile apps, you can reintroduce your brand to your customers. Brand recognition and increased brand awareness to clients is as important as enhancing your business. If people cannot see you, it means there will be no sales and no revenue.
Developing your mobile ready ecommerce store and app with the right business solution partner can help you to reach customers all around the world on various platforms like search engines, social media apps, and others.
3. Direct marketing
At a time when you are down with a limited budget and avenues for direct marketing, mobile apps offer the best direct marketing opportunities for business holders. In addition, you can get prompt information about your customers by looking at their geographical locations.
You can even collect data from user sessions and entry points into your app, which can be later used for marketing campaigns. Once you have the data you need, mobile apps allow you to deliver content to your users more effectively than the traditional marketing platforms. For example, you can share information about your new products, product specifications, latest features, special rates and discounts. Therefore, marketing becomes much easier and more direct.
4. Connect with your customers
As a business, you want to sell your products or services. But for customers shopping at a retail brick and mortar shop, it is about more than just purchases. Due to pandemic and consequent lockdown, retailers couldn't provide a "shopping experience" to their consumers. Fortunately for store owners, m-commerce can develop an in-store experience that is meaningful and memorable.
As more customers drive towards your mobile app, the more your business will grow. It is, therefore, your responsibility to connect with customers through increased engagement. You can make your mobile app more meaningful by creating a feedback or review portal, letting customers drop honest testimonials and leave questions related to your services.
5. Add customer value
Retail stores offer a unique experience, but apps can offer a personalized mobile experience. A significant reason behind the massive growth of smartphones is the availability of PWA packed with brilliant features and amazing utilities. A salesman explains product details in a store and gives customers recommendations for what they should buy.
Similarly, mobile apps enable you to collect and store customer information. You can use customer behaviour data to feed AI algorithms that power recommendation engines and ad-delivery platforms. For value addition, you can even start loyalty and referral programs for promoting your business.
6. Improve customer loyalty
You may have built a consumer base with great love and hard work. And with the second covid wave, your business may have become incommunicado with your clients. So, how do you create a plan of action where you don't lose customers to your competitors?
Mobile apps can help you build an instantaneous and direct relationship with your customers and gain their loyalty. You can increase user engagement with interactive programs such as reward programs.
7. Get valuable customer insights
Conducting a business without customer insights is an impossible feat. If you do not have the pulse to your customer needs, you will soon be out of the business. Unfortunately, during the pandemic, you may have felt detached about actual consumer behaviour.
But mobile apps can serve as a reliable and valuable source of consumer insights. If you use mobile analytical tools, then you will be able to gather information from your users. Once you quickly evaluate the data, your business will rapidly recover.
8. Deliver unique features and services
In a bid to stay ahead of your competitors, you may want to provide unique features and services to your customers. All you have to do is to add advanced features to your app, and you are ready. Businesses are packing mobile apps with interesting and unique features that may provide you with an advantage vis-a vis-your competitors.
You can add rich push notifications, analytics and click-to-call and click-for-direction features to convert leads to sales even much faster. It is time to strategize your business because mobile app features impact how you deliver your services.
How StoreHippo can help you leverage mobile commerce
StoreHippo is built on the mobile-first principle. StoreHippo builds PWA ecommerce websites that just look, feel and work like apps on all devices, i.e., mobiles and desktops.
StoreHippo platform contains an inbuilt mobile app builder. You can use it to create a codeless app right from the dashboard. This will help you in cutting down the time duration, cost, and resources of your app development.
We provide inbuilt SEO tools to increase your brand visibility. Our SEO tools help you create a fast, robust, and user-friendly PAW that will rank higher in search engines. As a result, it will bring in potential customers to your mobile applications and increase conversion rates.
You can even leverage our push notifications to create a personalized experience for your clients. The right notifications help you increase engagement, retention, and acquisition.
StoreHippo offers marketing tools, including a discount engine for discount creation, email marketing tools for delivering automated emails, and analytics tools to continuously track site performance and traffic. All these tools can support you in understanding customer's behavior, user experience and building relationships with potential customers.
The way forward
Every crisis presents an opportunity. As businesses are looking for ways to recover from the second covid wave, retailers should utilize all the benefits that mobile apps bring to enhance user experience.
India's mobile internet users will continue to rise due to internet accessibility as well as affordability. With the advancement of promising technology, young consumers will only add to this burgeoning medium. As millennials spend more on digital shopping, businesses should harvest this opportunity to recover from covid losses. The tipping point for mobile applications is on the horizon. It's time to adapt to it. Start your 14-day free trial with StoreHippo mobile-ready platform to experience the power of m-commerce.
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