One in three UK retailers donít have a mobile app as responsive web eats into the app market
A third (32%) of the UK’s top retailers don’t have a mobile shopping app, reveals the new State of Digital Commerce report launched today by Episerver, which examines the retail and ecommerce trends set to shape 2017.
The report analyses the mobile presence of 100 top UK retail brands and draws on research with 1,200 consumers and 100 marketing professionals. It highlights that nearly a third of top retailers fail to provide a mobile application across either iPhone or Android devices.
In addition, 66% of marketing professionals no longer include mobile apps within their mobile marketing campaigns. Instead, the majority (56%) are choosing a responsive mobile presence, with 80% of the top retail brands opting for a responsive ecommerce site.
In 2017 mobile is going to play a bigger role than ever before in both marketing and retail. Our research shows that smartphones have reached near-complete adoption in the UK, with ownership of tablet devices also now pushing 70%. Yet while mobile commerce is going to be hugely important for todayís retailers, mobile apps are going out of style. This switch from mobile apps to in-browser experiences is largely being driven by the surge of mobile search and traffic, consumers have grown accustomed to managing their lives through a web browser. As such, the idea of manually installing and launching a different app for each brand experience seems like an unnecessary hassle.
This is backed up to some degree by a recent Google and PayPal study that finds that speed to get to what they are looking for is key to most shoppers. So long as they can easily find what they are looking for then they aren’t so bothered about how they get there.
What is interesting is that the Google-PayPal study encourages retailers in the UK to get on messaging apps such as WhatsApp and Facebook Messenger, as this is increasingly where their customers are to be found – especially if they have a problem and want to communicate with the retailer.
One in three UK retailers donít have a mobile app as responsive web eats into the app market.
Quote from the article: ìconsumers have grown accustomed to managing their lives through a web browser. As such, the idea of manually installing and launching a different app for each brand experience seems like an unnecessary hassle.î
Just as well one could say that customers have grown accustomed to managing their smartphones through apps as 88% of what they do on those devices is through apps (and rising). So if anything app like experiences are what customers are increasingly expected from their favorite brands. Of course itís true retail apps are just a very small piece of the app pie. However in a mobile world, the discussion should not be about web *or* app but about web and app. Web is crucial for discovery at the start of the funnel and app for forging a stronger brand-customer bond near the end of the funnel.
Customers are very willing to download and use retail apps if it is from a brand they love and if the app offers a great experience. Once you get people in the app they convert way better and returns much more often.
– Mobile web: make sure to have the best mobile web experience and be found and turn browsers into customers
– Mobile app: create deeper engagement with customers to have them buy more and more often.