It is a common belief that mobile apps are meant for big businesses like Walmart and Amazon but it is not so. More and more small and mid-size businesses are opting for mobile apps to cope with market demands. The truth is that mobile apps can benefit most businesses, but not all.

If you are a small business owner you need to ask yourself some questions to really determine if you need a mobile app or not. If you can honestly answer yes to all the following questions, mobile apps may be the way forward for you.

• Would you and your customers benefit from round-the-clock connectivity that mobile apps offer?

• Can you make a user-friendly and productive app for your business?

• How would your business benefit from a mobile app?

Now that you have determined that your business would definitely benefit from a mobile app, let us how a mobile app can make you more user-friendly, interactive as well as productive.

Mobile marketing and sales : With the help of geo-targeting you can identify the key location of your customers and send timed messages to them regarding offers and sales. This will help you to create a bond with your customers and encourage them to visit your store again and again. This will also reduce your expenditure on advertising and marketing and provide a more focused approach. You can combine geo-targeting with SMS service to send text messages to your loyal customers and inform them about special discounts and offers meant just for them. Thus you can connect instantly with your customers and maintain a good business relation with them.

Customer loyalty programs : You can encourage your customers to download your app by offering them first-time app user discount, special offers, loyalty points as discounts and many more incentives. You could also do a survey of your customers to find out which incentive they would prefer on using or downloading the app. This survey can be done by the app itself. This would lad your customers to feel more appreciated and special.

Mobile scheduling and reminders : Mobile apps can be used for sending reminders to customers about their scheduled appointments, cancel or reschedule an appoint, request an appointment. This feature will make you instantly accessible to your customers leading to greater customer satisfaction.

Making payment through mobile apps : Nowadays mobile apps are used for making payments through credit/debit card, netbanking and net wallets. This is a great timesaver for business owners and customers. No need for bulky cash registers or risky cash payments. Payment can be made quickly and safely even when you are on the go. Mobile payments can be integrated with taxation and accounting apps to calculate tax automatically and manage vendor accounts more efficiently and automatically.

Communication and collaboration with other small businesses: Apps like Slack and Dropbox are great tools for team collaboration and prioritization of projects, sharing documents and the ability to access everything with just a click. Now you don’t need to create dedicated dedicated shared drives and a VPN connection just to share a document. All is easily possible through these apps.

Mobile CRM and sales support: Mobile apps have made a breakthrough development in the field of customer relation management. Now you can keep track of tasks, contacts, organizations, projects, opportunities and emails all with a single click. You need not maintain hand-written records or store information in your memory. Earlier you had to stash visiting cards and contact information about all your acquaintances. Now this data can be scanned and directly fed into your CRM along with any special notes about your new acquaintances. Any change in their contact information can also be updated within seconds. This is a great time-saving tool. When interacting with your client your sales person can immediately access client information, sales pipelines, previous correspondence with the client , client orders and quotes. This is not only time saving but also looks very professional. Moreover business owner can track each sales person’s performance through his CRM. Ultimately it will help you to create a good business model for better productivity and growth.

Apps build brand and recognition: A mobile app for your business will create your brand awareness. It is like a blank billboard. You can include as many features as you like. You can make it fun and friendly. It offers instant connectivity with your clients. Include such features that users feel compelled to visit again and again. In advertising this is called ‘effective frequency’. Ultimately they will feel inclined to buy your product or service.

Beat the competition: the mindset today is that apps are meant only for big brands. Rarely do we see small businesses using mobile apps. So if you want to create a niche for yourself in the market and stay ahead of the competition, create a mobile app for your business and stay connected to your customers. Be the first to use mobile app for reaching out to your customers. You will certainly be noticed for your enterprising ways!

Source: techaheadcorp