Member Article

Mobilise or Die

The mobile scramble has now reached fever pitch with early adopters reaping huge benefits by having mobile friendly solutions to offer their visitors. The importance of mobile optimised online content has never been more important and those companies who haven’t ‘mobilised’ their online content will be left scrambling for scraps left after the ecommerce feast when the online mobile banquet gets serious this autumn.

YouTube, Facebook,Slideshare, Tumblr and Pinterest all recently announced updates for better mobile content delivery and there have been a string of app updates for Apple’s recently launched ios7 to make online browsing – with a focus on local shopping – even more user friendly.

The keyboard is losing favour as the touch screen and voice command revolution move up a notch

In a Westminster eForum event (participants included David Dyson, CEO of Three UK, Ian Carrington of Google, Paul Morris of Vodafone, and many other experts) Internet statistics revealed that mobile Internet usage is increasing fast. This was confirmed in a study released by Pew Research Centre, an American think tank organization based in Washington, D.C. that provides information on social issues, public opinion, and demographic trends shaping the United States and the world, that demonstrated that more and more consumers are using their mobile phones to access the Internet.

The facts are startling:

• A sale coming from mobile phones on eBay occurs every 2 seconds.
• Smartphones are outselling Personal Computers, even though PCs are usually cheaper to buy.
• 28% of Internet usage comes from a mobile phone
• 19% of search queries in the travel industry in 2012 came from mobile Internet usage, up from 11% in 2011
• In the retail industry, 16% of search queries come from mobile web usage, a 6% rise in 2 years.
• In 2011, 10% of search queries in the entertainment industry come from mobile, by 2012 it reached 19%
• Mobile web usage was responsible for 50% of sales related to Mother’s Day in 2012.
• 38% of UK tablet owners spend more of their time on their device than watching TV.
• Search queries from tablet increased by 23% after Christmas day 2012.
• There were a total of $241 billion mobile transactions in 2011.
• 86% of adults own a mobile phone.
• 53% of adult mobile phone owners use it to access the Internet.
• A majority of respondents use their mobile phone to access the Internet since it’s more convenient to use and they always carry it with them everywhere they go.

The sad fact is that most small businesses haven’t even considered creating a mobile presence for their business.

The main reasons given include a general ignorance of the changing consumer purchasing trends coupled with a lack of understanding of the mechanics of mobile marketing.

Small business owners are largely unaware of the importance of mobile marketing and do not realise that they must have their regular website optimised for mobile phone browsing.

If a business owner is still not convinced to take the plunge, a quick check of a business’ Google Analytics stats will reveal just how many visitors do access the company website using mobile devices. The shock may just spark some action from a non-believer, especially when they try to access their own website on a mobile and realise just how difficult it is to view and navigate a non-mobilised site on a hand-held device.

As businesses struggle in the offline world, the online world just got a lot more competitive; and businesses who do not take steps to ring fence their customer base by offering multiple ways of communicating and buying, particularly in the online world, the smart kids on the block who are riding the mobile curve will sneak up and grab their clients away from them.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by James McRoy .