Mobile apps for small business owners is becoming more common as smaller businesses have found apps to be one of the main cornerstones for marketing and for branding their business.
In the past, apps were only available to “large” companies due to the high costs involved in developing a custom app. App developers spent many hours designing and coding the apps to the exact specifications for the company which lead to the extremely high price tag. But, as it has pretty much played out in the past with other automations, technology has caught up with the trend and we now have made apps that are more affordable for the medium to small business owners.
Look at your smartphone right now. Every one of those apps that you see on your screen was developed for a specific reason. To check your email, local weather reports, social media, work calendar… etc. Then mobile apps for business marketing came into existence and the whole world of marketing exploded. Now businesses can buy, sell, trade… or just about any transaction you can think of that you could do in person you can now do on your smart phone. Business marketers had developers create mobile apps for their business to take advantage of this new marketing strata.
What do you see when you watch people walking through a mall or shopping area. Most will be looking down at their phones interacting with someone or some business. Now it can be argued that this practice can be somewhat risky, especially if you're not watching where you are going. But that's another discussion at some other time.
However, here's what's refreshing about a mobile business app. It can be referred to as an “electronic business card”. It is always in front of a businesses customers. As the smartphone user scrolls through the apps and they have your app for your business they will see it multiple times a day. A business can only grow with that kind of exposure.
Here is a great example of a mobile business app operating. A customer, we'll call him John, who had downloaded the app from a local pizza place, places a pizza order from the app for a little gathering of friends at his house. John knows they make great pizza and sure enough one of his friends wants to know the name of the place where he got the pizza because it is NOT a major chain. John says “here's the name of the pizza place and you can download their app at the app store”.
Word of mouth is the best advertising money cannot buy. That pizza business picks up another customer they would normally not get. AND, when John's friend downloads the app, the pizza place is on his phone and he will see multiple times during the day or night.
That is only one way mobile business apps work for businesses.
