The Age of the Customer®, Part 8: Mobile apps are in your business' future
Recently, a friend said to me, "Apps are everything." In this case "app" means application.
Webster says an application is something useful. Today, "app" typically means a computer application designed to convert a complicated digital program into a handy but powerful tool that will make life and work more productive.
The hyperbolic reference my friend made was to mobile applications. If you have one of the mobile "smart phones," like an Apple iPhone or one that uses Google's Droid software, you know that mobile apps are diminutive digital power tools you can download to your smart phone - Google has thousands and Apple has tens-of-thousands. These apps put a world of capability, information and connectivity literally in the palm of your hand and at the command of a thumb.
According to Google's CEO, Eric Schmitt, his company expects to be more successful in the future with mobile platforms - smart phones, iPad, etc., than with PCs. However, nothing Schmitt prophesied can happen without the mobile app. If he's correct - and I think he is - this means mobile apps will become a bigger part of our lives. But more importantly, they will become a bigger part of our customers' lives. And that possibility is something on which every small business owner must focus today.
Mobile apps, which are too sexy for your desktop, do two very compelling things: 1) They put power in your hand; and 2) They take the cool computer desktop user experience you enjoy to a higher orbit of cool.
Hockey great, Wayne Gretzky, said the key to his success was the ability to skate where the puck is going instead of where it is. If you want to know where your customers are going with regard to how they will find you, connect with you, prefer you to connect with them and even do business with you, you have to start skating toward mobile apps.
Get started by doing these things today: 1) If you don't own a smart phone, buy one and start using it so you can see what your customers are falling in love with; 2) Hire your web developer to do these two things in this order: a) make sure your online information presents well on mobile platforms; and b) build a mobile app for your business that customers can download to their smart phones.
Whether you're Google or Grandma's Diner, mobile apps may not actually be everything, but they are becoming an increasingly essential way for your small business to stay relevant with customers.
Write this on a rock... Skate to where customers are going: toward mobile apps.
Jim Blasingame, Creator/Host of The Small Business Advocate Show
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