Does Your Site Make A Mobile Phone Fly?
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Last week, I was at the mall with my teenage daughter as she searched for a dress for her winter formal. Basically, she and my credit card were in one part of the mall, while I wandered around a different part until she was ready for the dad limo to ferry her back home. As I passed one popular store, a mobile phone went bouncing down the hall next to me. It did not take long to identify the phone’s owner; he was sitting outside said store looking…ah…frustrated. Returning his phone to him, I discovered he threw the phone after making five failed attempts to purchase something from the retailer’s mobile site.
Two questions immediately came to mind:
- Is the general mobile experience really that bad?
- How can a company avoid being the mobile site that sends a phone flying by?
We know mobile adoption is off the charts with nine out every 10 people in the U.S. owning a mobile phone and Nielsen pegging early 2012 as the point when smartphones will be the majority. Not only is everyone now armed with a mobile device, but we cling to them harder than a lifelong NRA member does to their favorite pistol as 83% of Americans never leave home without their mobile phone.
Consumers are clamoring to engage brands on a mobile level and research shows their expectations are rarely being met; most retailers are unprepared for the expanding mobile marketplace. A study by Harris Interactive reveals 85% of consumers expect their mobile experience to be better than the experience they would have on a desktop website. Roughly 80% of retailers (both online and brick and mortar) do not have dedicated mobile or mobile-enabled sites. The bulk of these retailers are sending mobile traffic to desktop-enabled sites. At the beginning of the mobile push, this was acceptable as the traffic was in the infancy stage. Today, not having a mobile site is akin to not having a website, circa 2000.
Unfortunately, 84% of mobile users who have conducted mobile transactions have problems. The Harris study also revealed that more adult mobile users are frustrated by a bad mobile experience (58%) than by going to the DMV (50%) or by being stuck in traffic (56%).
How do consumers respond to a bad mobile experience?
- 43% say they would abandon the transaction and try again later on a computer
- 16% would be more likely to buy from a competitor
- 12% would abandon the transaction and try a competitors mobile site
- 63% would be less likely to buy from the same company via other purchase channels
The last statistic should be a resounding wake-up call to all brands. By delivering a bad mobile experience, you are risking more than half your potential customer base. This loss would not be from a site or a particular store, but from an overall loss of brand fans, regardless of location.
So what is a mobile neglectful brand supposed to do? Here are three key recommendations to help save your brand from being tossed into the mobile consumer trash bin:
- Invest immediately in mobile development. This does not mean convert a few pages of your site o fit in the size of a mobile screen, but to make it a true mobile website. Make it as easy for a consumer to conduct all of the same operations on your site from their mobile device as they would on a desktop.
- Engage paid mobile search traffic. If you currently engage in PPC advertising and are a retailer with physical locations, you can still capture those paid clicks by activating click-
- Enhance presence on sites with ready mobile presence. Many directory, review and social sites are mobile-ready. Retailers with large local presences can optimize the traffic of these secondary sources to mobile searchers. Ensuring business listings are optimized, reviews are addressed and social commentary is replied to will go a long way in driving mobile traffic through the doors.
By the way, the gentlemen in the mall who was teaching his phone to fly did finally make his purchase. He went to a competitor of the original store, at the other end of the mall.
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| Categories: | Mobile |