Mobile commerce has been lately predicted to grow up to $31 billion by 2015 (Emarketer Inc.) in the USA. The term m-commerce is also one of the most popular words connected to retail. It concerns not only shopping online but apparently even the in-store shopping. Although it’s so powerful, don’t let yourself treat it as a separate notion. There’s also s-commerce, f-commerce, re-commerce and many more… And all of them eventually compound to simply e-commerce.
In this post, however, I’d like to present a few ideas of how to combine mobile commerce with the other popular subtype of e-commerce that is social commerce. Why social commerce? The social aspect of e-commerce is extremely important as it influences the buyer’s behaviour a lot. And this is what counts for you!
1. Pierce through with what you got.
Once you already have a mobile ready website, which you should after you had read our previous posts Does the mobile technology overtake users needs and How to handle mobile, it’s high time to advertise it. Treat it as a separate product of yours that you want to sell. Just take a look at asos.
Image source: asos.com
Why is it crucial? Well, through the last six months 44% more users accessed retailer websites via a mobile (according to reevoo research). Thus, your clients need to know that they can do some shopping at your eshop while traveling by a train for example. You should think of announcing that big step towards mobile through social sites. Not only will it drive people to the mobile website itself but also will increase the buzz around your desktop eshop.
2. Provide the perfect shopping experience.
That’s something we have already talked about a lot. However, it’s always worth reminding.
You should bear in mind the specificity of a mobile device that can’t hold so much text and graphics. The design has to be related but limited, the same refers to the text and content in general. In my opinon asos.com does here a great job. They left their social endevours, like a blog, but were able to integrate it in the mobile device possibilities.
Image source: asos.com
If you are already engaging your customers in writing reviews and sharing products on your desktop eshop it would be rather unwise to deprive them the joy of socializing on a mobile device.
Image source: amazon.co.uk
3. Engage even more
As was just mentioned above the social functions at your mobile webshop have to engage just as at your desktop one. It has been lately reported by reevoo that through the last half a year the amount of reviews written and shared via mobile devices increased by 27% and is continuing to grow fast.
Image source: gamestop.com
At this moment 10% of your reviews come from mobile devices users and this group is growing. That’s a strong influence all right! And what they expect is the best treatment possible, that’s why you should not forget about a place for recommendations and reviews at your eshop, not to mention social sharing options.
4. Get yourself a smartphone
Ok, you probably have one… But start using it in between the meetings or at the meeting if it turns out to be boring…. Frankly speaking try to encourage yourself and your stuff to react immediately to the content placed by your customers in the reviews section and on social networks. Once you offered the whole social media experience on a mobile device, you should also act as the mobile social sharer yourself, or at least try your best.
According to comScore November’s 2011 research 35% (or 17 million) of all UK smartphone users socialize on blogs and social networking sites, once a half of them do it on a daily basis. Regarding that, you can either do something about or let your competition do it for you.
Do you own a mobile version of your shop? Have you noticed the mobile users influence at your eshop?
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