Mastering The Mobile Commerce Experience

Responsive design is no longer optional, as it was once, long ago. Responsive design, and a strong mobile presence is an essential feature for any online retailer.

If your eCommerce store has not gone mobile yet, you are far behind industry trends and standards.

Why mCommerce is Necessary

Last holiday season (2015), one third of all purchases made were from a smartphone. Not only that, but 10% of all retail revenue (non-holiday season) is made on desktop or mobile, and not in-store.

Another great statistic: 67% of users are more likely to make a purchase from a mobile-friendly website. If a user goes on your website on their smartphone and it is not optimized for mobile, chances are that you’ve missed out on a potential sale.

Now think about it: how much revenue would you be losing if your customers were not able to make a mobile purchase?

In this day in age, people are spoiled with beautiful interfaces, easy-to-navigate mobile sites, and intuitive mobile applications. This means that if you’re lacking in any of these areas, your user is going to bounce, and visit the website of one of your closest competitors.

Mobile commerce sales are booming, so you better get your store on board before you lose out on a big chunk of potential sales.

Best practices for mCommerce

Navigation: Search bar

With such little space, you have to make good use of the real estate on your screen. At Codal, we recommend always having a search bar on your mobile site.

Why? Because with that small of a screen, there is not a ton of room for navigation, so the search bar will essentially become a central point for browsing. That said, always make sure to have the search bar in a very visible and accessible spot on the site.

Social media integrations

This may seem like an obvious point, since social media is at an all-time peak. However, millions and millions of people share content and experiences with each other through social channels, and your online store can really maximize on this, if implemented correctly.

Between product reviews, sale promotions, or recommendations, it is easy to get people talking about your product or brand on the internet with a well thought out strategy.

Some companies, such as LuLaRoe, are only selling their products on Facebook. This startup (not quite a startup anymore) is projected to hit one billion dollars in sales this year, only from selling on Facebook. No brick and mortar store, no website, and no mobile commerce.

If they can maximize on only one social media channel to hit a billion in sales, we’re sure you can use social media in a similar way, to maximize your profits.

A solid foundation: Shopify

Building your mobile site on a solid foundation, such as Shopify, will open up more doors to be able to sell. It allows you to set up a store directly on social channels, such as Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest, and overall is extremely simple to manage.

From a merchant’s perspective, you’re able to create a product, fulfill an order and manage all of your inventory, all from your smartphone. And, it is almost guaranteed that your users will have a positive experience.

Conclusion: don’t underestimate your mobile experience

Sometimes it can be difficult to keep a good mobile experience that has every functionality on desktop. Sometimes, features need to be cut out for mobile.

This is understandable, however, a mobile experience shouldn’t be valued any lower than desktop, or in-store experience. Don’t cut out any features that are valued high.

As a matter of fact, instead of thinking about which features you should cut, maybe you should think of ways to give your mobile customers rewards or perks for using their mobile device.