Posted on: 2015-11-16 4:21 PM In 2012 we started out with a vision - "Any company should be able to have an app without breaking the bank." It was a bigger task than we first thought. We published FindMeCoffee as a demonstration of our concept. It was intended to be a "Stake-in-the-ground" work that was intended to evoke capability discussions among mobile marketers. Instead, it became a going concern and a proving ground for rapid app deployment and mobile marketing features. Fast forward three years and countless thousands of dollars of investment and you have a model for what not to do.
Don't get me wrong, we are happy that we get tens of thousands of daily visitors and millions of monthly searches but we've learned the hard way what is important to most retailers wanting to engage with their customers.
1. Location-Location-Location - Our number one search is for things that are around people at the time of search. People plan using their desktop and they react with their phones. If you're going to build an App make sure that the first feature lets people find your stores in one click. Make sure you can let them know if you are open and please include all the relevant details for your type of business.
2. Mobile Offers and deals only matter if they are immediate - Offers like "Come and get a cookie before they are gone." will bring people who want a cookie to your store; provided it's nearby. Offers like "Come and get a cookie by Friday if you buy a coffee" inspire procrastination and require planning. Both create too many hurdles to get that cookie.
3. Focus on your repeat customers. This applies to mobile app marketing. . Customers resent offers designed to bring in new customers especially if they are for first time buyers only! Build a following by engaging your repeat customers and sharing "insider" offers. These customers already like your product and have downloaded your app so it's easier to increase the "spend" of someone in your store than to try to bring in someone new. These loyal customers will bring new people to you because we're all a little vain and want to be the first to share that new place that no one has heard of yet.
4. People love to be in the know. The only ads or offers that people complain about are irrelevant ones. People don't want dating adds In their coffee app. But if you want to send them a coupon for a free latte they'll complain if they weren't included.
5. Know your customer. When you build your app start with the reports that you want and then make sure that you can collect the data that fills those reports. Customer reviews, usage patterns, and offer ROI's are the marketers bread and butter but if the app wasn't designed to collect the required data then it wasn't the best spend for your dollars.
6. Refresh often. People bore easily. If you're app isn't being refreshed with new features that reflect the changing needs of your customer and that adopt the coolest new technology then you'll seen a decline in usage over time. This point leads into my final and most important point. Get good value!
7. Get good value. Custom apps can cost literally tens of thousands of dollars for each phone type and can take months to build and debug. Then after they are built they require almost as much time and money in terms of what I like to call "Care and Feeding", or maintenance to keep them going. Now, (this is my pitch) there are platforms out there that can let you roll out powerful CMS enabled based store locator apps in as little as days to weeks and that cost much much less than custom apps. These apps are usually turnkey, worry free and risk free propositions that often come with an open extensible architecture for your unique needs.
My sales pitch. Check out our website and if you're looking to build a store locator/customer offers app then give me a call. We might be able to help.
