What’s small, portable, fits in a purse or pocket and is always on? This should be easy to answer: Smartphones.
There is something to be said about smartphones allowing its users to be “always on.” Smartphones offers a variety of activities with connection points that are three-fold: communication via voice, text, email, social media, staying informed with latest news, and blogs. They also offer entertainment options for playing games, viewing videos, or surfing the internet.
Consumers can access smartphones at any time of the day and anywhere. This bodes well for small-business owners. Essentially, smartphones are uniquely suited for hyper-local marketing tactics. Given consumers’ propensity to collect information, it isn’t far fetched to see consumers comparative shopping while in-store. Some even see smartphones as an emerging point of purchase device online and offline.
While it is expected for sales to continue to grow via smartphones, small-business owners are joining other marketers who are trying to address concerns that still plague smartphone purchases. These stem from consumers questioning their security, available payment features, ease of use, navigation, and security of payment processing. If marketers can ease or solve the above consumer concerns, this would greatly expedite consumer adoption of purchasing via smartphones.
Like all newer technologies, good solutions don’t happen overnight. However, it is clear that smartphones are impactful in delivering communication messages and can help drive the purchase process.
The key is to be present where your desired audience is and be accessible at all times. After all, you don’t want to leave money on the table to your competitor’s advantage.
Adele Lassere is a marketing/advertising consultant with 20+ years experience, freelance writer and author of “Elements of Buying: A How To Reference Guide on Advertising for Business Owners,” available at Amazon.com. Adele was listed as Black Enterprise’s 2011 Top Execs in Marketing & Advertising and Black Enterprise’s 2013 Top Women Executives in Advertising & Marketing. Contact: [email protected]
