eMarketer released a new study on how Canadians use their smart phones, and how brands are attempting to reach these mobile users.
A few notes that I found of interest are as follows:
- Canadians are now spending 2 hours and 20 minutes each day consuming media on their smartphone
- smart phone use has increased over 1 hour since 2012
- Canadian companies are trying to use these trends to their advantage, but are finding it’s difficult to get user buy-in
This third point doesn’t surprise me at all.
Companies are interested in building apps, instead of just utilizing a mobile website, and are looking for ways to entice users to use their app. Some successful types of apps that companies are developing include gaming, social networking and video players. These allow interaction with users that provide them with entertainment. Other successful apps have an angle that really sets them apart from their competition, and really provide some benefit for their users.
So while a great app can get a company huge interaction, there area few things that need to be addressed before a company moves forward with creating an app. For instance, apps are very expensive to develop, especially if you need to reach the widest audience – you may need to create ones for iPhone, Android, Blackberry and any other smartphone your customers may user.
Some questions you may want to ask yourself to determine whether you would be better developing an app or a mobile website are:
- Do you need to provide time-sensitive information to your users?
- Do you need to provide secure information to your users?
- Do you need to provide different information dependent on where the phone is located?
- Do you need to access the sensor on a phone?
If you’ve answered yes to these questions, then an app may be best for you. On the other hand, if you don’t need an app, your already existing website is probably better use to you.
If your website isn’t already mobile-friendly, we can help you take your current website and make it mobile-friendly.
