The iPhone was never supposed to have apps; at least not as we’ve come to know them.
It sounds crazy, but it’s true. Steve Jobs’ vision was for the smartphone to have a handful of built-in apps: Calculator, Mail, Notes, etc. Everything else was going to be accessed via modern web standards, i.e. through a browser.
It’s rumored that Jobs only changed his mind in 2008, after hackers started making their own apps and jailbreaking the device with Cydia.
The rest, as they say, is history: Apple’s app store became a smash hit, generating a whopping $34 billion in app sales in 2016. Google Play wasn’t far behind, with $17 billion in revenue.
Yes; apps went from “irrelevant” to “ubiquitous” in just 8 short years. In the process, the app market has gone through countless changes – and it’s still evolving extremely rapidly.
To help you keep up, we’ll share 6 of the latest mobile app trends for 2017, starting with…
Mobile App Trend 1: mCommerce now 50%+ of eCommerce
In the U.K. and Japan, m-commerce now drives over 50% of all online retail sales.
This is likely because both countries have near-universal access to high-speed mobile internet. Other countries where mobile internet is close to ubiquitous – South Korea, Taiwan, the Netherlands – are now approaching the 50% mark as well.
With users spending 90% of their mobile time inside apps, it’s fair to say most of this business is app-driven. As the trend continues in 2017 and beyond, expect to see laggards like the U.S. and Germany approach (or cross) the 50% threshold this year.
This means mobile has become the number 1 channel for eCommerce. Online merchants who can’t deliver the mobile experience their customers are looking for, both in-apps and on mobile webstores, will eventually lose customers. Research shows 51% of mobile users say they have purchased from another brand, because the mobile user experience was better.
Mobile App Trend 2: Mobile apps driving high-ticket sales
In the past, the main source of revenue for an app was its up-front sale price. Later, this shifted to micro in-app purchases. Now, the latest trend is that mobile devices are driving direct high-ticket sales. Consider that the average conversion value for mobile devices is:
$117.16 for iOS
$111.70 for Android
That’s massive, and it means any e-commerce business can grow sales by using apps: high-ticket products are no longer a problem.
Especially because…
Mobile App Trend 3: Mobile apps are ending mobile cart abandonment
One of the traditional problems with m-commerce is the extremely high cart abandonment rate. Using mobile websites, users leave their carts without ordering up to 97% of the time! Many of these customers come back and buy via their PCs – but with a customer journey interruption like this, some conversions are lost anyway.
Mobile apps solve this problem by offering convenient, safe checkouts (that are often processed in 1 click). This drops abandonment rates all the way down to 20% – which makes this one of the most valuable trends to take advantage of today.
Mobile App Trend 4: Alternative payment systems are dominating
Think most shoppers use credit and debit cards to pay for their products? Think again! 59% of all m-commerce sales come from PayPal, Apple Pay, Google Pay and even cryptocurrencies like BitCoin.
This means 2 things:
If you want to reach your full sales potential, it’s important to accept payments from various platforms.
As more alternative payment systems become common, a higher number of users find it easy to shop online.
Just don’t get the wrong impression: accepting BitCoin is not enough to serve all cryptocurrency lovers. The currency went from $1,000 to well over $2,300 in value in Q1 & Q2 2017 – so you may want to focus on stable currencies like Erithreum and Litecoin.
Trend #5 on our list is…
Mobile App Trend 5: In-App Chats are a Massive Deal
The live chat feature can increase lead acquisition by a massive 600%. In the past, live chats were limited to websites – but they’re now becoming common in m-retail apps as well.
With tools like LiveChat making it easy to add this feature no matter your budget, expect this latest trend in mobile apps to continue until most apps have a chat box by 2019.
Last but not least, let’s talk about…
Mobile App Trend 6: Multi-Channel Retail is Booming
6 in 10 users start shopping on one device but complete their purchase on a different one. A further 82% of all consumers use their mobile phones to get information before making a purchase in-store. In a nutshell, this means that mobile actions affect purchases across all channels.
This is the reason big-name retailers like Amazon are making it easy to bridge the gap between the digital and the physical. Check out this feature, which allows you to browse sneakers online after ID’ing them in a store:
Expect to see more multi-channel integration in the future. A study of 46,000 businesses decisively found that being optimized for several channels drives revenue – so that’s what businesses are going to be doing for the foreseeable future.
The first step to being multi-channel optimized is having a native app as well as a mobile website. We’ll explain how you can do this quickly and affordably in a second – but first, let’s go over the 6 trends again:
Mobile App Trend 1: Apps now 50%+ of E-Commerce
Mobile App Trend 2: Mobile apps driving high-ticket sales
Mobile App Trend 3: Mobile apps are ending mobile cart abandonment
Mobile App Trend 4: Alternative payment systems are dominating
Mobile App Trend 5: In-App Chats are a Massive Deal
Mobile App Trend 6: Multi-Channel Retail is Booming
Now, let’s get back to that last point: multi-channel retail (and its rise).
As you already know, it pays to have multiple channels. For mobile devices, this means having a native app that users can download and a mobile website that’s accessible through browsers.
To help around this, we’ve created a tool that turns your webstore into a native app. It has all the features brands need to stay top of mind and engage with customers, like unlimited rich push messages, look-books, simplified checkout and much more. Even better, we update your app for free so it remains standard-compliant and in tune with mobile trends – and that’s not all.
Apps built using JMango360 are free to make, and only cost a couple hundred dollars a month to publish in the App Stores. This presents an excellent opportunity for you to save money and maximize your sales by going omni-channel, which we think is pretty great.
To get a free demo, in which our team shows you how simple (and fast) it is to create and design an app, click here. We’d love to hand-walk you through our interface and show you how fast and easy it is to make your very own app.
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