Is Your business taking advantage of Mobile Commerce?

Twitter has recently announced the new idea surrounding ‘Twitter Payments’ which would allow users to send over money from their bank accounts to another with just one tweet! Crazy huh?.

Smith (2006) defines m-commerce as the buying and selling of goods and services through wireless handheld devices such as cellular phones and Personal Digital Assistants (PDA)

An example of this:

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Technology Giants Already Embracing Mobile Commerce:

Facebook is already working on its own payments system which will reportedly be operated through the messenger application (2014). Other leading online companies such as Amazon and Paypal already have payment systems in place. Most recently, Apple launched its new service Apple Pay, which allows users to pay for goods and services both online and in the physical world using just their phone. An example of Apple pay can be found through this link: http://www.cnet.com/videos/link/LhuNa4mKgHThEQ0h6j3vt0AwQCKeQtNi/

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Why Should your Company Consider Using Mobile Commerce too?

According to the Centre of Economics and Business Research, 5.6 million people in the UK use phones to purchase goods and services. While the value of goods and services bought on a mobile device are expected to nearly triple in 2018. This suggests that moving onto mobile commerce and integrating payments within your websites could create large profits in the future.

Paypal have stated that, “The rapid adoption of Smartphones is driving a surge in the number of consumers using their mobile devices to access the internet and complete eCommerce transactions”. With their company now boasting and annual revenue of 8.03 billion dollars and over 3.9 billion payments, which is a growth of 22% from 2013.

The Barriers of Mobile Commerce

1. Trust

Trust is perhaps the most important influence on information disclosure (Hoffman et al, 1999). The Internet Consumer Trust Model developed by Jarvenpaa and Tractinsky (1999) and the Electronic Exchange Model by Swaminathan et al. (1999) find trust to be a key priority to engaging in consumer transactions online because it reduces the risks associated with purchasing goods and services over the Internet.

2. Concern for Privacy

Culnan & Armstrong (1999) suggest that privacy for users is a large problem when it comes to commercial websites. Individuals’ concern for privacy increases when they feel the need to register and and out personal information. A survey completed by Sheehan & Hoy (1999) found that customers are providing incomplete information when they do register, presumably because they have less trust in the Web site.

What can you do to get Started?

1. Make Sure its Optimised for Every Device

According to Google, 67% of people are more like to buy from a mobile friendly site. Whereas, 61% are eager to leave when they can’t find what they are looking for (Google, 2012). This makes it vitally important to ensure that your website is responsive and/or mobile optimised. Customers will more be more likely to browse round your website more if the site is easy-to-use. This would typically be used with Cascading Style Sheets (CSS3) which is a programme which allwows the designer and the user to control the presentation of  a web page. According to Reed et al (1998), cascading style sheets will prove to be one of the most powerful tools available for the web designer as you are able to control just about every part of your web page.

2. Make sure it’s Secure..

According to the Mobile Payment and Fraud Survey (2014), 32% of merchants see mobile payments as riskier then standard eCommerce sites. Having a secure payment process and clearly stating your security settings to your customers is essential for potential buyers as they would feel safer knowing their money is safe and they are getting their money’s worth. Early research of this suggested that once a secure platform is created and there are no loopholes, we can expect to see very high value transactions occurring on mobile platforms (Barnes, S. 2002).

3. Simplify Your User Experience

Theres never been a more important decision then to make your business website or platform as easy to use as you can. Potential customers will get annoyed, scared and bored of a website they can’t understand how to use. Minimising the steps they need to take to purchase a product, clearly label every little detail on your website and your customer will feel suitable for that website. According a survey done by Backspace survey (2013), 71% of people agreed that a simpler web design influenced their decision to buy on a mobile device.

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What can we expect?

If mobile commerce continues to dramatically rise in popularity and be widely used around the world. We could see the downfall of store retailers such as Argos and other big department stores. As we have already seen, shops such as blockbuster and GAME have tremendously struggled to compete with the online store of the XBOX and Playstation as game were available online. A survey from Tribute Media (2014) stated that “51% of shoppers research online and visit the store to purchase while 44% research online and purchase online too”. With growing technologies on the mobile, we can expect to see an increase in shopper researching products online and purchasing online too.

According to Google (2014), 41% mobile users have turned to a competitor’s site after a bad mobile experience. This could cause all business with a poor online website and usability site could see falls in profits as more consumers turn to other competitors.

Summary

In my personal opinion, smaller businesses need to embrace this idea, as it will eventually become widely available for all firms and they can be at risk of being left behind by their competitors.

 

 

Barnes, S. J., 2002. The mobile commerce value chain: analysis and future developments. International Journal of Information Management22(2), 91-108.

Culnan, M. J., & Armstrong, P. K. (1999). Information privacy concerns, procedural fairness, and impersonal trust: An empirical investigationOrganization Science10(1), 104115.

 Hoffman, D. L.Novak, T. P., & Peralta, M. (1999). Building consumer trust onlineCommunications of the ACM42(4), 8085.

Jarvenpaa, S. L., & Tractinsky, N. (1999). Consumer trust in an Internet store: A cross-cultural validationJournal of Computer Mediated Communication5(2), 136.

Google Survery. 2014. http://googlemobileads.blogspot.ie/2012/09/mobile-friendly-sites-turn-visitors.html

Rackspace Survery http://www.rackspace.com/knowledge_center/whitepaper/the-ecommerce-customer-experience-0

Reed, D., & Thomas, P. J. (1998). Cascading Style Sheets. In Essential HTML fast (pp. 111-121). Springer London.

Sheehan, K. B., & Hoy, M. G. (1999). Flaming, complaining, abstaining: How online users respond to privacy concernsJournal of Advertising28(3), 3751.

Smith, A. 2006. Exploring m-commerce in terms of viability growth and challenges. International Journal of Mobile Communication, 4(6) pp.682-703.

Swaminathan, V.Lepkowska-White, E., & Rao, B. P. (1999). Browsers or buyers in cyberspace? An investigation of factors influencing electronic exchangeJournal of Computer Mediated Communication5(2), 1-23

 

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