Jan
2016
Is it worth developing an app for an independent restaurant?
According to this source, in July 2015 there were over 1.6 million Android apps and 1.5 million Apple apps available to download, with the largest percentage (22%) being games and those for food and drink, such as restaurants, coming in at 2.72%. It seems that these days every business has its own app, but do the benefits outweigh the costs when it comes to developing one for an independent restaurant?
What are the benefits to having an app?
Having your own mobile app would give a huge presence on a person’s phone, always sitting there rather than the customer needing to open a browser to access a website. This means that the business will always be in the mind of the phone user, leading to them opening the app (even by accident) which is unlikely to happen with a website alone, and can provide a much better user experience. Through an app, a business can provide better customer engagement: allowing a customer to book a table or view a menu in a few clicks rather than making a phone call (see chart below), improve customer loyalty: making a sincere connection with your customers and tracking their spending through rewards, and make themselves stand out from the competition: be the first to offer a mobile app. Another key point would be that an app can have extra content like a game, reward system or push notifications that a website simply cannot offer. Greenberg and Kates (2014) warn us that incorrect marketing in the area of apps can actually damage a brand rather than build it. With so many apps available to download, users are going to want to pick their favourites and will often delete those that they perceive to be useless, so it is important to ensure that the app will hold some value to the user before deciding to take the idea forward. What will make the user download your app? How will it benefit the user?
How much will it cost?
Since the app will be free to download, to encourage the widest possible reach, the costs will not be recuperated through downloads as with many games offering in-app purchases. To develop the app for all 3 major platforms, the costs will almost be tripled, with this source suggesting that it will cost around £15,000 to develop and deploy a brand-worthy app, not considering maintenance costs. Something else to consider would be how to make customers, and potential customers, aware of the apps existence, leading to further publicity costs. When it comes to return on investment, it is estimated that per $1 an app will reach 599 people when created for all 3 major platforms, but a mobile website will reach 2839.
Would a mobile friendly website be a better option?
Optimising an existing website for mobile is incredibly simple, and applications such as Weebly allow a business to create, manage and post content, and measure traffic simply starting at just £5 a month. Some website hosts, such as WordPress allow the website to be automatically converted to a mobile version when accessed from a mobile device, which would be even better value for money. Allowing mobile friendly access to a small business website will encourage customers to check back on it and will allow people browsing to spend more time clicking through pages to access more content, as this will be easy for them to do, meaning this would be a worthwhile small investment for an independent restaurant. Another key point, discussed in this article is that mobile websites will work on any device, whereas an app will be specific to individual platforms, further increasing development costs.
Overall, it seems that developing a mobile app can be incredibly expensive so it would be important to think about whether the app holds any real value to the customer. Greenberg and Kates (2014) tell us that customers are more likely to make a purchase if it is easy to do so on a mobile device – and this can relate to restaurants through allowing easy access to booking a table or viewing a menu. It seems that it may simply be too expensive with very little return to create and maintain an app for an independent restaurant, unless there are creative and useful ideas for content.
Interested? Have a look at the following posts for more information:
http://mashable.com/2011/02/24/mobile-app-dev-cost/#1ITOql5M1Pqq
https://clutch.co/app-development/resources/mobile-apps-2015-small-business-survey
References:
Greenberg, E. and Kates, A. (2014) ‘Strategic digital marketing: top digital experts share the formula for tangible returns on your marketing investment’. [Online] < http://lib.myilibrary.com.ezproxy.brighton.ac.uk/Open.aspx?id=521998 > [Accessed 30/1/16]