Rush to Mobile Commerce Retail Applications

Recently I read an article on Internet Retailer titled “Mobile commerce tech vendors experiencing a pre-holiday season boom”. Its shows a strong signs that mobile commerce will start picking up in coming years. The significant increase in the number of mobile device users has created a very strong demand for emerging mobile commerce applications and services. The launch of the Apple iPhone 3G, RIM BlackBerry Storm and the G1 Google Android enabled phone proved that this industry is capable of getting over the small screen challenge.

Many of the leading retail e-commerce websites traffic stats showing that in recent months the traffic is increased from Mobile phones . And the mobile channel is more personal than any other and there is no doubt that mobile commerce sites and services will strengthen the bonds between brands and consumers. According to Internet Retailer research, there are almost 100 retailers, big and small, in m-commerce today and few more will add to this list in the coming holiday season.

To capture the new business opportunities all the leading mobile commerce vendors will be investing millions of dollars in its technology in the coming years. Leading software vendor IBM will invest $100 million in mobile enterprise applications in coming 5 years. Digby (ABI Research ranked Digby in its Top 8 Mobile Commerce (Non-NFC) Vendor Matrix) will be investing heavily in its technology in the next two years.

Mobile Business Opportunities

About Mobile: In today’s world mobile phone is one of the essential electronic gadgets in human life. Most of the people rely on mobile phone for communication and entertainment in their daily life. Mobile phone is one of the device which helps to connect people either via the direct communication or by Text messaging.

Mobile populations: According to the United Nations survey 60% of the world’s population uses mobile phones i.e. 6 in 10 of world’s population. Yes it is hard to calculate precisely How many of them actually uses mobile. But, there is a significant population for a business opportunity and many of the Financial Institutes and Retailers have penetrated into the Mobile Market.

http://www.itindustrynews.co.uk/60-of-worlds-population-using-mobile-phones-says-united-nations-873.html

Mobile phone business opportunities: With the growing population in mobile usage mobile phone has become one of the prime channels in Financial Services. The two key functional areas where mobile helps the Financial Services are Mobile Notifications and Mobile Payments. Let’s consider Bill presentment and Payment functionality in retail Market. Bill Presentment and Payment is a common and important functionality (For example: receiving and making payments for the utility bills like Mobile bill, electric bill, Gas bill, etc). As of today Text Messaging is the quickest way of presenting a bill summary to the Consumer and to send a gentle reminder for a Payment. Consumer can pay the bill via Text Messaging as soon as they receive the bill summary message or a reminder notification.

Challenges: Security, Legal Issues and Pricing. Let’s look into these areas of concern in the next blog.

Mobile Price Comparison Applications

A plethora of new mobile applications are available to consumers to use by typing bar code or snap a picture to compare the prices from thousands of reputed stores. These new applications will definitely play a significant role in electronic commerce. I did some research and found the following applications are interesting in this space.

ringfo.com: Ringfo service will help consumers to find the best deals on books, CDs, and many other products. By using this service user can listen the new and used product prices.

Steps to use the service
1. find the bar code on any product -- also called UPC or ISBN
2. using phone keypad, enter the numbers found below on product's bar code**
3. listen for new and used prices*, customer ratings, and similar items

frucall.com/m: Frucall allows consumers to get pricing and customer rating information about items they see in store by making a call from their mobile phone.

Users can use this comparison tool in 3 ways
1. Phone call 2. Text Message 3. Mobile Web

mshopper.net: Mshopper is an easy-to-use mobile shopping tool which lets consumers use their cell phone to access the lowest online prices for any in-store item

• Get real time price comparison right in stores
• Browse to find categories and merchants you’re interested in
• Use the info to negotiate a better deal

mobSaver.com: By text messaging mobsaver, consumers can instantly compare online vs. retail prices while you're at the store. If you decide to buy online, you no longer have to memorize the titles and hope to still remember them by the time you get home. Simply text mobsaver, sign in when you get home, and you'll see your saved list of items.

I invite you to share here in comments your interesting Retail price comparision Mobile App

Reasons to Buy Apple iPhone

I didn’t get convince to buy the iPhone when it was first introduced in Dec. 2007, the main reasons were.. just enough features and the price of the product. But after seeing the 3G, I temped to experience the product features and then immediately decided to order the iPhone. Now I am really, really enjoying the iPhone 3G features... Kudos to Steve Jobs and his team

I thought now every mobile user can consider to buy this awesome product for the following reasons

• 3G Speed


• Affordable Price


• Myriad iPhone Applications


• Video Recording


• Multi-Touch Screen


• Internet Over WI-FI


• Better battery Power


• Scientific Calculator


• Voice Turn by Turn GPS ...and may more exciting features

Future of Global Retailing

Mobile technology has become powerful month by month and that it has a dramatic impact on the future of retailing. Social media experts saying that mobile technologies will definitely change the way you interact with your customer, the way people shop, the way you manage your brands, and the way companies advertising. The coupons, promotions, and bar-code readers for mobile phones will be more competitive. And the U.S. retail industry is behind compared with its Asian and European counterparts. For example, Japanese consumers can scan food items using the barcode reader included in their mobile phones so they can easily check the freshness.

I think M-commerce may not be explode in next 1 or 2 years, but it is likely to continue growing steadily as more wireless devices become available, and more and more apps are released to facilitate “anywhere shopping”. The biggest challenges we will see with m-commerce over the next few years will be a continuation of the struggles that retailers have facing today such as: lack of standards, lack of ubiquitous wireless network coverage, security violations, user experience confines, and negative notion about the m-commerce investment.

In US, few retailers already have m-commerce capabilities and those includes: 1-800-Flowers with the Mobile Gift Center; Sears with Sears2go; Polo Ralph Lauren with m.RalphLauren.com; Target with the creative Target Gift Globe app; Amazon with Amazon Remembers, which enables users to take a picture of a product and the same will saves on Amazon’s servers as well. Once your picture is on its servers, Amazon will attempt to match your picture up to a product. If it’s successful, Amazon will shoot you an email to let you know; and PETCO’s pilot program, where customers can use their mobile phones to get ratings and reviews of products in stores.