Best App for Movie Lovers

This made me laugh so hard I decided I had to share it and blog about it.

An app to help you know the best time in a movie to go to the bathroom.

Yeap.

https://appadvice.com/app/runpee/450326239

It is just one of the many apps listed in this fine little article to assist you with your movie viewing needs:

https://appadvice.com/collection/movie-apps

Happy Reading (and movie watching),

J.W. Gant

Best Retail Mobile Apps

I happen to think the world of retail is as competitive as it gets with some of the best minds and the best business plays happening.

A look at retail mobile apps is worth your time and this article by the folks at ClickZ uses the Forrester research to help you gain a view:

https://www.clickz.com/retail-mobile-apps-forrester/227758/

Here is a snippet from the piece:

What makes a retailers’ mobile app great? That question has been asked by countless marketers (and by, um, us) over the years. Forrester Research tackled it in a new report that retailers’ mobile apps, and where they excel and miss the mark.

Mobile commerce is perpetually on the rise. During Cyber Monday, smartphone sales accounted for $2.1 billion, a 48.1% growth year-over-year. And according to eMarketer, more than 90% of our time on smartphones is spent in-app.

Here’s the catch: We’re also highly selective about the mobile apps we use. App downloads keep increasing, but users’ interest disappears as quickly as a Snap. In 2017, App Annie found that the average smartphone owner only uses 30 per month and nine per day.

When Apple revealed the most popular apps of 2018, Amazon was the only retailer on the list, which was dominated by social media and entertainment. In order to command consumers’ attention, retailers have to make sure their apps are top notch.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

HolidayWrapup - Mobile Drives Traffic

If eCommerce is part of your strategy you should be paying close attention to the trends in customer shopping habits.

The shopping season in 2018 was dominated by mobile touchpoints as customers increasingly get out their phone to shop.

Here is a snippet from the report:

Mobile shopping eclipsed desktop for the first time during the 2018 holiday season: 48% of orders came from mobile devices while just 44% came from desktop or laptop computers, according to Salesforce. Mobile accounted for 66% of all e-Commerce traffic during the season, and 74% of shoppers browsed from a mobile phone on Christmas Day.

Here is the full story:

https://www.retailtouchpoints.com/topics/omnichannel-cross-channel-strategies/holiday-wrap-up-mobile-dominates-e-commerce-driving-66-of-traffic

Here is one other point.  For years now we have seen the growth of mobile as a point of interaction between retailers and manufacturer brands while sales has been dominated on a desktop style device.  That is trending towards a pure mobile-first interaction.  The customer shops on their phone, finds what the want on their phone and buys it there too. We are projected to pass the 50% threshold within the next 2 years.

Here is that data:

https://www.statista.com/statistics/249863/us-mobile-retail-commerce-sales-as-percentage-of-e-commerce-sales/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

State of Mobile Report

App Annie is well-positioned to comment on what is happening with mobile apps as they've been crawling the app stores from nearly the beginning.

Their 2019 report is worth reading for a free registration but you can get a quick run-down via Forbes. Basically mobile gaming is a massive business and is still growing at a double-digit rate.

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Global app store consumer spend reached $101 billion in 2018, up 75 percent from 2016. This figure is expected to exceed $120 billion in 2019, according to mobile data and analytics provider App Annie. The company released its annual The State of Mobile in 2019 Report — a comprehensive guide for businesses looking at mobile.
Here is the full article:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/tjmccue/2019/01/30/mobile-app-state-of-mobile-2019-report-from-app-annie/#6d3a8eb434ab

Go here to get the full report:

https://www.appannie.com/en/go/state-of-mobile-2019/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

eCommerce Native App or Hybrid Progressive?

I've had quite a few conversations this year around the question of when a company, retailer or manufacturer looking to go direct to consumers, should build a Native mobile app.

That isn't an easy question to answer.

The company culture comes in to play and the relationship the brand has with its customers.  If you just need a simple interface for online sales then why build a native app?  Mobile web is a great solution.

Then one app I've been using came to mind: Hamilton

Yes, the app for the Broadway musical.  For a while I was in that app every day as the lottery for shows in Boston was held every day.  I found myself doing lots of other things in the app and play around with it a bit even now that the show has moved on from Boston.  It occurred to me if they can get me in to their app every day then the opportunity exists for other brands to do the same.  If the relationship with their customers demands it.

Here is a little article on a different approach:

https://econsultancy.com/five-ecommerce-brands-success-progressive-web-apps/

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Essentially, PWAs [progressive web apps] are mobile apps that are delivered through the web. By using an app shell and pre-caching on a user’s phone, they can be added to the home screen and will load instantly.

Google states that 53% of users will abandon a site if it takes longer than three seconds to load. As a result, the functionality of a PWA can simplify the online shopping experience, and even improve conversions.

Recently, we’ve seen a number of ecommerce brands capitalise on the technology.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Nike and the Store of the Future ... Today

It started for me with the launch of the Nike Apple Watch.

An Apple Watch branded specific to Nike.  Cool looking too.  There's much more going on there than I realized at first however.  If a loyal Nike customer is wearing that watch, they likely have the Nike app to go with it and ... what happens when that combination goes to a mall near a Nike store?

Bingo.

Nike Stores are really at the cutting edge as this piece talks about.  Here is a snippet from the piece:

Retail isn’t dead, boring retail is. That was the sermon Nike was preaching at its New York City headquarters yesterday in a presentation by chief digital officer Adam Sussman, senior director of Nike Stores Experience Michelle Warvel, and Ron Faris, head of Nike’s SNKRS app and s23 NYC digital studio. The brand is using SNKRS to connect with culture, experimenting with turning experiences into retail opportunities, as well as preparing to roll out in-store features in which customers check out their new kicks with their phone.

I love how that article begins by the way.  So very true!

I talk about the traditional ranking of retailers, Tier 5 the smallest like your local christmas tree vendor, and Tier 1 the largest like Walmart.  There is really a "super tier" now.  Those retailers putting it all together: digital interactions (mobile and social), ecommerce, and a great in-store experience.  They are the very top of the list.  Some companies can do one of those great and succeed but they'll never be the biggest of the big.  Two gets you a long ways but the very best do it all.

Here is the full story:

https://www.fastcompany.com/90256871/nike-showcases-its-mobile-vision-for-the-future-of-retail

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Google Phone vs Apple iPhone

Great little article from the folks over at TechCrunch that looks at the most recent offerings from Google and Apple.

Here is a snippet from the piece:

First off, if you’re strapped for cash, or more accurately just want to be more responsible with the cash you do have, the price tags of these devices communicate some loud differences. The Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL go for $200 less than the iPhone XS and iPhone XS Max, respectively. Paying $1,000 for a phone is wild, but it’s the world we live in...

Here is the full article:

https://techcrunch.com/2018/10/09/pixel-3-vs-iphone-xs-how-do-they-stack-up/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Mobile Driving Retail

The trend is strong and continuing.  Mobile interactions with customers is increasingly at the heart of the digital relationship between retailers and their customers.

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Holiday sales are set to grow 13% this year over 2017, with mobile devices pushing 68% of e-commerce visits and 46% of orders, according to a new report from Salesforce. The cloud computing firm estimates artificial intelligence (AI)-based product recommendations will account for 35% of revenue.

Here is the full story:

https://www.retaildive.com/news/mobile-to-drive-68-of-holiday-e-commerce-traffic/532468/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

The New Nike Mobile App Store

We've been hearing it for years now.

Bricks & Mobile, the play on the descriptive "Bricks & Mortar".

Truer words were never said.

When I was building the shopping assistant app for regional supermarkets the concept was an in-store shopping assistant.  I envisioned mobile would soon enable concierge level service for the masses.

Hello Nike.

Here is a snippet from the piece:

A year later, the mobile strategy is showing results with direct-to-consumer sales that rose 34% and comparable store sales gains of 5% in fiscal Q4 2017 from a year earlier, per eMarketer research. Nike's website also had about 11% of the online traffic generated by the top 10 U.S. apparel retailers in Q1 2018, one of the only direct-to-consumer brands in the top 10, according to SimilarWeb.

Here is the full article:

https://www.mobilemarketer.com/news/nike-melds-mobile-physical-retail-with-new-la-concept-store/527832/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Rethinking Your Brand App

The folks on the tech team over at Forbes have an opinion piece worth reading.

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Salesforce’s most recent State of Marketing report explains that marketing leaders are zooming in on the customer experience as a critical part of their marketing strategy. In the report, 68% of the marketing leaders surveyed said their companies are increasingly competing on the basis of customer experience and 64% are focusing more on providing consistency across every channel to accommodate changing customer expectations.

What can I say?  This "recent" report says the customer experience is critical?

Joking right?

Seriously.  Pulling my leg.

We have known for years you need to be where your customer is.  Starbucks has it figured out.

Still worth the read though.  Here is the full article:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2018/06/11/four-ways-to-rethink-the-brand-app-experience/#462f433d5e4e

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Technological Disruption and the City Taxi

I am fascinated by all things related to the ongoing entry in to the Information Age. 

A bit more than 100 years ago the street lamps in major cities were powered by gas.  Every evening a fleet of trained individuals would pan out across the city igniting the city's gas street lamps.  Every morning they would extinguish them.  Along came electricity and quickly those jobs were all eliminated.  Great safety and cost savings improvement for the city and the inhabitants therein.  Terrible for the people who lost their job and had no skills for anything else.

Technological advances always result in disruption of the status quo.  Today is no different.

What do you know about how taxi services are regulated in our biggest cities?  Nothing?  Count me there too.

City managers long ago recognized the need to regulate the number of taxis in a city boundary so as to prevent overcrowding of taxis on the streets.  These managers, however, also saw an opportunity to make money regulating that task.  Enter the taxi medallion.

A taxi is required to have a taxi medallion to do business within city limits.  New York, Chicago, all of the big U.S. cities do this.  A finite number are created.  As you can imagine when demand outdraws supply the price goes up (ECON 101).  Owning your own taxi medallion was the gold standard and a dream realized for generations of middle America.  The price could go north of $1 USM.  Yes, million, for a taxi medallion so you can drive a cab in city limits. People would save for years and take out a loan the size of, or larger than, most home mortgages.

With the advent of UBER and Lyft the value of these medallions is plummeting.  No longer able to compete and dragged down by a massive loan now underwater we are seeing a dramatic rise in suicides among long-time city livery and taxi drivers.

Disruption comes with a cost.

Read more here:

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/shadow-uber-s-rise-taxi-driver-suicides-leave-cabbies-shaken-n879281

Interesting Reading.

J.W. Gant

Mobile Retail

The Mobile Marketing folks recently organized a summit on "Mobile Retail" and captured what they consider the best quotes from the summit.  It is worth a read for anyone interested in tech, mobile, or retail.

Here is the full story:

http://mobilemarketingmagazine.com/the-10-best-quotes-from-our-mobile-retail-summit

Here is a part of the piece:

Our day was kicked off by Jat Sahi of Fujitsu, who explored how mobile and digital was disrupting not just traditional working practices, but entire sectors and business models, and what retailers can do to keep pace with the speed of change.

I'm of course solidly in the camp that sees how disruptive technology is.  However, it is the customer that matters.  Tech alone will not solve problems.  How we provide for people, their wants and needs, does matter.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

TargetPay is Here - Wallet

Following years of investment in mobile wallet through the now sold off MCX and the CurrentC mobile payments solution, and well after Walmart enacted its Walmart Pay solution Target has theirs in place. They call it simple "Wallet".

This is the beginning of furthering a huge divide between the top of the Tier 1 retailers and everyone else.  We may need to create a new designation like "Super Power" when mere "Major Power" was no longer enough.

The biggest merchants will have a strong physical presence, eCommerce presence, vertically integrated merchandising, strong mobile, and strong mobile wallet capability. Think Amazon and Walmart.  Now Target.

Everyone else?  Well, this speaks to the huge need for a white label solution for all of those merchants not big enough to handle all of this on their own.

Anyone?

Here is the story:

http://www.businessinsider.com/targets-mobile-wallet-is-finally-here-2017-12

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Target launched its long-anticipated mobile wallet for in-store payments on Monday, according to TechCrunch. The product, which will be barcode-based and housed in the existing Target mobile app, is known as Wallet. Two key features distinguish Wallet and could help optimize it for use:

The wallet is only available to store cardholders.

...

That’s especially true because it expands upon existing app functionality.

...

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

BRotD - Entry 0255 Shopping Online Using What Device?

Best Reading of the Day

Forbes has a fantastic article for all of the holiday shoppers out there looking to browse online stores for their shopping needs.

Quick.  What device are you reading this on?  Desktop computer?  Is your smartphone nearby?

If you wanted to grab something off of eBay real quick which device should you use?

Here is a snippet from the piece:

Since the dawn of Cyber Monday, when consumers would come home from shopping in stores all Black Friday weekend, only to turn around and use high-speed connections at work on Monday to finish up their shopping lists, retailers have observed that consumers are using different digital channels for different objectives.

Over the past few years, holiday shopping has reflected some of these shifts. Online sales are growing far faster than store sales, and within online, mobile is capturing a larger share of traffic – but mobile still drags far behind desktop and even tablet experiences when it comes to sales.

Retailers also have not invested evenly across their digital channels. Just because a retailer's desktop website is a great experience, it doesn’t mean its mobile site – or app – has kept up.

Here is the whole story:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/nikkibaird/2017/11/21/mobile-or-desktop-site-or-app-which-is-the-best-way-to-shop-this-holiday-season/#3be564c7214a

I wrote about these things a couple times here regarding retailer's digital strategies and here regarding the question of what is actually "mobile" and what isn't.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Which Retailers are Mobile?

The advent of the smart phone has done two things that require retailers to respond: taken away some traffic from older internet sources, and opened a new type of opportunity for mobile interactions.

Initial offerings were essentially to offer the same online web experience but in mobile.  Going way back to the introduction of the first iPhone one of the enormous selling points was the ability to view the full New York Times website on your phone.

Wow!

Quickly the limitations of that experience became clear.  A tiny screen you hold in your hand requires a different approach from the interactions one has with a full PC screen.

A few retailers really really get that.  Here is a story on the best experiences:

http://www.mytotalretail.com/article/mobile-cx-study-gives-best-buy-home-depot-and-target-top-marks/

Here is a snippet from that piece:

As consumers spend more time shopping on smartphones, their expectations for mobile experiences have soared. With mobile interactions influencing $1.05 trillion in offline sales in 2016, the successful retailers of 2017 will be those that offer consumers mobile sites with a frictionless path to purchase that also integrates into omnichannel shopping experiences.

Which omnichannel retailers are doing it right and setting the bar the highest for merchants looking to deliver a seamless mobile customer experience (CX)?

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

BRotD - Entry 0253 Next Generation Stores Today

Best Reading of the Day

Always remember, the folks who want to sell you something will often be willing to write studious analyses to help persuade you to but it.

With that in mind you really should read this, the best read of today, or the month really.

Forget everything we know or think we know about the retail store.  Given the technological shifts we've seen in recent decades with online, social, integrated fulfillment, seemless customer service through digital, mobile, and more, what should the store look like today.

Here is a snippet that provides one view:

Over the next three years, outdoor lifestyle apparel retailer Toad&Co. plans to open 20 new brick and mortar stores.

With news of store closings by powerhouse brands likely swirling around in your head, you may be tempted to make sure you read that number correctly. It’s been dizzying for sure. So why would an apparel retailer be looking to expand its brick and mortar footprint in this environment?

Santa Barbara, CA-based Toad&Co. lives by a simple truth: People enjoy shopping and being in the store, and still want that experience. They just don’t want it to be disconnected from the rest of their purchasing journey.

“We don’t believe brick and mortar is dying,” explained Kelly Milazzo, VP of operations for Toad&Co. ”But we do believe that the consumer expects, and will soon demand, a seamless interaction with the brand.”

Here is the full article:

http://www.chainstoreage.com/article/how-make-next-generation-store-right-now-store

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

NewStore of Boston Uses Tech to Help Against Amazon

The next generation store, according to some, is fully integrated with technology.

Demandware eCommerce founder Stephan Schambach is back with a new creation that is mobile first.  Forget eCommerce, it is now all mobile all the time. Everything done on your phone.  Pay, order, delivery, all integrated for the convenience of the customer and whatever retailers or manufacturers sign up.

They just earned a big round of funding so keep an eye on them.

Read more here:

http://www.xconomy.com/boston/2017/07/18/newstore-rings-up-50m-to-help-retailers-win-mobile-influence/

Next up is some thoughts on what the next generation store looks like.

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

The iPhone at 10 Years Old - It Begins

We will be seeing a bunch of these articles as the 10 year anniversary approaches.

I have one phone from each major update, including a working original iPhone.  I have the Game 4 from the 2004 ALCS MLB game between Boston and New York on it that I pull up some times.

Good little read here to see how far the smartphone has come:

https://www.cnet.com/news/using-the-2007-iphone-in-2017/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

Target to Incorporate Cartwheel in to their Core App

Bye bye Cartwheel.

If you aren't familiar with it, and shop at Target, you should be.  This great little experiment really opened up Target as a leader in digital interactions with customers, especially in-store.  I've also spent some time with the Cartwheel team and can say they are passionate about what they do, and do it well.

Well enough it is time to pull it up to the mothership.

Target is pulling Cartwheel in to the main Target App and will sunset Cartwheel as a stand-alone.  This was inevitable if Cartwheel were a success so I'm sure this is bitter sweet for the team.  Better for the average Target customer, to be sure.

Read on:

https://techcrunch.com/2017/06/09/target-and-cartwheel-apps-to-merge-starting-this-summer-mobile-payments-and-improved-maps-to-follow/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant

BRotD - Entry 0252 Google's Mobile Behaviors Analysis

Best Reading of the Day

Google is out with another excellent study that is worth your time.  Here's the title:

The Consumer Behaviors Shaping the Next Generation of Mobile Experiences

Now if that doesn't sell you on the read I ... why are you here?

No reason to quote more on this one, just go read it:

https://www.thinkwithgoogle.com/advertising-channels/mobile/consumer-behavior-mobile-digital-experiences/

Happy Reading,

J.W. Gant