Archive for the ‘Mobile Marketing’ Category
The proliferation of smart phones make mobile computing the fastest growing online space. Accessing the web from mobile phones offers a different experience compared to traditional desktop computing, and brands that refuse to customise, ignoring this crucial differentiation lose out.
The mobile user accesses information either through the web browser or by downloading an app. The popularity of both these methods place businesses in a dilemma over whether to develop a mobile website or custom app. Both have their pros and cons.
An app scores over a mobile website in many ways:
- An app is available on the phone at any time at the click of a button, whereas accessing a website requires an active internet connection and typing in the address or multiple clicks
- The use of native code ensure high performance for apps, unlike a website where performance depends on many factors such as internet speed and server load
- Apps are easy to find in the app store and easy to locate in the phone whereas website visibility depends on fickle search engine rankings. Storing the website address or even placing a bookmark remains relatively complex compared to the straightforward access of an app.
For all these advantages, mobile apps also has some glaring disadvantages:
- Unlike websites available across platforms or phones, apps works only on the specific platform for which it was developed. Businesses wanting their apps across all possible phones face the Herculean task of developing separate apps for the hundreds of platforms in vogue
- Unlike a freely available website, the customer has to download an app specifically
Overall, the drawbacks of the apps become the advantages of the website and vice versa. Websites remain platform independent, and since one version works across all platforms and phones, is faster, easier and cheaper to develop. Moreover, unlike apps which remains static unless the user downloads an update, the website is dynamic and the changes made to the server reflects instantly on all mobiles next time they access the page.
Mobile websites however do face some serious drawbacks, much more than what traditions websites designed for the desktops face. An app may access all features of the phone, such as the camera, which remain off limits for the website. Moreover, charging users for accessing a website is hard, but monetising an app is easy.
Businesses faced with the dilemma of whether to prioritise a mobile website or custom app would do well to opt for the website. All these drawbacks of the website notwithstanding, any customer wanting to know more about a brand almost always look up a search engine rather than enter the app store. This and the fact that it becomes virtually impossible to have apps for all possible platforms make websites a better bet. New technology allows the embedding of a website in an app, offering the best of both worlds.
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