Being a serial-entrepreneur myself, I love seeing companies who dare to be the first to go after a new market. Companies who will take the shot and risk failure – or make it big.
And mobile is a new market, by all means. Outside of Japan, commercial transaction volumes using a mobile for anything but ringtones and wallpapers are more or less negligible. In fact, I think one of the key reasons why m-commerce is still considered a new market – despite having been technically viable for at least 10 years – while e-commerce has prospered, is that people have insisted on treating mobile as “just another web browser”.
But mobile is different. There is the obvious case of the significantly smaller screen, which makes it important to prioritize harder which content to display. There is also the lack of quick text input methods which makes any kind of forms a sure conversion rate killer. And don’t forget the camera, or the ability to call or text anyone you want.
Finally, there is the difference in context. Web usage is often planned – you are sitting down to perform a task – while mobile usage is driven by the moment – you are bored, or you have an impulse urge. Computers are sometimes shared, mobiles are very much personal. By releasing mobile stores that are just mobile browser-enabled versions of their standard web stores, many retailers may be missing out on the opportunities that mobile offers.
However, that does not mean everything is new. Some old tricks still work just fine. In fact, as the case of Bokus’ mobile store project shows, they are even more valuable in a mobile context.
Such as strong merchandising: delivering a shopping experience with excellent support for product discovery, up-selling and cross-selling. Because the screen is so small, because adding another product and checking out takes effort, mobile is where displaying the right product at the right time – and nothing else – is the most essential.
After all, the mobile phone is a personal tool, so why shouldn’t you expect a personal shop in it?