We are experiencing a quantum shift where most online businesses are transitioning their online platforms from websites to mobile. And the best way to penetrate the mobile market is to have a native mobile app of your own.
This is happening due to the rapid technological advancements, where more and more customers are now accessing the web from their mobile platforms than computer systems. And every business wants to be where their customers are.
This trend has created a huge demand for mobile apps in the industry and online businesses, especially within the online retail and e-Commerce businesses where companies are building mobile applications of their own.
If you run an online business, especially in the retail domain, then it is highly recommended that you consider building a mobile application for yourself. The benefits that you can reap are plenty, especially if you own a WooCommerce website on the WordPress platform. This is because there are more than 78 million e-Commerce stores running on WooCommerce and most WooCommerce stores are looking to build a WooCommerce native app for their online business.
Building a mobile application can really be a turning point in the growth journey for your business. As a business manager, you can convert your website into Android & iOS apps without coding. Even if you lack technical skills or background, we’ve got you covered!
You don’t have to be a techie in order to manage your business app and let that not be a hindrance to your success. In this article, we discuss how you can build, manage, and grow your business with your own mobile application, that too without any coding skills or technical expertise at hand.
In this blog
- Establish ground zero
- Strategize to victory
- Establish requirements and expectations
- Set yourself up for victory!
- How to enhance app performance?
Establish ground zero
The first step is to establish the ground zero for your business to exactly know where you stand. List down the resources that you currently have at hand. Once this has been established, you can then decide on the strategy going ahead.
Ask yourself if can you do it on your own? Alternatively, do you have an in-house technical team for app development in your office to make your own app? If not a team either, then do you have a few resources that can get this job done for you? If the answer is still no, then do not worry, in this scenario one of the best ways to succeed in this trade is by having an expert work on your idea.
Suggested Read: Top 75 mobile app statistics – Market size & usage
Strategize to victory
Now that you have established your ground zero, you can now strategize the way forward. You will now have to decide on how to get your mobile app built and what is the best way to get it done. Whom to contact and in what scenario.
Your goal should be to get the best solution with the least amount of investment. Let’s discuss the options that you have going forward.
1. In-House Team
You have three options going ahead, the first and most tiresome option is to hire experts and build an in-house team for your business. This team will then work on building your mobile app for you.
While this sounds like a nice idea but involves a heavy investment of time, money, and infrastructure on your part. Investments will include the time taken in the hiring process, the monetary investments in terms of employee salaries and other infrastructural resources, time taken to build your app from scratch and the anomalies that creep in with the human resources, untimely leaves, switching jobs and list is endless.
This is not a viable solution especially for a small to medium-sized business as you should focus on getting the maximum returns in the minimum possible investment.
2. Outsource the job
The second option here is to outsource your work to experts, while this involves a lot fewer efforts and gets the job done without the hassles presented in the first option, however, there is a catch here as well.
When you outsource your work to an app development agency or freelancers, you lose control over what you exactly want, when you need it and it may overshoot your budgets just like the first option. Your hired experts may quote an unreasonable amount of time to build you an app, as that increases the hours to increase their pays and eventually burn a hole in your pocket.
The above options only add to your expenditures of the returns they offer and are not a viable option, especially for a business that has just started out.
3. Online App Builder Solutions
But do not worry, there is a third option that takes care of all the above for you. This option is to go for a WooCommerce mobile app builder, which is the easiest way to build an app. These come with the perks of digital agencies without the heavy investment of both time and money. The best app builders will offer you a premium native mobile app, with a quick delivery time and that too on a very reasonable budget.
That being said, there a few different app builder services in the market and not everyone offers you the same features. And you should be mindful before zeroing in on the best app creator for your business amongst all solution providers, as the quality of the mobile app will greatly determine your customer satisfaction, and eventually the success of your business.
With multiple mobile app builders out there, zeroing in on one can be a difficult choice, as building a for your business is a big investment. Your app will the face of your business for your customers, your mobile app will represent your business and therefore, should be so good that it leaves an everlasting impression on your customers.
Suggested Read: Ideal time and cost you should spend on a WooCommerce app
Do not worry, we will help you select the best app builder in the market today, and for this, you must set your requirements down very clearly.
Let’s discuss this in detail in the next segment.
Establish requirements and expectations
Now that you have decided that you want to convert your WooCommerce website to a mobile app, you must clearly lay down your macro and micro requirements with your mobile app so that you have your expectations in front of you at all times.
This will help you map your progress and results with the mobile application that you get. Below are some of the features that your mobile application must-have for a successful venture.
Suggested Read: Essential features of an engaging WooCommerce mobile app
1. Native Mobile App
There are a few different types of mobile apps like web view, hybrid app, and native apps. Most app builders offer you a mobile app wrapper. What this does is that it wraps your website in a wrapper that simply just opens your website on mobile. This is equivalent to opening your website in a mobile browser. These are called hybrid apps and you should stay away from these solutions for multiple reasons.
You must go for a native mobile application to offer your customers a premium user experience. Customers will install and stay on your app only if you offer them an experience that they fall in love with. And this is possible only with a native mobile application.
Some app makers also call their offering a native app, but it is only a native app wrapper that presents your website inside an app with some app-like features such as device contacts, camera, push notifications, etc. Therefore, you must do thorough research before taking the deep dive.
But do not worry, there are a few app makers online that offer premium service and native mobile apps for the same, if not less required investment. This article aims to guide you to select a premium and truly native app builder for your business for the best user experience.
2. Coding Requirements
Ensure that the app builder that you select doesn’t require you to code anything. Because that defeats the purpose of going for an online app maker.
There are a few app builders online that have coding requirements from their users and do not offer premium services for the investment that they charge.
3. Multiple Payment Gateways
Most app makers online, offer you only one payment gateway to integrate with your business via your app, that too this payment gateway is not of your choice but a pre-defined payment gateway that the app builder service must have a pact with.
You must select an app builder solution provider that gives you the freedom to integrate whichever and how many ever payment gateways that you like. This is essential to build trust between you and customers and ensure secure transactions.
4. Free Demo & Trial
Always select an app maker that offers you a free demo of their services. This will ensure that all your expectations are being met even before you invest a dime in their services.
Avoid investing your resources in an app maker solution provider that doesn’t offer you any free demo or trial.
5. Apps in-sync with the website
You must ensure that the mobile application your app builder builds for you is always in sync with your website. Your mobile applications must always stay in sync with your websites and any modifications you make on your website should automatically reflect on your app. Any design changes you make on one page should automatically reflect on all your app screens.
Otherwise, you will have to submit an update on app stores every time you make any change on your website.
6. Flexible Pricing
Finally, you must go for an app maker that offers flexible pricing options and that can fit in your budget very easily. Remember that our goal is to get the best returns for our investment. An easy subscription plan is the most flexible option that you can go for, which doesn’t burden you with the huge cost of starting an app.
These are some of the features that you must have in your mobile application to ensure success in your business.
Suggested Read: How much does it cost to make a mobile app?
The WooCommerce app builder by AppMySite offers all these features and more, that too for a very reasonable price and flexible and easy subscription plans. Learn more about the flexible pricing plans here
App My Site is the best native app builder in the market today, with its innovative solution that is well suited for both big and small businesses alike, easily outshine and outranks all the other app builders in the market today.
Learn more about the features offered by AppMySite here. AppMySite offers you a complete Premium and Native Mobile App that if fully dynamic in nature.
Set yourself up for victory!
Building a premium mobile application for your website is a great start for your new venture in the m-Commerce space, but it is only half the battle won. To ensure a glorious victory for your business, you must market your application well. The right promotion and marketing strategies are the missing pieces of this puzzle.
Let’s discuss how you can best promote your new WooCommerce mobile app to reach an untapped customer base and grow revenue.
1. Define your target audience
The very first step of any marketing strategy is to define who your target audience is, and it should be the same for you. Good news for you is that your business already has an audience for your existing WooCommerce website and you plan on reaching a much wider audience with your mobile application when you turn your website into a mobile app.
You must define this new audience, who they are, what they do, where do they hangout and what platforms they use both online and offline. This will really help you understand your target customer base and help to strategize your marketing plans which are discussed further.
The goal of every marketing plan should be to reach the correct customer with the least amount of efforts and in the quickest time possible. And a well-defined target customer helps you do just that!
2. Have a winning ASO Strategy
ASO or App Store Optimisation is the process of optimizing a mobile app in order to get the maximum visibility in the app stores. This results in higher rankings, increased downloads and the highest conversion rate to install in the app stores.
ASO is also known as App Store SEO, which is the best way to achieve high rankings on the app store. Optimise your App Store Page with the right keywords in the app name, short description and long description.
Perform a thorough keyword and market research for the best keywords and keyword combination for your application content.
App My Site also offers the best in class ASO services that you can avail to set yourself up for success!
3. Utilise your competitive advantage
As you already have a running online business on your WooCommerce website, you should use that as your competitive advantage over others to get the initial traffic on your mobile application.
Encourage your existing customers to download and use your app for all their purchases. Additionally, motivate them to give your app 5-star reviews that will greatly boost your rankings on the app store.
Offer them discounts and deals on downloading your mobile application and leaving a positive review.
Suggested Read: How to Get Existing Customers to Install Your New App
4. Press release
Get in touch with multiple press release and media companies that can give you a stellar review for your mobile application on their platform. This one activity can get you a lot of visibility. A good press release can promote your business like no other paid platform.
However, do keep in mind that this can be a paid or free promotion both. More often than not, the better press release platforms are usually paid.
Press release can be online and offline. In case of online press release, do take care that you get a do-follow backlink from the media agency which will greatly boost your search engine rankings.
5. Optimise Website UX
Optimise your website to prompt app downloads. Include app download buttons on your main banners of the website. Additionally, include pop-ups in your website to remind your users to switch to mobile applications.
Include links to your mobile applications customer receipts and invoices. And offer discounts and deals on app downloads to the existing users of your website.
This will automatically promote your app download numbers as customers will be prompted to download the mobile application frequently.
6. Email Marketing
Email marketing is a highly cost-effective method of marketing your products and services to your audience. The best of the companies utilises email marketing to promote their products and encourage sales.
Email marketing helps you build meaningful relationships with your audience. It allows you to create targeted and personalised messages. It also the improves response rates to your direct marketing campaigns. And best of all, managing an email campaign is easier than most people imagine.
However, it is important not to overuse email marketing. Receiving marketing emails can irritate people if it is irrelevant, too frequent or unwanted.
7. Offer Incentives
When it comes to motivating your audience, incentives can work wonders! Offer Incentives to your customers for purchase on your mobile application.
These incentives can be discounts on first purchase and other referral programs to promote app downloads. They could also cater to getting better discounts or winning extra deals on your customers favourite products or festive discounts.
Incentivising app downloads will greatly motivate your existing audience to switch to your mobile application.
8. Articles and Blogs
Writing informative and entertaining articles and blogs is a great way to keep your audience engaged. Regularly publishing blogs keeps your audience coming back for more.
You must offer great value and relevant insights to your customers through your blogs. The more value you put out to your audience, the more you will get back in return. This increases your websites session rates and customer returns. Which eventually brings up your search engine rankings.
The more webpages you have, the better your domain ranking gets. Improved domain ranking improves search engine rankings which in turn results in more audience that you attract. Having an active audience on your blogs can be utilised very smartly to promote your products.
This activity alone can greatly boost the performance of your website and mobile applications both. With AppMySite, all the new and old blogs on your website reflect on your mobile applications as well. Your audience will now be able to read what you share from the comfort of their mobile phones.
Additionally, you must write small and big articles for other websites as well. Make sure that these websites are from your specific domain industry and request do-follow backlinks. This will greatly improve your visibility on the world wide web.
9. Leverage Social Media
The power of social media is unprecedented. A good social media presence can really do wonders for your business. It is one of the best ways to reach your customers today as almost everyone is on one social media if not many. You can reach them through multiple platforms at the same time with your social media.
Select the top social media platforms where your audience spends the most time. Analyse your social media interactions to improve upon with time.
Social media posts and stories can be a great way to gain eyeballs and promote your products. Be it attractive images, videos, articles or a promotional post, couple them with the correct hashtags and have a winning strategy in your arsenal.
You can also create a viral campaign for your business that can give a greater visibility and branding for your business. Be consistent with your approach. Regular attractive posts and live videos are some of the better options to leverage the true power of social media. Remember that a live video always takes precedence over regular videos.
10. Influencer Marketing and Ambassadors
Influencers today are playing a key role in marketing. Gone are the days when companies had to hire celebrities and high-end models to create awareness for your brand. In this age of social media, social media influencers have become a great source of creating awareness for your brand and advertising your products.
Studies have shown that an average customer is more likely to buy a product when referred to by a friend or an influencer than advertised by a celebrity. This opens a lot of doors for you as a business as it is way more cost-effective to hire an influencer to promote your product than having a high-end celebrity making advertisements for you.
11. Advertisements
Leverage the power of paid ads wisely! Paid advertisements are like a double-edged sword, it can do wonders for you when done right, otherwise, it can seriously damage your budgets when the ads go wrong.
To ensure success with paid ads, do your research on your target audience, market and keywords. Analyse and decide what to promote, where and when to really extract the most juice from your paid ads. Get help from experts if need be.
Paid ads on around festive seasons can gather a large audience for your business and can enhance your revenue growth.
You can either run your ads on search engines like Google, Yahoo and Bing or other social media platforms like Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram and many more. That being said, to get the most bang for your buck, you must analyse and understand where your audience spends the most time.
12. Gamification
Gamification as a concept is very new in the marketing industry but is being hailed as the next big thing. What this simply means is that you modify your user experience to create a game-like environment.
Set milestones for customers which motivates them to make more purchases and spend more time on your mobile app. There should be a pre-defined reward for your customers on achieving every milestone. Every activity or purchase on your mobile app should be a step closer to the next milestone. And every time a customer sets a new record, they should be rewarded.
This will not only motivate your customers to make more purchases but will also sky-rocket your sales and customer retention rates!
Gamification converts their shopping experience into a game-like environment where they strive harder to win. Which eventually results in greater customer retention and sales.
13. Video Marketing
Another marketing methodology that is hot in the industry today is Video Marketing. Videos market much more than just content or a blog. Even Google gives preference to a video over a webpage or a blog in its search results.
As part of your regular marketing campaign, creating a YouTube channel and regular postings can do wonders for you. Having a solid subscriber base on YouTube gives you a very lucrative platform to promote you promote and business.
You must also create a short demo video explaining your app’s main features, designs, and highlights to directly communicate the value to your users.
YouTube is the second largest search engine after Google, therefore, ranking well on YouTube certainly means enhanced visibility, that results in an exponential growth in your sales and revenues. Additionally, since Google is the parent company of YouTube, greater engagement on your YouTube videos and channel improves the chances of you ranking higher on Google as well.
14. Word of mouth
Finally, the last but definitely not the least marketing methodology in this list is word of mouth. This age-old phenomenon has the potential to outrank all other promotional activities and will get you the most traffic.
People tend to trust others experience over any other advertisement, once someone gets a good review about your product, they are most likely to purchase it. And this chain continues. Word of mouth can even spread like wildfire.
To promote word of mouth, encourage your customers to leave a good review for your app on the app store. Frequent pop ups and push notifications can do the trick. Introduce ambassador programs and referral programs to your customers, make them the ambassadors of your product and motivate them to refer your app to their friends and family.
Suggested Read: Best ways to promote mobile app from your website
These are the top marketing & promotional methods that you must adopt to grow your arsenal. Implementing the above strategies well would invariably lead to a great marketing & branding success for your business on mobile apps.
How to enhance app performance?
The sections above explain the advantages of using an online app maker to create an app. One key lesson you need to remember while using online app makers is the importance of a good web host. This is because the performance of your website will have a direct impact on the app speed as well.
WP Engine is a great hosting solution for your WordPress website. It will immediately scale your website speed and additionally offer important guidance on optimizing your frontend. Over 90K clients across 140 countries trust WP Engine to provide reliable WordPress experiences.
Let’s discuss the top ways that you can implement for the best conversions from this well-earned traffic.
1. Presales and Post-sales
At the end of the day, businesses are run by the revenue that they generate. And the cycle completes only at successful sales or conversions. Offering great presales and post-sales services really have an important role to play in improving customer engagement and retention.
As part of presales and post-sales, provide them with support ticketing system or a special FAQs page that helps them resolve their basic queries. Engage them with chat support or include chat bots that take care of the chat services autonomously. Offer responsive refund and return services. The more time customers spend on your app, the more they are likely to make a purchase.
Suggested Read: Why you must have a Woocommerce app to sell more
2. Loyalty Programs
Everyone knows how important a loyal customer is for businesses, if a customer is loyal to your business, then they will always come back to you to make that purchase. A loyal customer will always choose you over your competitor even if they offer the same product or service for a relatively cheaper price, this is because humans always purchase emotionally and seldom logically.
The best way to convert more and more customers into loyal customers is to introduce a loyalty program in your business that is customised to your own customers. Most successful businesses have implemented a loyalty program for their customers in one or the another.
A loyalty program will reward your customers for every purchase they make on your websites with loyalty points. These loyalty points can then be redeemed later by your customers to make further purchases, which creates an endless funnel of product purchase that will keep your customers coming back for more and eventually result in increased revenues.
A loyalty program has really turned things around for good for so many businesses worldwide! A good loyalty and rewards program, when implemented well, can exponentially increase your customer loyalty, customer retention and customer return. Loyalty systems have also enhanced business growth and revenue returns for businesses in all industries.
Suggested Read: Best practices to build customer loyalty with mobile apps for WooCommerce
3. Data Analytics
When it comes down to understanding your audience and the performance of your own business, nothing speaks more truth than data. Data is facts and gaining insights from data is an art.
You must learn how to make the data speak to you, we don’t recommend becoming an expert in the field of data science. But equip yourself with basic data analytics tools and skills that will really provide you with great insights on your performance.
One added feature of AppMySite is that it also offers great analytical insights for you to learn more about your customers and your mobile app’s performance.
There you have it, a complete guide for business managers, from scratch to success, we discussed the best strategies from building an app to promoting it and then growing your business, with the above promotional and marketing strategies at your disposal, there is no one stopping you from becoming a success!
If you want to convert your WooCommerce website to a mobile app and are feeling overwhelmed with the available options in front of you then worry not, contact AppMySite today, and our growth advisors will get in touch with you to guide you towards a smooth transition.
Get premium mobile applications for your online business on WooCommerce and give your customers an experience like never before! Visit www.AppMySite.com today!