E-commerce Mobile App Development For Business [Cost & Features]

After the covid pandemic e-commerce mobile app development is a must-have asset for your business. In the recent scenario, there is a significant demand for mobile applications for businesses or companies due to the explosion of smartphones and how users reach the network to conduct purchases.

For conducting any online marketing strategy effectively, you need proficient mobile applications to do the job. Consumption habits are completely changed among users. The internet is accessed the most through smartphones. This tendency among the users has accelerated the development of multiple mobile applications for business owners to ensure their market positioning.

Any company needs to define a strategy and business identity which goes through having an internet presence with the help of a web page and opening up to the virtual world with social networks. However, the story doesn’t just end here.

Companies and businesses in today’s scenario need to give their best short when it comes to sales and marketing. They have to adapt to the present and obvious future of E-Commerce nature for maintaining the formidable market position and make investments in the development process of a custom mobile-based application for their respective businesses. In this blog, you will find a complete guide on how to develop an e-commerce mobile app for your business.

Having said that, it is quite clear that mobile marketing has become one of the most promising strategies of marketing and everlasting members of business investments.

E-Commerce Mobile App Development Helps in Achieving A Promising Market Presence

We cannot imagine our lives without the usage of mobile phone devices. Even surviving for one day without smartphones is next to impossible for us. This draws us to a concrete conclusion that if your product or brand gets displayed on someone’s smartphone 24*7, then there are high chances that it will lead towards a conversion. So e-commerce mobile app development can help you in branding your business.

Some mobile applications have undoubtedly become indispensable in our lives. We are totally dependent upon these applications to complete our day-to-day tasks both official and personal. Hence, whether you are a small scale, medium scale or a large scale business enterprise, you must capitalize on this user’s behavior to maximize the reach for your brand. In simple words, having a personalized mobile app is always beneficial for your business as you will be present on your potential customer’s smartphone and increasing your chances of sales.

Successful business models in the past had followed a concrete policy of strategic digital marketing to reap the fruit of success. This was made possible as mobile applications act as an indispensable tool and great support for customer care both for the relationship and contact with employees and customers as well as for their overall development.

Every business that wants to stay competitive and make a mark in the industry must invest in the development of a mobile application as it can significantly add value to your business to get ahead of your competitors at a big margin.

How E-Commerce Mobile App Development Can Add Value to Your Brand?

Having mere a website for businesses is just not enough in today’s digitally-driven scenario. There are tons of advantages to having an on-demand mobile app for e-commerce websites to target clients anytime and anywhere.

Transform the User Experience

In this modern era, customers demand a consistent and personalized experience throughout their journey with a brand. And that is not feasible with just having a website for your brand to interact with your customers. If you want to create a repeat value so that your customers get back to you again and again, then mobile apps can be a great medium.

With the power of emerging technologies like AI, ML, VR, and AR, combined in a mobile E-Commerce App, you can gather fruitful insights concerning your potential customers such as:

• Your users’ preference as in what time of the day they make a decision to buy your product?
• How much time do they take to decide about the final purchase?

Once you have all this relevant information with you, you can offer your customers an optimized shopping experience to maximize your sales.

Direct-to-Customer Marketing Channel

Today customers are 24*7 connected with the brands with the help of mobile phone devices. These mobile gadgets have also changed the way people interact with brands, acquire information, and do purchases. Undoubtedly customers are using mobile devices to perform shopping and business units must integrate these mobile devices into their marketing strategy. This inclusion can change the interaction between the brand and consumers.

Now the connected customers must be targeted in an effective manner. These connected customers can become a conversion in brands that offer consistent and steady involvement via mobile eCommerce. The E-Commerce apps not only help users to stay connected with the brand but can also be used for delivering deals, offers and coupons to the uses efficiently and effectively.

Better Rate of Conversion

It is very clear that Mobile E-Commerce apps drive higher conversion rates. In the end, this is the only thing that matters because it can lead to conversions and generating revenue for the company.

Hence, if you too have an E-Commerce business and you are still figuring out whether to have a mobile app or not, then for maximizing your conversion rate, you must go with this option. When customers decide to purchase a product they want a smooth non-interrupting method to execute their purchases. For that, you need a mobile application, and here are the reasons why:

• Mobile applications are enriched with features like push notifications that assist greatly in conversions.
• Mobile applications can use the device’s features like GPS, Microphone, and Camera for placing orders.
• In Mobile applications, you can save all your information like your credit card or debit card info for easy and smooth transactions

The application also allows you a feature where you can integrate mobile wallet apps in your E-Commerce app for making the checkout process a one-step-game. This allows the user to enter as minimum information as possible while performing the checkout process. Therefore, we can say that this is seen as one of the best ways to increase the overall profitability of the business. You might be interested to know the conversion optimization tips for your E-Commerce site.

Better Efficiency Leads to Increased Revenues

It is easy to manage mobile apps due to their user-friendliness. Despite the fact, you have to spend some pennies in developing your application if you want to satisfy your customers’ needs and increase the sale significantly. This is because a good mobile application brings more customers due to its remarkable functionality. This tends to lead to more profit.

Another tool is to push notifications which helps to maintain the brand reputation and increases the sales revenue. Push notifications help in instantly delivering the information to the customers to encourage them for purchases.

Strategic Brand Marketing

You can easily increase your brand’s online visibility and that’s one of the most important reasons why people go for Mobile eCommerce app development. As we all love to spend time on mobile phones, it is easier for the brands to conduct strategic mobile marketing by using an E-Commerce platform via mobile.

But it is not that easy to connect with your customers. For that, the brands need to provide a seamless mobile app experience that users love. This is mainly because the app cannot look clumsy in the eyes of a user. It should look neat, clean, and easy to access.

According to Statista, more than 35% of app users remove the app from their devices if they find it difficult to use. This is a sign of bad UX which is a serious matter of concern. Hence, do all that you can to make your app look the most beautiful, smooth, and easy to operate. Apply smart branding tactics with appealing UI/UX designs for creating a lasting impression on mobile customers.

Also, give utmost emphasis to answering the queries of all your customers as an effective way of your eCommerce app branding. The more the brand is familiar with its customers, the better it will be at answering the main points.

Saves Time

Source: https://buildfire.com/

There is no better feeling like time-saving as time means money. Depending upon your target audience, you need to count every moment while framing your marketing strategy as there are some categories whose attention span is very small. Say for example if your audience is Millenials or Gen Z. Then you need to take utmost care in framing your marketing strategy.

As per Google, the bounce rate of a website gets worse with every second it takes for page loading. The report also says that the landing page takes at least 22 seconds for complete loading. 53% of users close the page if the mobile takes more than 3 seconds to load. This is a big thing to worry about.

The solution to this problem is a robust Mobile eCommerce app. Applications on mobile load 1.5 times faster as compared to eCommerce websites. Further, data retrieval is also very easy in mobile apps which engages the customers by providing them with a seamless experience overall. This saves a lot of time for the customers.

Loyal Customer Base

Mobile applications have a vital role in establishing a strong bond between the brand and customers. The traditional methods of marketing are mostly outdated. Mobile marketing is the next big thing and the hottest topic. Mobile E-Commerce apps nowadays can save businesses by helping the brands knowing their customers better by staying closer to them within just a couple of taps.

One thing needs to be noted that your app should act as a mirror for your brand. This means that it should provide all the necessary information to the customers and motivate them to make purchases. Here are some of the ways that might help you in boosting customer loyalty with the help of a mobile eCommerce app:

• Use push notifications for communicating with your customers to tell them regarding things like sales offers, discounts, and other important information related to the stock.
• If you focus on designing and creating a layout for your app that is appealing and engaging, you can create a consistent brand value for your product.
• You can provide a customization feature where your customers can do things like including prioritized features and relevant suggestions based on their searches and purchases.
• It is always a good option to formulate a strong and seamless method of communication between customers and your brand to solve their queries via chat or call.

Do something which forces the customer to keep coming back to you again and again. This could be offering them time-to-time offers, discounts or it could be some other loyalty programs where you give premium memberships to your old customers.

Also Read: Benefits of Choosing Magento eCommerce Development Platform for Online Store

Top 5 Futuristic Trends for E-Commerce Mobile App

For making your mCommerce app ready for the future, let’s say for the next 4 to 5 years, there are some important features that you must add to it for generating conversions. Here are those 5 essential eCommerce mobile app features to stand out in the market:

Social Commerce

You must have noticed that some social media platforms like Instagram allow their users to checkout without even leaving the app. This particular feature comes under Social Commerce and can make mCommerce even bigger and pleasing for consumers in the upcoming years.

Here are some statistics that prove the point:

• Social media is responsible for more than 43% of the searches to purchase products.
• Around 37% claim that they purchased something from social media.
• 56% say that they are surfing Facebook for holiday shopping ideas.
• 55% claim that they did purchases when they discovered a product on social media.

Hence, if you want to make your E-Commerce business competitive, it is necessary to give it a touchup of social media. Through this, you can create a serious impact on your overall audience with an increased customer engagement rate, better brand promotion, and higher return on investment.

Voice Shopping

You can learn in detail about voice shopping here. As per a survey, the industry of voice shopping apps is expected to increase from $2 Billion in 2018 to $40 Billion in 2022. It is surely going to be among the top trends. Here are the top 3 benefits that voice technology will provide to mCommerce:

• Convenience: Voice Searches are much more convenient as compared to text searches as customers find it easier.
• Speed: This feature will provide results quickly as searching with voice is faster than typing.
• Adaptability: According to ComScore, 50% of all searches will be voice by the end of 2020. This is an indication that people are loving this feature.

There are multiple ways businesses can use this technology. So this means that the feature is not just confined to searches, but far more than that in the upcoming years. Businesses can optimize their mCommerce app by integrating several other things using voice technology like:

• Making a purchase
• Contacting Support
• Tracking a parcel
• Making payments
• Adding items to the cart

Hence, as an eCommerce store owner, consider making voice search an important point in your to-do bucket list for providing your customers with a seamless shopping experience.

Mobile Chatbots

Well, it’s not a recent trend as many firms used to use it. But the future tells us that their use in mCommerce apps is supposed to enhance for performing various functions. Here are some tools for your eCommerce apps benefit:

• Higher user engagement of mCommerce applications by forming communication with various customers at one time.
• Smart personalization with improved CX while communicating with the customers.
• Seamless support at all hours of the day to resolve queries and complaints.
• Better customer analysis in terms of likes dislikes, or preferences to improve recommendations.
• Time and cost-saving in terms of hiring a human customer support executive.

OmniChannel Experience

As the E-Commerce industry is facing tough competition, brands are now promoting sales on multiple channels like websites, mobile apps, mobile websites, or physical stores. All these channels must provide their customers with a seamless experience. For instance, if a customer adds an item to the cart then it should not be deleted when he opens up the e-store website.

There should be proper synchronization among all the channels with each other. Statistics suggest that around 60% of customers start shopping on one device and checkout on a different one. Also, around 80% of users consult their phones before purchasing. Now let us understand that how you can make an omniChannel strategy by using a eCommerce app.

Suppose a user searched for a product on your mCommerce app today and a day later he reaches your store. In that case, you can target the customer using a push notification as the best way to provide an OmniChannel experience you can either offer the customer a discount or simply define your product’s USPs in a brief format. Because at the end of the day, all that matters is a fantastic customer experience – be it offline or online.

Multiple Payment Options

As per Statista, the rate at which the mobile industry is growing is close to 62%. So, if you are all set to launch your mCommerce app for your eStore, then make sure to add multiple payment gateways or mobile wallets in your application. Customers nowadays are widely using mobile wallets like Apple pay, Android Pay, or Google pay.

These payment methods are safe as well as quick at the same time. Often we see that issues like re-entering the card details, again and again, complete lead to losing a potential customer. These methods act as a breeze of fresh air to offer customers a smooth and uninterrupted experience.

How to Develop an E-Commerce Mobile App?

Here are the steps for teaching you how to develop an E-Commerce Mobile app for your business:

Understanding Your Market

Always conduct a thorough research about your market before e-commerce mobile app development. There are some important questions to which you must find answers like who is your target audience? What are their age and location demographics? What are their likes and dislikes? What products are they using currently? All these data will help you create the best app possible. Therefore, always do your homework and give your best shot in understanding the taste of the audience by knowing about your market, finding out your goals, knowing about user demands, and so on.

Decide Your Business Model

It is very important that you decide what should be your business model before developing your E-Commerce app. These apps generally have one out of the following two types of business models and they are B2C (Business to Consumer) and B2B (Business to Business). Let’s discuss them one by one.

B2C Model – This is a very common approach in which anything you buy in an E-Commerce store online is a part of a B2C transaction. Some of its popular examples include Wal-Mart, Wish, and GAP.

B2B Model – Under this model, an eCommerce business sells its products or services to another company online. Under this, the buyer often resells the purchased item to the consumer, and sometimes the buyer is the end-user. One such example enterprise eCommerce platforms like Boeing.

Choose Your Tech Stack

This step involves deciding what technologies you’ll use for developing an eCommerce app. This decision is very critical as it will highly impact your eCommerce mobile app development cost. For example, if you want a better reach in less time and you have a limited budget, you should go with cross-platform app development or if you want performance over cost then native app development should be your pick. Lastly, try to find out which device is most popular among your target audience and in the geographical area you are looking forward to launching your app.

Find An Appropriate E-Commerce App Development Company

Then this step comes when you find an appropriate eCommerce app development company for your project. While choosing the company, you should always ensure that the organization holds expertise in delivering quality-oriented solutions to customers worldwide. You can do a pre-check by checking the portfolio, talking to their clients, enquiring about their development process, and finding out how proficient they are in integrating emerging technologies in such a dynamic industry.

The NineHertz is one such company, that is well versed in delivering outstanding digital customer experiences all around the globe. We have an experienced team that can work committedly towards making your dream come true in exchange for a very nominal price.

E-Commerce Mobile App Development Features (​Basics)

E-Commerce Mobile App Features of Admin Panel

• Dashboard Administration
• Login Input including Login ID & Password
• Control of Product category/subcategory
• Manage Users (Consumer/Seller)
• Manage Promotions, Bonuses, Tips

E-Commerce Mobile App Features of Customer Panel

• Product Listing & Categorization
• Product Cataloging (Image & Video Gallery)
• Product Wishlist Portion
• Product Comparison Tool
• Personalized Returns & Notifications

Features of Vendor Panel

• Managing Lists & Orders
• Registration/Login Access
• Set-up & Control of Multiple Stores
• Live Subscription Plan
• Automated adjustment of Inventory on marketing

ECommerce Mobile App Features (Advance)

Ecommerce mobile app development features gives a pleasant look to the users and makes the app easier to use. Every e-commerce app has its basic features but if you want to make your app unique and loveable by users, you will have to add some advanced and unique features that make your app different from other e-commerce platforms. So, here we mention some amazing features that you must add to your app for making it more unique.

Social Media Login, Signup Option

Integrating social media in your e-commerce app helps users easily access your app without any problem. This is the advanced feature by which your users can like your app as they don’t have to remember another id and password.

Not only this, integrating social media gives added benefits like the users can also share their discount codes or promotional campaigns directly on their social media. This will build your brand’s goodwill and also help in attracting a wide range of customers.

Quick and Easy Registration Process

Usually, the registration process of any e-commerce app is too long and complex. This may irritate users and lead them to jump out of your app. So it is suggested to keep your registration process easy so that users can easily access your app without any problem.

Push Notifications

Push notification is the latest trend that many m-commerce applications use to initiate their sales. This is the most popular and effective way to let the users know about what’s going on in your app. This is basically a kind of notification that appears on the user’s screen whenever anything new happens in your app like if there is any sale on any product, if any new product is launched, etc.

Real-time Analytics

Real-time analytics give you valuable information about your eCommerce application. It dispenses real-time data of your mobile app regarding activities, online users, most trending things or services obtained, most productive regions, and many more. By knowing this you can make your marketing strategy accordingly to the users needs and wants,

Chatbot Integration

The chatbot is the latest technology that makes your app more interactive and attractive looking. It is mainly included to answer some questions asked by customers. It is best if you have a lack of time and human resources.

Filters and Search Options

It is also one of the must-have ecommerce mobile app features in today’s eCommerce app. There are millions of goods present on an e-commerce app and exploring for the appropriate product may demand hours or maybe even days. So to save the precious time of users, filters and search options make things easily available for the users.

Multiple Payment Gateways

Every customer has different methods by which they can pay for their product after buying it from an eCommerce app. So it’s your responsibility to make things available and feasible to every customer. Attaching multiple payment gateways ensures that the users can choose the payment method according to their convenience.

ECommerce Mobile App Development Cost

The average close of developing an eCommerce app lies between $5,000 and $ 200,000. However, there are so many factors that are present that you should consider while estimating the ecommerce mobile app development cost. Some of the main factors that your take in mind are:

• List of Features
• UI/UX design complexity
• Targeted Platform
• Maintenance of app
• Experience of Developer

The eCommerce mobile app development cost also varies according to the location of the developer. Now let’s take a quick sight at the pricing of different locations as (per hour rate):

• USA and Canada: $50 to $250
• India and Indonesia: $10-$80
• The UK and Western Europe: $35 to $170
• Australia and New Zealand: $50 to $150
• Eastern Europe, like Ukraine: $20 to $150

Final Words

In the end, it’s correct to say that with all the above-given reasons, a Mobile eCommerce app is a boon for your online businesses in this technologically driven scenario. This is because it has the power to engage more users to connect the dots of your business with its target audience. Hence, if you want your business to be successful, you must emphasize building an eCommerce mobile app to reap the fruit of success. Hope this article will be of some value to you. That’s for you reading it till the end. All the best!