The Age-Old Challenge of Wayfinding

Wayfinding is a term that has been introduced previously. It refers to the methods and tools we use to navigate complex environments. Think of the signs at an airport, the maps in a shopping mall, or even the breadcrumbs left by Hansel and Gretel. But in today’s fast-paced world, traditional signs just don’t cut it anymore, especially in hotels, where guests want to maximize their stay without getting lost.

Mobile Apps: The Modern Compass

Personalized and timely communication is essential for providing a positive pre-arrival experience. Endeavor to reach out to guests to welcome them, confirm their reservation, and provide them with information about your hotel and its amenities.

• Personalized Navigation: Imagine an app that not only tells you where your room is but also suggests the quickest route to the pool, gym, or dining area based on your preferences. Personalization is key!
• Instant Updates: No more outdated signs or maps. Mobile apps can be updated in real time, ensuring guests always have the most accurate information.
• Interactive Experience: With augmented reality (AR) and virtual reality (VR) features, some apps offer an immersive experience, allowing guests to “walk through” the hotel before even stepping out of their room.

The Impact on Guest Experience

Guest experience is at the heart of the hospitality industry. Hotels that understand and prioritize it always stand out. How does wayfinding via mobile apps enhance this experience?

• Reduced Stress: No one likes getting lost. Mobile apps ensure guests spend less time wandering and more time enjoying their stay.
• Enhanced Engagement: With interactive features, guests can explore the hotel and its services at their own pace, increasing engagement and satisfaction.
• Tailored Recommendations: Based on a guest’s preferences, apps can suggest dining options, spa treatments, or events happening in the hotel.

The Journey of a Guest: Before, During, and After

Mobile apps aren’t just about navigating within the hotel; they play a pivotal role in the entire guest journey.

• Before Arrival: Guests can explore the hotel, check out amenities, and select their preferred room. Some apps allow for virtual tours, giving guests a sneak peek of what awaits them.
• During Stay: Apart from navigation, guests can use the app for room service, spa bookings, or to communicate with the concierge. It becomes an all-in-one tool for a hassle-free stay.
• After Departure: The journey doesn’t end at checkout. Guests can provide feedback, book their next stay, or even access loyalty programs via the app, ensuring they remain connected with the hotel.

Why Every Hotel Needs an App

In today’s digital age, having a mobile app is no longer a luxury but a necessity for hotels. Here’s why:

• Staying Ahead of the Competition: Guests expect modern amenities and digital solutions. Hotels with intuitive mobile apps stand out and attract more bookings.
• Data Insights: Mobile apps can provide valuable data on guest preferences, helping hotels improve and personalize their services.
• Increased Revenue: With features like in-app bookings, promotions, and personalized recommendations, hotels can drive more sales and increase revenue.

Challenges and Solutions

While mobile apps for wayfinding are revolutionary, they aren’t without challenges.

• Technology Integration: Integrating new apps with existing hotel systems can be complex. However, with the right tech team and robust platforms, this can be smoothly addressed.
• User Experience: A poorly designed app can be more frustrating than helpful. Hotels must invest in user-friendly designs and regular updates.
• Adoption: Convincing guests to download and use the app can take time and effort. Offering exclusive promotions or features accessible only via the app can be a solution.

Adopting the Trend: Success Stories from Leading Hotels

In the ever-evolving hospitality landscape, numerous hotels have already embraced mobile apps for wayfinding, setting benchmarks for others. Here are some success stories that highlight the transformative power of these apps:

• The Tech-Savvy Resort: A luxury resort in the Maldives introduced an app that not only provided guests with navigation but also allowed them to book private dinners on the beach, spa sessions, and even scuba diving lessons. The result? A 25% increase in their in-resort bookings and rave guest reviews about their seamless experience.
• The Urban Business Hotel: Situated in a bustling city, this hotel’s app became a lifeline for business travelers. Besides in-hotel navigation, the app offered real-time traffic updates and the best routes to the city’s business hubs. Guests appreciated this thoughtful feature, leading to a spike in repeat bookings.

These success stories underline a simple fact: when hotels align technology with guest needs, magic happens. And in this digital age, mobile apps are at the forefront of creating memorable guest experiences.

Conclusion

The role of mobile apps in revolutionizing wayfinding and enhancing guest experience in hotels cannot be understated. As technology advances and guest expectations evolve, these apps will only become more integral to the hospitality industry. Hotels that recognize and adapt to this trend will undoubtedly lead the way in offering unmatched guest experiences.

Chat with us today to discover how we can help you revolutionize your mobile app strategy in hospitality!

The post Finding Your Way to Exceptional Stays: The Mobile App Revolution in Hospitality appeared first on Phunware.

At the forefront of this revolution is the Digital Patient Experience.

The importance of the digital patient experience cannot be overstated, as it plays a pivotal role in shaping patients’ perceptions and satisfaction with their care. Hence, investment in digital solutions is reportedly an essential action for improved healthcare experience.

After all, a positive patient experience can lead to increased satisfaction, improved treatment adherence, and even better health outcomes.

In this blog post, we’ll delve into the exciting world of digital healthcare, exploring how technology is shaping how we access and manage our health. From user-friendly healthcare apps and websites to the latest trends and innovations, and the challenges that come with this digital transformation – we’ll uncover everything including the building blocks of a successful digital patient experience.

Understanding the Digital Patient Experience

Digital Patient Experience (DPE) refers to the use of digital technology for patient engagement activities that take place both inside and outside the healthcare environment. Digital patient experience enhances the journey of a patient through a healthcare organization by making the process of receiving care easier and more efficient.

Unlike traditional healthcare interactions that often involve face-to-face consultations, paperwork, and manual processes, the digital patient experience leverages technology to improve accessibility, convenience, and efficiency in healthcare delivery. 

Benefits of a Positive Digital Patient Experience

The implementation of digital patient experience offers several advantages, not just for healthcare providers but also for patients. Some of the key benefits that come with a positive digital patient experience are:

Improved Patient Satisfaction

With the use of digital technology, patients have access to more personalized touch points with their care providers which leads to improved patient satisfaction and engagement. Patients can access their medical records, ask questions, view their results, and even book consultations with clinicians, all from their mobile devices. This promotes a higher level of engagement between patients and care providers leading to better health outcomes.

Enhanced Access to Healthcare Services

Digital technologies enable patients to access medical services, such as telehealth or virtual visits. This is helpful for patients who find it difficult to access healthcare services, such as aging adults or those living in rural areas.

Better Health Outcomes

Digital technologies enable effective monitoring of patient health records. This enhances diagnoses and empowers the healthcare organization to offer more personalized advice. 

Improved Operational Efficiency

With digital technologies, healthcare operational processes become faster and more efficient. From patient check-ins to storage of medical records, care providers can safely manage and store data in the cloud. Automation of healthcare processes such as scheduling, reminders, and follow-ups simplify operational processes, resulting in time-saving and fewer resource requirements.

Building Blocks of a Successful Digital Patient Experience

Patients today expect the same level of convenience and personalization from their healthcare providers as they do from other industries. Therefore, healthcare organizations must understand the core elements of a digital patient experience so they can meet patients’ expectations. The building blocks of a successful digital patient experience are:

Seamless Appointment Scheduling and Access

The first step towards creating a successful digital patient experience is to ensure that patients can easily book and access appointments. Utilizing online booking platforms and implementing virtual waiting rooms and telemedicine capabilities has been shown to increase convenience for both providers and patients thus, they should be a priority.

To further enhance the appointment scheduling and access process, healthcare providers can leverage the digital experience to guide patients throughout their journey, from booking to attending their physical appointments with instantaneous reminders, and GPS and on-site navigation to easily attend their appointments. 

Personalized Patient Portals

Empowering patients with access to their health records, customizable features, and patient-centric information is an integral part of digital patient experiences. Healthcare organizations should develop personalized patient portals with enhanced patient engagement capabilities.

Learn more about how Phunware’s tech delivers unmatched growth for healthcare organizations

Communication and Engagement Tools

Leveraging secure messaging and chatbots on the patient portals allows for effective. Patients can get quick responses to queries, and access interactive and educative resources. This will enable them to better understand their treatment plans and participate more in their care.

Integrating Wearable Devices and Remote Monitoring

Connecting patients’  wearables and implementing remote monitoring allow for real-time health tracking. Integrating devices such as smartwatches, and smart thermometers with patient portals will enable healthcare organizations to capture real-time patient wellness information and offer proactive healthcare interventions.

Designing User-Friendly Healthcare Apps and Websites

A fundamental part of making healthcare services better and more accessible is to ensure the digital patient experience delivers a good user experience (UX). Many factors contribute to good UX, including:

• Intuitive navigation with clear and concise instructions.
• Clear and organized information structure
• Visually appealing design

Responsive Design for Mobile Accessibility

Easy access to healthcare services on mobile platforms is now a necessity, and this is where responsive design comes into the picture. Responsive design helps healthcare platforms to adapt to different screen sizes, ensuring optimized features and usability across devices. It also entails designing healthcare platforms to be mobile-friendly, e.g., the use of large buttons for touching/tapping, optimizing image, scripts, and other resources to reduce load times.

Additionally, apps focused on monitoring and tracking health data need to provide reliable and secure data handling. This denotes the need for effective backend integration, security protocols, and testing approaches. 

Incorporating User Feedback and Iterative Improvements

To create functional healthcare apps and websites, it’s essential to collect patient feedback and iteratively use it to enhance the platform based on their needs. Some strategies for incorporating user feedback for improvement include

• Conducting usability tests with real users to identify pain points, areas for improvement, and opportunities for innovation.
• Providing accessible channels for users to share their feedback, such as surveys, contact forms, and social media.

Overcoming Challenges in Digital Patient Experience

As promising and transformative as the technologies propagating patient experience, some challenges must be addressed to fully realize the potential of the digital patient experience.

For example, ensuring the privacy and security of patient data is paramount as we transition to more digital technologies. Privacy and data security concerns can be addressed by implementing robust data security systems that comply with all applicable regulations such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act (HIPAA) and the California Consumer Privacy Act (CCPA). 

Additionally, all digital solutions should be designed with explicit data and privacy settings that give patients control over their data.

Bridging the Digital Divide

Disparities in digital access and literacy can lead to unequal access to healthcare and digital services. This results in a digital divide between underserved and marginalized populations and the general population. Healthcare providers can ensure inclusivity by collaborating with local municipalities to create more affordable access to digital technologies.

Additionally, training programs that provide digital literacy and healthcare information to underserved populations can be an effective way to bridge the digital gap.

Overcoming Technological Barriers

Integrating legacy systems with new digital solutions can be a major hurdle for healthcare providers. It can also be challenging to train healthcare professionals to use new digital solutions and technologies. To overcome these barriers, healthcare providers should focus on creating strategic plans that incorporate digital transformation across multiple platforms. It’s also important to provide caregivers with adequate training and support. 

By leveraging the strengths of digital technologies and existing healthcare processes, providers can effectively mitigate any technological barriers and drive greater patient experience.  

Future Trends and Innovations

With revolutionary solutions reshaping how healthcare works, the digital patient experience is quickly becoming the new reality of healthcare. Digital advancements and innovations have enabled us to transform the traditional healthcare experience into something more personalized, accessible, and cost-efficient.

Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) are beneficial for healthcare in terms of personalized and predictive patient care and diagnosis. This technology can be used to monitor patient health at scale, as well as provide personalized recommendations and support for patients based on their medical histories.

AI and ML can also be used to support treatments with evidence-based data, enabling doctors to make more informed decisions about patient diagnoses and recommendations. An example of this is the Canadian AI company Atomwise, which uses AI-supported technology to analyze medical records and predict potential targeted therapies for cancers. 

Virtual and augmented realities (VR and AR) are also transforming healthcare by providing patients with immersive experiences. Phunware is pioneering geolocation-based triggers that deliver timely directions and content to users as they enter and exit the healthcare facility. With AR, this could be further be applied to wayfinding or other onsite experiences.

Furthermore, medical professionals can provide training for healthcare staff using virtual simulations to mimic real-world scenarios. 

Blockchain technology, although still developing, allows for secure data exchange between providers. This enables patients to easily switch between providers without worrying about loss of data. 

Blockchain facilitates data interoperability which ensures that data is accessible across different platforms and sources. This allows healthcare providers to share information across organizations thus, empowering patients to access the best healthcare regardless of their location. An example of such technology is the US-based company MedicalChain, which uses blockchain technology to securely transfer medical records between providers, resulting in better care for patients. 

Conclusion

As we’ve explored throughout this blog post, the digital patient experience is undeniably a cornerstone of modern healthcare. It is transforming how patients access and manage their health, leading to numerous advantages and most importantly better overall health outcomes.

To create a successful digital patient experience, it’s crucial to focus on these essential elements:

• Developing user-friendly healthcare apps and websites
• Addressing challenges like privacy concerns, digital divide, and technological barriers
• Keeping up with future trends and innovations such as AI, VR, AR, and blockchain

Embracing these key components and prioritizing the patient experience will help ensure your healthcare organization remains competitive and can always meet the changing needs of patients.

If you’re new to patient experience or already have an existing patient experience system but looking to elevate how patients perceive the care they receive in your establishment, chat with us to see how you can improve the quality of service one digital interaction at a time.

We provide comprehensive digital solutions for healthcare organizations to enable them to deliver a satisfying experience for their patients.

Chat with us to know how you can improve your patient experience one digital interaction at a time!

The post Revolutionizing Healthcare: The Digital Patient Experience appeared first on Phunware.

For services, the digital front door is the key that gives you access. It’s revolutionizing how people access the services they need and it’s becoming more essential now that services are transitioning online.

The digital front door is more than access to service alone, it also facilitates other important aspects of services. It enables providers to personalize their services and tailor them to their specific customers. It also allows for more streamlined security protocols to help protect customers’ data. 

In this blog, we’ll delve into the digital front door and how it is changing how consumers access services. We’ll explore the technologies that power these innovative platforms, examine real-world examples of thriving digital front doors, and the prospect of digital front doors and their potential impact on industries worldwide.

The Basics of the Digital Front Door

A digital front door is a virtual entry point that allows users to access a wide range of services and resources from businesses, organizations, or governments through a single, unified platform. This concept has gained significant traction in recent years, as more services are moving online to meet the growing demand for digital access and convenience. 

From healthcare to hospitality, the digital front door is revolutionizing how we interact with the services we rely on every day.

The key elements of a digital front door include:

1. User Experience (UX) – a well-designed user experience is crucial for any digital front door, as it ensures that users can efficiently navigate the platform and access the services they need with ease. This means having a clean, intuitive interface, with clear calls-to-action and seamless navigation.
2. Accessibility – a digital front door should be accessible to everyone, regardless of their technical skills or abilities. This means that the platform should be designed and developed with accessibility in mind, ensuring that it complies with relevant accessibility standards and guidelines.
3. Security and Privacy – as users will be sharing sensitive information through the digital front door, robust security measures and strict privacy policies must be in place to protect user data and maintain trust.
4. Integration – a successful digital front door should feature seamless integration with existing databases, customer relationship management (CRM) systems, or even external APIs.
5. Scalability – as the demand for services continues to grow, digital front doors need to scale to accommodate increased traffic, new features, and additional services. This means having a flexible architecture and infrastructure that can adapt and grow as needed.
6. Customization Options – an effective digital front door should offer personalization and customization options. This will allow your users to tailor the experience to their individual needs. For example, you could allow customers to choose their preferred language, and opt for targeted promotions, and personalized content. Delivering personalized experiences will enable you to better engage with your customers and foster long-lasting relationships.

Benefits of Implementing a Digital Front Door

There are many benefits to implementing a digital front door, which include:

Enhancing Customer Experience and Satisfaction

A digital front door can help to enhance the customer experience by making it easier for them to access the information and services they need. For example, a digital front door can allow healthcare patients to schedule appointments online, view their medical records, and communicate with their doctors through secure messaging. This can lead to reduced wait times, improved communication, and increased patient satisfaction.

A digital front door can help to enhance the customer experience by making it easier for them to access the information and services they need. For example, a digital front door can integrate with EHR (Electronic Health Record) systems to enable patients to manage appointments online, view their medical records, pay bills, and communicate with physicians and healthcare professionals through secure messaging. This can lead to reduced wait times, improved communication, and increased patient satisfaction.

Additionally, a digital front door can be used to provide wayfinding and location-based services to help users find their way around a facility and to locate specific services or departments.

Streamlining Access to Services

With a digital front door, customers can access a range of services through a single online platform. Gone are the days of confusing phone menus, long waiting times, and trips to different departments. The digital front door provides a seamless and intuitive experience, allowing customers to find the information with a few clicks.

Improving Efficiency

Organizations can also benefit from a digital front door if they leverage automation and digitization of processes. Automation improves an organization’s efficiency and scalability thereby reducing costs.

Case Studies of Successful Digital Front Doors

Case Study 1: Atlantis Paradise Island Resort

An outstanding case study is how Phunware’s tech helped Atlantis Paradise Island to provide guests with convenient services with an innovative digital front door. The solution enabled guests to discover and book unique vacation experiences, access interactive self-guided tours, and access real-time navigation across the resort.

Case Study 2: Virginia Hospital Center

Another interesting case study of a successful digital front door implementation is Phunware’s powerful healthcare solution for Virginia Hospital Center (VHC). 

VHC’s digital front door enabled patients to schedule both virtual and physical appointments, manage prescriptions, and find a doctor. The digital front door also integrates with MyChart, which allows patients to view information on their vital signs in real-time along with lab results, medications, and medical procedures.

Implementing a Digital Front Door Strategy

To launch a digital front door, we recommend you start by assessing your organization’s unique needs and goals. This involves evaluating your current service delivery methods, identifying gaps and inefficiencies, and understanding your customers’ expectations.

Having this clear picture of where your organization stands can help you better determine which features and functionalities your digital front door should include to address these needs and align with your overall business objectives.

Once you’ve identified your organization’s needs and goals, then you can start creating a detailed roadmap outlining the implementation process. This should include milestones, timelines, and resources required to bring your digital front door vision to life. A well-defined roadmap can help ensure that all stakeholders are on the same page and that you’re progressing as planned. 

Overcoming Challenges

Implementing a digital front door strategy often comes with challenges. For technology teams, the obstacles often include concerns about deployment timelines and internal investment from staff. For finance teams, you often need to justify the ROI on the investment. 

At Phunware we pride ourselves on needing minimal time from internal IT teams and we provide ROI analysis for all of our prospects to win over their internal teams.

Digital Front Door Technologies and Solutions

The core technologies that make up digital front doors include Software Development Kits (SDKs), Application Programming Interfaces (APIs), cloud computing, responsive mobile apps, and web development. Two or more of these technologies are often combined to build digital front doors. The three essential solutions of a digital front door include identity verification, authentication, and account optimization.

Identity verification solutions for example in EHR systems verify users’ digital identities, helping detect and prevent fraudulent activities. Authentication technologies are used to authenticate users, granting them access to digital services. Account optimization solutions allow businesses to tailor their customer service for a particular customer, creating a more personalized experience. 

Ensuring Security and Privacy in the Digital Front Door

One of the most important steps when designing a digital front door system is to establish a strong security policy. This should include measures such as

• Stringent password protection and two-factor authentication (2FA). 
• Preventing data breaches with techniques like privilege systems and strict access control policies. 
• Leveraging encryption to ensure only trusted users with a decryption key can read the data. 
• Implementing a firewall and anti-virus to deter malicious actors from accessing the system.
• Performing regular system reviews to identify potential security flaws. 
• Informing users on how you collect and use their data

Digital Front Doors in Different Industries

Digital Front Door in Healthcare

One industry where the digital front door has made a significant impact is healthcare. With the advent of COVID-19 and the ongoing digital transformation, healthcare providers are leveraging this innovative approach to enhance patient experiences and streamline their processes.

A survey conducted by Accenture found that 21% of Americans surveyed are willing to pay for digital health services. The survey also found that access to healthcare has improved for 26% of the respondents.

From telemedicine to appointment scheduling and remote patient monitoring, the digital front door is reshaping the healthcare experience. For example, instead of having a paper-based or phone-based system, healthcare organizations are now able to offer integrative scheduling, tracking, and payment systems. This helps to reduce administrative burdens while ensuring that healthcare organizations can meet the needs of their users.

Remote patient monitoring has also made it possible for activities such as vital signs monitoring, remote physiological monitoring, and mobile laboratory monitoring. These features enable patients to be monitored even when they are not physically present in the clinic. This helps to reduce the need for face-to-face visits, while also promoting improved access to care.

Digital front doors are not limited to remote services; they also play a crucial role in managing the entire patient journey, even when they visit a physical healthcare facility. From navigating to the facility, finding parking, and onsite wayfinding, digital front doors can guide patients every step of the way, ensuring a seamless experience.

With digital front doors, healthcare facilities can now offer mobile check-in options, allowing patients to check in for appointments using their smartphones. This reduces wait times and administrative burdens while providing patients with a convenient and efficient way to access services.

Digital front doors can also help healthcare organizations monitor dwell time – the amount of time patients spend in waiting areas or exam rooms. By analyzing this data, providers can identify bottlenecks and make improvements to enhance patient satisfaction. Additionally, digital front doors facilitate the distribution of follow-up surveys, enabling healthcare providers to gather valuable feedback and insights for continuous improvement.

Digital Front Door in Hospitality

The hospitality industry is one of the most customer-facing industries, and as such, it is constantly looking for ways to improve the customer experience. Hotels are now leveraging digital front doors to enhance guest experiences and streamline operations.

With digital front doors hotels can:

• Provide seamless check-in and check-out experience. Long gone are the days of waiting in queues at the reception desk to check in or out of your accommodation. With digital front doors, guests can now complete these processes through their smartphones or other devices, saving time and reducing stress. 
• Personalize their service and recommendations for individual guests by leveraging the power of data analytics from digital front doors. This personalization can create memorable experiences that keep customers coming back.
• Enhance guest communication with hotel staff and improve service delivery such as housekeeping, and query and issues resolution. This instant communication channel not only improves guest satisfaction but also enables hospitality providers to address concerns proactively and efficiently.
• Become more sustainable and thus save costs. For example, by replacing traditional key cards with digital keys, hotels can reduce plastic waste and save on production costs.

Digital Front Door in Government Services

Governments around the world are switching to digital front doors to transform their services. Digital front doors can help governments to:

• Improve access to services thus, enabling citizens to access services regardless of their location. This is especially important for citizens who live in rural areas or who have difficulty getting to a government office.
• Improve the citizen experience by providing a more convenient and personalized way to access services. Citizens can use digital front doors to find information, apply for benefits and permits, and pay taxes from anywhere.

Digital Front Door in Banking and Finance

In recent years, the emergence of the digital front door has completely changed the customer experience around banking and finance.

Digital front doors enable customers to access banking services from their computers, tablets, and phones. With online access to their bank accounts, customers are now able to manage and track their financial activities within a few clicks.

Digital front doors also give the convenience of logging in to complete tasks opening new accounts, paying bills, transferring money, and managing investments any time of the day.

A digital banking experience report found that about four out of ten customers now have an online bank, and 36% of them check it at least once a day.

Digital banking and investment planning services have especially made it easier for customers to monitor their financial activities. This objective for enhanced customer experience has led to the rise of a growing trend of ‘fintech’ companies that are using digital technologies to deliver innovative financial products and services, such as mobile payments, automated financial advice, and new methods of investing.

Digital Front Door in Education

The digital front door is revolutionizing access to and the delivery of education. From online courses to virtual learning, digital front doors pioneering more accessible learning.

For those of us who grew up going to school five days a week, the idea that education can now be accessed anytime and anywhere is mindboggling. Digital front doors are opening up educational opportunities to far more individuals around the globe than ever before. And from the comfort of school buildings or homes, students are reaping the benefits.

From reducing the cost of attending university to increasing the number of courses available, the introduction of digital front doors in education has been incredibly beneficial. With less time spend commuting and traveling, students now have much more time to focus on their studies. It has also enabled students to access the latest development in their field while saving money on textbooks and other resources.

For educators, the use of digital front doors allows them to offer custom and dynamic content. It also allows for quicker enrollment and feedback by using online forms, surveys, and real-time tracking systems. This helps educators stay connected with their students, to keep the students on track with their studies.

Measuring Success and ROI of a Digital Front Door

A well-designed and optimized digital front door will not only drive cost savings, but also improve customer satisfaction, reduce operating expenses, and lead to more efficient public services. 

Some useful metrics for measuring the value generated and return on investment (ROI) of a digital front door include:

1. User experience: This metric indicates customer satisfaction with the overall user experience. It includes assessing how easily customers can find information, complete tasks, and access services and other forms of support. 

To measure user experience effectively, consider incorporating various indicators that can provide insights into aspects such as customer acquisition rates, customer satisfaction, and most importantly, customer service quality and efficiency.

2. Cost savings: This metric indicates the cost savings of using a digital front door over traditional service methods. To measure the cost savings associated with your digital front door, you can check for the reduction in required physical space and improvement in staff and operational efficiency.

To ensure you are getting the most out of your digital front door, it is important to regularly measure and review all these metrics. Doing this will help you understand what is working and what isn’t, and provide you with insights on how to improve the effectiveness of your digital front door.

Conclusion

Digital front doors are transforming how businesses interact with their customers and service delivery to users across different industries. With features such as solid user experience, accessibility, security and privacy, integration, scalability, and customization- digital front doors have become essential for businesses looking to stay competitive in today’s digitally connected world. 

Digital front doors are proving revolutionary across various industries, such as healthcare, hospitality, government, banking and finance, and education, bringing users the convenience, cost savings, and personalized service they desire. As digital transformation continues, the power of the digital front door will only increase, driving further innovation and allowing companies to provide an even greater level of service to their customers.

At Phunware, we understand the importance of digital front doors for businesses of all types, thus we provide you with the solutions you need to succeed. Whether you’re looking to attract new customers with cutting-edge digital front doors or need to offer more convenience for your existing customers, Phunware’s comprehensive digital front door solution can deliver the technology you need.

Chat with us today to discover how we can help you transform service delivery!

The post The Digital Front Door: Revolutionizing Access to Services appeared first on Phunware.

That’s where a solid mobile app growth strategy comes in.

Mobile app growth strategy is the set of activities, tactics, and techniques that app developers and marketers use to acquire, engage, and retain users, and maximize revenue generation. A well-thought-out strategy plays a crucial role in achieving high user acquisition and retention, and revenue goals.

In this blog post, we’ll explore everything you need to know about mobile app growth strategy. From understanding the fundamentals to tips and tactics for effectively acquiring, retaining, and monetizing users, adoption of best practices, and how to measure success.

Whether you’re a mobile app developer, app marketer, or app growth strategist, this guide will provide you with the insights and tools needed to succeed in the hyper-competitive world of mobile apps.

Let’s dive right in.

Understanding Your Audience

A successful mobile app growth strategy starts with understanding your audience. Knowing who you’re creating the app for, how they’ll use it, and what they need it to do are all essential elements of success. Here are the steps involved in understanding your audience:

The first step is conducting market research. This involves researching your target market and learning about their needs and preferences. You can do this by exploring other related apps, analyzing customer reviews and feedback, and conducting surveys and interviews with potential users.

Once you’ve gathered data from your market research, you can start to define user personas. This involves creating detailed profiles of your ideal users with information such as age, gender, location, education level, interests, and any other relevant details. This gives you a better understanding of who to target and empowers you to create a tailored growth strategy.

Evaluating user behavior is also an important part of understanding your audience. You can analyze user behavior through downloads, retention rates, in-app purchases, and more to gain insights into how users are engaging with your app and what they find valuable. Google Analytics, Flurry, and Mixpanel are examples of tools that help you to analyze user behavior.

Finally, it’s essential to use feedback to improve your app and make it more user-friendly. User feedback will give you an understanding of what users like and don’t like about your app and what features they would like to see implemented.

It can often be challenging to fully understand your audience thus, it’s essential to partner with professionals who can help you simplify this discovery process. Phunware provides full-stack mobile solutions that enable organizations to easily understand their audience and enhance their app growth strategy.

Optimizing User Acquisition

As the mobile app ecosystem continues to become more crowded and competitive, the cost of acquiring users has also been growing in recent years. It’s important more than ever to have a strong user acquisition strategy to drive mobile app growth.

Before you begin acquiring users, you need to develop a comprehensive user acquisition strategy. To do so, you should begin by setting specific, measurable goals that you want to achieve through user acquisition. For example, do you want to acquire 1000 users in the first month? Or perhaps you want to lower the cost per acquisition by 25%? Defining your goals will help you measure your progress and success.

Once you have your goals, you need to determine how you’re going to acquire users. This includes deciding which channels and platforms you will use and identifying the target demographic for each channel based on factors such as age, gender, and interests.

Implementing App Store Optimization (ASO)

App Store Optimization (ASO) is crucial in user acquisition. ASO is the process of improving the visibility of your app in stores, such as Google Play and the Apple App Store.

You can improve your app’s ranking and drive more organic downloads when you optimize your app store page by focusing on keywords, descriptions, and visuals. Identify the most relevant keywords for your app and use them in the title, description, and screenshots. You should also ensure that your visuals are clear and engaging to encourage users to download your app.

Once you have optimized your app store page, consider launching an advertising campaign to drive even more downloads. This can include running ads on platforms such as Google Ads, Facebook Ads, or Apple Search Ads.

When launching your ads, make sure you’re targeting the right audience with precise targeting options such as demographics and interests. You can also test different ad creatives to determine which one is most successful.

Phunware offers mobile advertising expertise to deliver unmatched growth and improve your ROI. From Media Planning to Campaign Optimization, we can effectively target audiences to drive strong campaign performance.

Leveraging Social Media Platforms

Social media is also a great way to acquire users. You can promote your app on platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. Use visuals and videos to showcase the features of your app and encourage users to download it. You can also leverage influencers and user-generated content to reach more people.

Enhancing User Retention

Retaining mobile app users is just as important as acquiring new ones. Enhancing user retention can contribute significantly to the growth of your mobile app. It not only helps in maintaining a consistent user base but also helps in improving the app’s ranking in the app stores.

Research into global user retention rate shows that the average retention rate for iOS apps dropped from 25.6% to 4.3% over 30 days in Q3 2022 while it dropped from 22.6% to 2.6% for Android apps in the same period. If you’re an app developer, app marketer, or app growth strategist, this shows how important it is to keep users engaged with your mobile app.

The following are four vital tactics for keeping users engaged with your app:

1. Focus on User Experience

You know how frustrating it can be when an app is slow to load or the navigation is confusing. That’s why focusing on user experience is key to user retention. Make sure to use a mobile-friendly design, optimize the app for speed, and provide a streamlined navigation system. Doing these will improve the user experience and thus increase engagement and retention.

2. Implement Push Notifications

Push notifications are a great tool to engage users and keep them engaged. They can be used to alert users of new content, remind them to use the app, or offer promotional discounts. Just make sure to use them sparingly and keep them personalized. If notifications are too frequent, users may opt out or uninstall your app entirely.

Push notifications are an essential feature of mobile engagement alongside other audience monetization techniques such as direct campaigns.

3. Create In-App Personalization

Creating in-app personalization is another great way to increase user engagement. This means allowing users to customize their experience within the app. You can do this by offering personalization features for the home screen, enabling notification preferences, etc, thus giving users a feeling of control and helping to build loyalty.

4. Leverage Gamification Elements

Lastly, infusing elements of game design into the user experience encourages users to complete tasks, engage with content, and even interact with one another. Adding game elements keep users engaged and encourages them to come back to the app.

Monetizing Your App

Developing a mobile app is only the first step, the key to long-term success is monetizing your app effectively. To make your app profitable, you need to choose the right app monetization model. Below are some popular ways you can monetize your app

Implementing  In-app Purchases

In-app purchases have become a significant source of revenue for many app developers and it’s a great way to keep users engaged. According to a report by Allied Market Research, the in-app purchase market is growing at a CAGR of 19.8% from 2020 to 2027 and would reach an estimated revenue of $341 billion by 2027.

With in-app purchases, users buy additional content, virtual goods, or services ranging from currency to premium content. One of the keys to successful in-app purchases is to make them timely and relevant.

Hospitality and healthcare organizations particularly can monetize their apps using in-app purchases. For example, a healthcare provider could offer premium services such as virtual consultations or personalized health plans for a fee. Similarly, a hospitality company could offer in-app purchases for additional services such as room upgrades, late checkouts, or exclusive access to amenities.

Integrating Ads

Advertising is another popular way to monetize apps. It involves placing ads in your app, either in the form of banner ads, interstitial ads, or video ads. This approach can be a great way to bring in extra revenue without requiring users to make any purchases.

However, it can also create a less-than-ideal user experience, so you should consider how intrusive the ads will be before you decide to use this model.

Offering Premium Features

Premium features are another app monetization tool. You can offer core app functionality for free but charge users for additional features, such as advanced features, unlimited access, or ad-free experiences. This monetization model works best for apps that appeal to power users and are used frequently.

Measuring and Analyzing Your Success

Measuring your app performance is essential for a successful mobile app growth strategy. Key Performance Indicators (KPIs) help you measure performance against predetermined goals and objectives and they can provide you with insights into whether your app is growing or not, and help you identify areas for improvement. Below are three important KPIs you should track:

User Engagement

User engagement is essential for understanding your app’s performance. It’s important to measure how many people are actively using your app and how often they’re returning. To measure user engagement, you can track metrics such as the average session time, the number of sessions per user, the number of daily and monthly active users, and the total time spent in your app.

The more engaging an app is, the more likely users are to spend time on it, return frequently, and recommend it to others. High user engagement leads to increased retention and revenue in the long run.

Retention Rate

User retention rates measure how likely users are to keep using your app after their first session. It’s important to track this metric as it’ll help you understand if users are finding value in your app and if they’re likely to come back. To measure retention rates, track the percentage of users who return to your app on any given day, week, or month.

App Store Ratings and Reviews

Ratings and reviews on the app store are important metrics to monitor for any mobile app. Positive ratings and reviews can help boost your app’s visibility and downloads, while negative ratings and reviews can cause potential users to look elsewhere. To analyze ratings and reviews, look for trends in the feedback and use this as an opportunity to make improvements to your app.

Refining and Scaling Your Strategy

Refining your app growth strategy can help you identify the most effective channels to promote your app, optimize your user experience, and ultimately, drive app growth.  The recommended steps for refining your app growth strategy include

A/B Testing

A/B testing is a powerful tool that can help app developers and marketers improve app engagement rates. It involves creating two versions of an app, with one serving as a control and the other as the test version.

Test versions can include variations in elements such as app design, user interface, or in-app content. By observing how users interact with both versions and comparing performance metrics, you can gain valuable insights into which version works best. Some examples of A/B tests include testing different app icons, testing different call-to-actions, and testing different pricing plans.

Surveys

Conducting surveys is another essential step in refining your app growth strategy. Surveys can help you better understand your users and their needs, and how they interact with your app. This allows you to make more informed decisions about how to improve your app to better meet user needs.

You can conduct surveys using in-app or email surveys. It’s important to make sure the questions in a survey are easy to understand.

Adapting to Market Trends

Market trends are continually changing, and app developers and marketers need to be able to adapt quickly. Staying up-to-date on the latest trends enables you to stay competitive and attractive to users. You can also use market trends to identify new growth opportunities. For example, Meta introduced Stories to Instagram in 2014 and later on Facebook in 2017 to compete with Snapchat’s features.

Experimenting with New Platforms and Technologies

Exploring new avenues such as AR and VR, podcasts, and new social platforms can help you reach new audiences and attract new users. However, you should critically asses these platforms and technologies to determine which will be most effective and generate positive ROI for your mobile app growth strategy.

In conclusion, mobile app growth strategies are essential for any successful mobile app development. Understanding your audience, optimizing user acquisition, enhancing user retention, monetizing your app, and measuring and analyzing your success are key elements of a successful strategy. 

Additionally, staying up-to-date with market trends, and experimenting with new platforms and technologies are important tactics for fostering mobile app growth.

At Phunware, we understand the importance of an effective mobile app growth strategy, thus we provide you with everything you need to succeed on mobile. Whether you are looking to improve your existing app or need a new one entirely, Phunware’s comprehensive mobile app solutions can deliver the technology and analytics you need to optimize your mobile app growth strategy and drive more downloads and revenue. 

Chat with us today to learn more about how we can help you achieve mobile app success!

The post The Ultimate Guide to Mobile App Growth Strategy appeared first on Phunware.

Have you ever been to an all-you-can-eat buffet? Giant appetizer platters, vats of soup, an endless selection of meats and veggies and desserts…it’s tempting to load your plate up with items that don’t even sound that appetizing. “It’s right in front of me—why not?” is the prevailing mentality (at least for gluttons like me). Of course, by the time the meal is over, you might as well roll me out of there. I will have eaten too much—without even enjoying a lot of it.

Right now retailers are at their own all-you-can-eat buffet of sorts. They have more options to engage customers than ever before. They have an array of technology tools they hope to use to nail marketing personalization once and for all, driving conversions and setting them apart from their competitors. There’s the standard fare, of course (email marketing, direct mail, PPC, etc.), and a few new gourmet options as well (native app push notifications and SMS alerts, geo-targeting, etc.). And retailers are pigging out.

They’re trying everything on the menu to deliver targeted offers to consumers, hoping to catch them at the right moment with the right message to make them to open their wallets. They’re sampling everything in the buffet…and leaving with nothing to show for it. In fact, over 60% of retailers say they expect ZERO ROI from so-called personalized messages they’ll be sending this holiday season. Talk about empty calories!

If the majority of retailers have no confidence in the return they’ll get on one-to-one mobile push marketing, we’ve got some work to do as an industry. Fortunately, through their loyalty programs, many retailers have access to the detailed shopper data that can make personalized marketing personalization effective. Add that to the data from consumers using the retailers’ branded mobile apps, and they have what they need to paint a pretty complete picture of their customers.

So what should retailers be doing with that data? Let’s start with the basics.

Bad Mobile Marketing Personalization: What Not to Do

A personalized offer can surprise and delight a customer (“Wow, this brand really gets me!”), or it can completely freak a customer out. Avoid creepy “I know what you did last summer” personalization.

Example: Customer has purchased two bottles of wine every night for the past three nights.

Not cute.

Also, if you’re going to use one-to-one marketing, make sure it’s actually personalized—not obviously programmed. Consumers catch on when they receive marketing messages from brands at the same time every day or week, and they learn to tune them out.

Example: No data collected.

This offer may as well say “Click here for something boring.”

Good Mobile Marketing Personalization

Good personalization leverages user data and context to deliver messages and offers that benefit users in some way—educating them, informing them, giving them discounts and promotions, or simply entertaining them. Segmenting app users and personalizing content according to the specific characteristics of each segment is a powerful way to keep users engaged.

When you layer this segmentation with location targeting capabilities, you’ve got the magic sauce. One location targeting tool is the geo-fence—a virtual GPS boundary used by marketers and advertisers to trigger campaigns and measure activity. To put it very simply, when someone with your brand’s app on their phone crosses through a geo-fence you have drawn around your store location (for example), it might trigger a message or promotion. Here are some examples of the types of high-converting mobile marketing messages you could deliver:

Example: Getting Creative with Geo-Fences
Data trigger: User has crossed through a pre-established geo-fence…

In-the-moment, contextually triggered marketing outreach like this just feels more relevant to the user—because it is—and it may even be welcome. (After all, who doesn’t love turtlenecks?)

Download our eBook, Capitalize on Context: The Savvy Retailer’s Guide to Location Marketing, to learn more about how mobile technologies help you understand and predict consumer context behavior.

DOWNLOAD THE eBOOK

Measuring the Effectiveness of Personalization

Some users are always going to be creeped out by personalized marketing and will resist the urge to share data with you in exchange for a more tailored marketing experience. That’s ok. You’re marketing to the users who do want personalization, and the only way to figure out what works is to test it.

An important indicator of good personalization is the number of users who re-engage with your app after receiving personalized communication from you. Whether your outreach is via push notification, email or something else, make sure you have a clear and succinct call to action that draws them back into your app. Tracking how many users take that call to action will validate that your messages were user-centric and not generic or irrelevant.

Tailoring push notifications and other marketing messages to your app users is not only about personalized content—it’s about the right context, too. Analytics are your best weapon for defining the best time, place and message to engage your app users. Keep in mind that the right context will vary from app to app, and will ultimately be decided by the users anyway.

The moral of the story: if you don’t want to end up among the 60% of marketers who expect zero ROI from their mobile marketing, don’t pig out at the all-you-can-eat mobile marketing buffet. A carefully planned, data-backed personalization strategy is your best bet for recouping that marketing investment—and then some!

Want to take the guesswork out of calculating ROI? Use our free Marketing Automation ROI Campaign Calculator to find out how much automation can save your team.

Take Me To The ROI Calculator

The post “Click Here for Something Boring”: When Marketing Personalization Falls Flat appeared first on Phunware.

Trying to convert users to high lifetime value is expensive, too. According to the most recent Liftoff data, the average developer cost to acquire a user who makes at least one in-app purchase now hovers around $50.

But don’t lose hope. A good rewards program can help you keep users coming back to play more, experience more and spend more. Put simply, a rewards program consists of a set of desired actions with accompanying incentives for completing them. Anybody can offer a few in-app tokens to make users feel special, but the secret sauce for the best mobile app rewards programs lies in how you construct them to works towards your business goals. Let’s take a closer look.

Step 1: Define Your Goal(s) for In-App Rewards

Rewards can help you achieve a number of different business objectives, and you can use a combination of rewards to achieve multiple goals:

• Learn more about your users
• Increase revenue through brand partnerships
• Boost engagement / drive habits
• Convert habitual users into premium users

Be specific and clear—the goal should drive the rest of your strategy.

Step 2: Identify the Right Actions to Warrant In-App Rewards

For each goal, there are logical actions that you might ask users to take.

• Learn more about your users. Actions in this case could be taking a survey, turning on location services (so you can gain more context about their daily lives) or sharing more personal information (birthdates, etc.) in the user profile.
• Increase revenue through brand partnerships. Actions in this case could be watching a rewarded video ad or even visiting a brick-and-mortar store. When you share your rewards program with a brand, you can realize much higher payouts than you would with traditional media.
• Boost engagement / drive habits. Actions in this case are behaviors that tie users more closely to your app, such as sequential days of usage. Your data can help you identify the actions that are most likely to be habit-forming. Let’s say your data shows that users who share content from your app with at least two people are 40% more likely to become habitual users. You might offer a small incentive for sharing, like access to a gated article or an exclusive photo filter.
• Convert habitual users into premium users. Actions in this case emphasize urging users to subscribe or pay for premium access to content in your app. Let’s say data shows that 80% of app users who engage for three consecutive days ultimately buy a subscription to your pro service. You might design a rewards program that offers an incentive for interacting three days in a row—such as a small amount of in-app currency—to reward the user’s loyalty or diligence.

Step 3: Define the In-App Rewards

The most successful rewards give the user something they find valuable. Examples include:

• In-app currency. Tokens, extra lives, etc.
• Customization. Many games and other apps provide unlockable personalization options such as new colors or decorations. These digital goods don’t change the app’s functionality or the game’s level of difficulty, but they do add a layer of entertainment, personalization and delight. Even better, they can be branded, providing an additional avenue for revenue generation through brand partners.
• Exclusive content. Exclusive content is a way to reward users for taking a one-off action, such as a newsreader offering premium content access as a reward for social sharing or a dating app unlocking profiles of people who have indicated interest in you if you pay real money OR watch rewarded video. This exclusive content can be branded and often highly engaging—as in a sponsored gameplay integration.

While you’re defining rewards, keep in mind the importance of matching the perceived value of the reward with the amount of effort required to achieve it. For example, a daily app visit might merit just a few tokens as a reward, while completing a long survey or an extended period of app usage deserves something of higher value. For a game, larger weekly challenges could offer in-game currency (which would normally cost real money) as a reward, while smaller daily challenges offer timer boosts only. For a dating app, users might unlock access to users who have already viewed their profiles by visiting a real-world location, while a smaller action like opening the app daily may only unlock a few extra “swipes.”

Step 4: Set Parameters for the In-App Rewards Trigger

How many rewards opportunities will each user receive in a given day, week or month? You may risk devaluing your own currency or content by making too many things accessible for free too often. If your rewards include exclusive content that users would otherwise have to pay for, you might end up cannibalizing their in-app purchases. Stick to offering users a few lower-value reward opportunities per hour or day and consider creating a weekly challenge to earn higher-value rewards.

Keeping App Users Engaged Is a Challenge for Everybody

You’re definitely not alone here. The good news is that while 23% of users only use apps once, 39% of them come back for 11 or more sessions. A strong rewards program is one smart way you can make sure your users are in the second category.

Looking for more ways to improve your user retention? Check out our eBook, Sticky Notes: How to Re-engage Your Users Like a Boss.

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Contact us to find out more about how in-app rewards programs can help you attract and engage the right audience for your mobile experience.

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The post 4 Steps to a Successful In-App Rewards Program appeared first on Phunware.

Why Location Technology Is Critical to Multichannel Marketing

For many brands today, multichannel / omnichannel is the name of the game. They are scrambling to engage consumers as they move back and forth between the digital and physical worlds and across mobile apps, owned websites, partner apps / websites and social media.

As eConsultancy put it, “Today’s customer is operating across multiple channels, devices and networks, making the simplistic linear customer journey an outdated concept.” Yet, according to a BlueVenn survey, more than 70% of US and UK companies have yet to connect channels for an omnichannel customer experience.

Location is a critical part of the multichannel customer experience because it enables the delivery of a tailored mobile message within the user’s daily context—e.g., near a competitor, near the stadium on Super Bowl Sunday, at home in the evening, etc.

Another eConsultancy report found that fewer than 50% of North American marketers say they have the capabilities to:

• Understand their customers’ typical cross-channel behaviors,
• Deliver dynamic content across digital formats in response to user behaviors, or
• Understand users’ cross-device buying journeys

The right location solutions could help these marketers crack the code on what omnichannel customers do, why they do it and how to reach them throughout their buying journey.

Four Considerations for Contextual Mobile Engagement

When it comes to personalization, it’s important to target consumers and drive experiences based on a broader suite of contextual signals—not just location and demographics, but also the time of day, the weather, past behaviors, current events and much more. For example, if I’m a fitness brand, I might want to factor in the weather in different parts of the country, upcoming races in specific areas, whether my target has stopped by the gym lately, and the typical time of day in which my target is active (i.e., not at work or asleep).

It all boils down to smarter, richer, more relevant engagement.

Here are four things to consider when creating full-context engagement:

1. Who users are: demographics, likely occupation, likely parent (or not), etc.
2. What they do: frequently visited locations, past shopping behavior, etc.
3. What’s happening: time of day, day of the week, weather, events, etc.
4. Where they are: current location, what’s nearby, typical travel patterns, etc.

Looking for more about the role of location tech in a multichannel world—and how to harness mobile for richer, more contextual engagement? Download our eBook, Mobile Data: The Missing Link in Your User Acquisition and Engagement Strategies.

The post Industry Insiders: Location Strategies Are Critical in Our Multichannel World appeared first on Phunware.

Across the U.S., mobile app usage continues to expand, accounting for the majority of internet users’ digital media consumption (comScore). Brands are starting to get on board—73% of U.S. marketers surveyed in August 2016 said they plan to increase their spending on mobile within the next 12 months.

Unfortunately, investment in mobile still fails to match consumers’ interest in the platform, a gap that represents a $22 billion opportunity in the US alone.

As mobile reaches maturity, organizations must stop thinking about it as a menu of isolated tactics like monetization, mobile app engagement, location-based marketing and so on. Instead, by thinking about mobile in terms of a lifecycle, we can understand and capitalize on it much better. Let’s explore why that is, what the mobile application lifecycle entails and how you can take control of it at every stage for maximum benefit.

A 1000-ft View of the Mobile Application Lifecycle

Regardless of the purpose it’s intended to serve, every mobile initiative has a four-stage lifecycle. The sooner you can understand these stages, embrace them and begin to organize your team and processes for success in the era of mobile (more on those topics in my next blog installments), the more handily you will be able to crush your competitors. The four stages of the mobile application lifecycle are:

1. Strategize

In this phase, you define the amazing experience you want users to have with your app. You outline use cases and determine the feature sets your app should offer.

You decide which devices (Smartphone? TV? Watch?) and operating systems (Android? iOS? Other?) you want to serve.

It’s also important to identify early on the infrastructure and bandwidth needed to support the experience you want to create. For example, if you know you want to build a patient wayfinding application for your hospital, do you have the wireless infrastructure in place to support this experience? If you want to provide proximity-triggered in-app promotions to users at your retail store or stadium, do you understand the hardware requirements for these use cases?

Finally, it’s critical to involve the right groups from across your organization as early as possible.

• Your Mobile team (it may be called the Digital or Virtual team at your organization) should drive the definition of the mobile experience and how it will be brought to life in your app.
• Your Media Buying team should be there from the outset to make sure you have appropriately strategized how you will build, engage and monetize your application audience (more on this below in Step 3: Launch).
• Your Data Science team should be there to plan what data you will collect through your application and how you will use it not only to optimize future versions of the application, but business processes, marketing strategy and a host of other initiatives not traditionally thought of as “mobile” (more on this below in Step 4: Engage and Monetize).

2. Create

In this phase of the mobile application lifecycle, you bring your app to life in the way that makes the most sense for your budget, timeline, inclinations and capabilities. At a high level, these are your options:

• If you have the capability to build your app in-house, you will likely want to license app components (usually in the form of SDKs, APIs and portals) and use your own engineering team to incorporate them into your application. Licensing application components is also the most budget-friendly option.
• If you don’t have the inclination or capability to build your app in-house, licensing a pre-built, brandable application is an excellent choice. Customizable app solutions are relatively inexpensive and offer quick time to market and low total cost of ownership. And if you choose the right partner, they don’t look pre-built at all.
• Of course, if you have the budget to do it, you can work with a partner to build a custom app from the ground up, with all of the bells and whistles you desire. At this point, it’s only a matter of picking a partner with proven expertise, stability and scale. (More on this topic to come in a future blog post about best practices for writing mobile RFPs.)

3. Launch

This phase of the mobile application lifecycle is where you facilitate application discovery and user acquisition to build the audience that will consume your mobile application. Your Media Buying and Data Science teams will play critical roles here, as performance-based audience building campaigns will be one of your main tactics. Finding the right—read: high-value—users for your app requires a thoughtful, data-backed media buying strategy.

4. Engage and Monetize

Finally, plan for how you will drive revenue with your mobile efforts. This may be as straightforward as charging for your app or offering in-app purchases of physical or virtual goods—but you should also plan to explore other techniques as appropriate, such as:

• Monetizing your app’s real estate through banners, interstitials and other paid media units.
• Leveraging the native capabilities of users’ smartphones to power contextually relevant messaging that drives foot traffic and purchases, both online and off.
• Using the data that accumulates as users engage with your app to inform and optimize engagement, integration and monetization approaches as well as future iterations of the app.

Many businesses successfully complete steps 1-3, but stop at step 4 because they think the work is done after the app is in the app marketplace and downloads are trickling in. This line of thinking is akin to devoting significant time and resources to design and build an automobile and get it to the dealership, then neglecting to service or maintain it after the buyer drives it off the lot. Will that buyer feel compelled to purchase a vehicle from you again? Will they get as much out of that car—and feel as positively about your brand—as they would have if you had helped them maintain it? Probably not.

Thinking about mobile in terms of a four-stage lifecycle will set you apart from your more shortsighted competitors and prepare you to play—and win—the long game.

What Makes the Mobile Lifecycle Unique?

The idea of a technology lifecycle is not new—it comes to us from the software development world. What makes the mobile lifecycle different is the hybrid digital / physical context in which mobile operates.

Think about it:

• Mobile bridges the physical and digital worlds. A smartphone is a digital device, but it moves through the physical world and includes highly specific geographic location technologies that mobile apps can leverage.
• Mobile straddles the line between customer experience and business solution. An app can serve users with entertainment, wayfinding, shopping, etc. while also delivering value to the business through third-party monetization, process optimization, user data collection and driving real-world outcomes like foot traffic or appointment compliance.
• Mobile use is immersed in the very personal context of the user’s daily life. People carry their phones wherever they go and they interact with apps throughout the day. Each of these interactions results in a data point—complete with location—brands can use to improve and tailor the mobile experience.
• These mobile data points are actionable far beyond the mobile channel. They can (and should) impact marketing strategy as a whole, media investment, operations planning—even real estate decisions. Mobile is not a digital-only channel. It’s an everywhere channel.

Learn more and download the eBook Mobile Data: the Missing Link in Your User Acquisition and Engagement Strategies!

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How Mobile Permeates the Business

Because of the context inherent to mobile data, the mobile lifecycle can positively impact multiple aspects of your business. Here are a few examples:

• Operations. Leverage data from mobile location-based technologies like beacons to streamline inventory control in a retail environment, monitor and manage patient traffic patterns in a hospital, or speed the flow of passengers through an airport or cruise terminal.
• Marketing. Use data from your mobile campaigns and app engagement to understand what offers your users care about, what app features they value, and where they live, work and play. Optimize your entire marketing approach based on these deep insights.
• Revenue. Mobile is a powerful channel for e-commerce, of course, but can also serve as revenue-generating platform through in-app media monetization and mobile engagement campaigns that drive real-world purchase conversions.

Learn more and download the eBook Bring New Life to an Underperforming App with Location Technology!

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Mobile affects many parts of your business, so you can’t keep it in a silo. Mobile strategies must be integrated with the rest of your marketing and digital efforts and managed accordingly. Those who still approach mobile on a per-project or per-feature basis are missing out on the full benefits—and are leaving money on the table.

Discover what it takes to close the mobile opportunity gap. Download Mobile First: Harnessing the Mobile App Lifecycle for Transformative Business Success for a strategic and tactical model with actionable items at every stage.

DOWNLOAD THE eBOOK

At Phunware, we understand mobile application lifecycle management intimately. We’ve been working in this space since 2009, with deep experience and expertise in leveraging mobile context for business gain. Our Multiscreen as a Service (MaaS) platform is built to provide effective solutions across every stage of the mobile lifecycle.

For more information about how Phunware provides strategic partnership across every stage of the mobile lifecycle, contact us. And don’t forget to check out the next installment in my blog series: Org Structure in the Mobile Era: How to Organize Your Team for Success.

The post Why You Should Be Paying Attention to Mobile Application Lifecycle Management appeared first on Phunware.

Brands like Ikea, L’Oreal and McDonald’s have seen amazing results from their mobile-first strategies and continue implementing innovative ways to engage their audiences. Ikea uses augmented reality to help shoppers visualize how items would look in their home. L’Oreal uses advanced facial mapping technology to turn customer smartphones into a virtual mirror so they can “try on” various beauty products before making a purchase. And McDonald’s recently used geolocation functionality by sponsoring a Pokestop at the height of the Pokemon Go craze. Combined with new ways to capture, process and analyze data, these authentically mobile technologies don’t only deliver the experience users want—they help brands keep improving their products, solutions and services.

Let’s take a look at some of the other “authentically mobile” trends that will shape 2017 and influence which brands come out on top.

Apps Continue to Bring Home the Bacon

Back in 2014, Gartner predicted over 268 billion app downloads generating approximately $77 billion in revenue for the year 2017. And market researcher App Annie projects that by 2020, gross revenue across all app stores could exceed $101 billion.

While some sources have warned against the death of the app, it’s clear that apps—and app revenue—aren’t going anywhere anytime soon.

Video is on the Rise

Mobile video has grown faster and bigger than expected! Variety notes that today, more than half of all video viewing is happening on mobile, representing a whopping 233% increase since Q3 2013.

Of course, the growth of mobile video wouldn’t be possible without the growth of data usage. Initiatives like T-Mobile’s Binge On are doing away with mobile data limits for streaming video so users can binge to their hearts’ content. Good thing, because 70% of Americans (and over 80% of Millennials!) are binge watching, according to Deloitte’s 10th Digital Democracy Survey.

The rise of video autoplay is another signal that video will be a force to reckon with in 2017. Apps like Facebook now start playing videos instantaneously—no play button clicking required. Although video autoplay is still in its infancy, it’s clear that companies are eager to to remove obstacles to higher data usage so video, the new king of content, can reign supreme.

Location Tech Makes Mobile Smarter

GPS and beacon technologies continue to evolve and will invade diverse industry segments in 2017. Last November, to coincide with the eagerly anticipated reboot of the TV show Gilmore Girls on Netflix, Connecticut’s board of tourism launched a major marketing campaign with a “selfie map tour,” successfully integrating social media with location-based mobile tech. This year, we’ll see more examples of how location-based solutions can replicate the successes that the retail sector has already seen. Retailers like Macy’s and GameStop have already undertaken high-profile experiments with location-triggered messaging, and brands in the personal care space, like Nivea, have even begun to add location awareness to their apps.

As location technology continues to proliferate and become more sophisticated (see: the advent of virtual beacons), we can expect additional industries to start leveraging the power of location to engage users.

Mobile UX Design in 2017

User experience is one of the major driving forces in the mobile space. Today, brands must focus on providing users with visually appealing apps. In 2017 we’ll see more creative mobile design elements, like splash screens, parallax graphics, split screens, micro interactions and grid-based design. But the best UX design must integrate with technology that creates a seamless, intuitive, and enjoyable experience for users. That’s why many brands are demanding custom design services and working with UX design expert partners to create a distinctive look and feel for their mobile solutions complemented by back-end technology that powers the UX flow.

Security and Privacy

Despite sensational headlines about information security and hacking, consumers express ongoing concerns about their privacy but do not always act on those concerns. According to 2016 findings from AARP, nearly 30% of US adults access the internet via public Wi-Fi once a week or more—even though only 4.8% rate public Wi-Fi as “very safe” (with another 39.1% giving it a tepid “somewhat safe” grade).

This isn’t to say Americans are reckless with their privacy online, however. A recent McKinsey survey of car buyers and users of shared-mobility services showed that Americans are more sensitive about their data sharing when compared to their Chinese or German counterparts. But for all locations, users were increasingly willing to share their personal data if they saw value in return.

The main takeaway: as long as users get something significant in return (Wi-Fi access, an app that provides tons of utility, customized notifications and promotions, etc.), they are willing to share their data. To learn more, download our eBook, Mobile Data: The Missing Link in Your User Acquisition and Engagement Strategies.

DOWNLOAD eBOOK HERE

Something for Everyone: SMB Mobile Adoption

The introduction of standalone app modules and template-like app framework structures now provides quick, effective and budget-friendly ways for small businesses to launch their own mobile strategies. That’s one reason small business trend forecasters now estimate nearly half of small businesses will have a mobile app by 2017. More affordable pricing and increasing competitive pressure are sure to encourage small businesses to incorporate mobile into their marketing initiatives as one of their top New Year’s resolutions.

Brands are aware of what we expect as consumers. In 2017 they just need to exceed all our expectations and use the power of mobile to really wow us.

Consumers have already shown a clear preference for accessing the internet via mobile devices rather than desktop computers, and in 2016 mobile internet consumption increased around 28%. Brands that launched mobile-first initiatives must now focus on authentically mobile experiences, which don’t merely prioritize mobile over desktop experiences, but go above and beyond to harness the characteristics and technology unique to mobile devices to deliver something truly new and awe-inspiring.

As for brands who have yet to dip a toe into mobile? Well, the timing couldn’t be better.

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The post 6 Mobile Trends to Watch in 2017 appeared first on Phunware.

Each Mist wireless access point includes an array of Virtual Bluetooth Low Energy (vBLE) beacons that give it hyperlocation capabilities. Because the access points are managed and enabled by the Mist Cloud, they have significant advantages over traditional battery-powered beacons. For companies looking to set up a new location infrastructure, Mist delivers the benefits of both Wi-Fi and BLE. Those with an existing Wi-Fi network can still use Mist’s vBLE devices to efficiently add location capabilities.

Why are virtual beacons exciting?

There are myriad location technologies, as we’ve explored before. Beacons are especially good for indoor short-range applications, such as indoor navigation and in-store proximity marketing. Instead of installing multiple small physical beacon devices, Mist’s virtualized solution enables businesses to create and “install” multiple beacon zones within any given floorplan using far fewer physical devices. And those devices can be managed and even repositioned with a few mouse clicks.

Ultimately, this technology makes beacon-enabled location services much more flexible, manageable and cost-effective, which means they’re a more viable option for more businesses and organizations.

Virtual beacons and the user experience

Combined with next-generation mobile apps (like the ones we build here at Phunware), virtual beacons will enable more businesses to take greater advantage of location and context. Instead of being limited to a beacon at the front door, for example, a store could implement multiple beacon zones to deliver context-appropriate messages and gather behavioral data via their customer mobile app. The store marketing team could even move those beacon zones around as seasonality and customer traffic patterns dictate.

I can see opportunities for virtual beacons across all kinds of industries, from healthcare to retail to airports, entertainment venues, museums, multi-unit residential properties and many more. For example, the next time I go to a convention like Cisco Live!, the Mist solution could be used to log me in to the conference’s wireless network, allow me to download the event app and prompt me to stop by the registration table (with turn-by-turn navigation).

There’s a great story about how Mist’s founders got their inspiration. As Julie Bort reported in Business Insider, CEO Sujai Hajela’s daughter wished there was a way for networks to “simply put information about wherever she was at her fingertips.” With virtual beacons, brands can not only make contextually-relevant information available, but create a contextually-relevant experience.

The post News from Cisco Live and Mist Systems: Virtual Beacons Are Here! appeared first on Phunware.

Cart, meet horse. Please straighten things out. In fact, how about we start with who’s driving in the first place?

That’s right. We need to start with the customer.

Learn more in this eBook: Mobile First: Harnessing the App Lifecycle for Transformative Business Success.

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To Create a Mobile Solution, Start with the Problem

Having a mobile presence is not about having a mobile-optimized brochure. It’s about using capabilities unique to mobile to solve problems and create experiences for your users. Brands should always start by answering the question “What customer problem(s) are we trying to solve? What kind of experience do we want to create?” Forrester Research echoes this sentiment in its report, Make Smart Wireless Location Technology Decisions. In fact, the report’s #1 recommendation is “Digital business professionals should first determine what service they want to offer to customers.”

Here are some of the most common customer problems we see at Phunware:

• “Trying to find my way to my surgical appointment is overwhelming and scary.”
• “I just want to know whether all the gym equipment is taken before I head down there.”
• “I’m running late for my flight and starving. Is there a healthy option in this terminal I can grab before boarding?”

These are the common business problems driving businesses to investigate their technology options:

• Driving foot traffic and sales
• Streamlining operations
• Increasing revenue from tenant shops and food outlets
• Reducing workload for customer-facing staff (such as information desk, concierge services, etc.)
• Tracking movable assets
• Acquiring and engaging users
• Understanding consumer context and behavior to guide marketing decisions

Learn more in this eBook: Mobile First: Harnessing the App Lifecycle for Transformative Business Success.

DOWNLOAD THE eBOOK

As you’re answering these questions, make sure you’ve got all the stakeholders on board. While different departments and groups might have wish-list items or secondary goals, keep the overall team focused on your goals.

Ultimately, we recommend narrowing things down to one or two primary problems you want to solve, with 5 or so secondary issues to address. Then, and only then, start looking at various technology solutions to see how they might apply.

Curious about how location technologies fit into your overall strategies? If you’d like to brainstorm with a mobile solutions expert, give us a shout.

The post Cart, Meet Horse: Why Choosing a Mobile Technology is the Last Place Digital Businesses Should Start appeared first on Phunware.

“Surveyed and interviewed marketers seem to agree that the ability to personalize customer experiences at numerous touchpoints will become an essential feature in future marketing departments.”

—The Economist Intelligence Unit

We couldn’t agree more. True contextual personalization, as enabled and delivered by mobile devices and location marketing, may well be the most powerful development to hit retail marketing in a generation.

In the chart, you’ll see that context can be lots of different things—from where users are to what you know about them and even what they might be doing. Location marketing gives you access to more of that contextual information, which retailers can use to unlock multiple new touchpoints AND capitalize on them with personalized engagement.

For example, any and all of these potential touchpoints can be opportunities for compelling personalized engagement:

• A customer who frequently purchases fishing tackle enters the parking lot of a local lakeside park
• The competition opens a huge new outlet three miles from one of your brick-and-mortar stores
• Heavy rain is forecast for the day of a big local event, sponsored by your brand
• A member of your loyalty program enters a different mall than her usual, but you also have a store presence there
• A power shopper approaches the dressing room in your store — and your associate knows she left items in her online shopping cart

And that’s just for starters. As The Economist Intelligence Unit put it, “Engaging customers with compelling, contextually relevant experiences is the new competitive high ground.”

Download our infographic Who, What, Where? Location Intelligence Boosts Offers and Engagement to learn more.

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The post How Retail Marketers Can Unlock More Touchpoints with Location Marketing appeared first on Phunware.

Loyalty doesn’t mean what it used to.

As part of its 2016 Omnichannel Report, MasterCard took a hard look at loyalty, finding that the qualities that make shoppers sign up for loyalty problems are not the same qualities that drive repeat business.

MasterCard points to affinity as the key factor in driving repeat business—not loyalty. Affinity is defined as a higher level of trust in the brand and an emotional concept of personal value, built around relevance and resonance. David Rosen, writing for the TIBCO Software blog, tends to agree: “The realization that emotional (elated) relationships are not limited to a few fashion brands, luxury automobiles, and Apple, is leading to an expansion of how brands engage with their customers. Achieving this higher level of bliss has profound impact on customer value.”

How can retailers deliver on the need for deeper, more meaningful customer relationships?

Mobile technologies give retailers an unprecedented ability to create rich experiences that deliver on genuine customer needs, build trust and engagement, and go beyond transactions to generate real brand affinity.

Whether as a stand-alone loyalty program app or as complete mobile brand experience (we’d argue for the latter), a branded mobile app is the ideal platform for connecting with your most engaged customers—and truly delivering personalized value. TIBCO‘s David Rosen echoes this idea, saying “Rewarding with a compelling experience (no doubt) has a deeper and longer-term impact than [rewarding with a] discount or coupon.”

By harnessing location-based technologies like GPS and beacons, retail mobile apps can recognize who and where customers are in their stores and in the wider world. This visibility empowers retailers to personalize their engagement, optimize in-store experiences and deliver previously impossible benefits.

For example, a retail mobile app with location-enabled features can identify customers when they enter the store—enabling staff to personalize their interaction and triggering personalized greetings and special offers on the customers’ smartphones. According to the Boston Retail Partners special report, 53% of retailers plan to implement this capability within the next five years. Yet the technology to do it now—and do it easily and cost-effectively—already exists.

Download our eBook to learn more about how retailers can make the most out of location marketing to drive foot traffic, influence shopping behavior and ultimately generate more sales.

DOWNLOAD THE eBOOK

These gaps between what customers want and what apps can currently deliver represent key opportunities for retailers to differentiate themselves and build genuine trust and affinity. The smart retailers will close these gaps ASAP.

“When executed appropriately, real-time personalization provides retailers the ability to deliver a better brand experience, which encourages ongoing customer engagement, sustainable loyalty, and sales uplift.”
—Boston Retail Partners, “Loyalty Programs—Rewarding the Customer Experience”

Next-generation retail apps take loyalty to the next level.

The majority of North American retailers are making mobile a top priority for 2016. Yet, according to the Boston Retail Partners special report, 73% of retailers did not offer mobile access to the features of their loyalty programs. 56% of retailers said they planned to take their loyalty programs mobile within the next 5 years. That’s moving in the right direction, but perhaps not quickly enough.

Watch our on-demand webinar to learn more about how embracing mobile in a new way can help brick-and-mortar retailers become more effective and change the game.

WATCH THE ON-DEMAND WEBINAR

We’ll be watching the evolution of loyalty and the intersection of loyalty programs with mobility. Stay tuned for more!

The post Beyond Loyalty Programs: Tracking the Future of Retail Customer Relationships appeared first on Phunware.

With marketing automation (MA), your brand can take targeting and personalization to a whole new level, leveraging consumer behavior and smartphone capabilities out in the real world.

What sorts of goals can you achieve with location-based marketing?

• Driving new and repeat foot traffic
• Increasing brand awareness
• Boosting the value of your mobile app
• Encouraging loyalty program sign-up
• Pushing sales with coupons and promotions
• Promoting an event, such as a store celebration, charity event or a sponsored community event such as a 5K or carnival
• Enhancing the customer experience and relationship

Want to deliver an amazing connected mobile experience? Check out this on-demand webinar: Mobile at the Intersection of Hardware and Software to learn how to engage with users where and when it matters most.

WATCH THE ON-DEMAND WEBINAR

How does marketing automation work?

Essentially, you build a strategic message plan around specific information about where your mobile app users are and what they are doing. By taking advantage of built-in technologies on the user’s smartphone—as well as intelligent analytics—you can understand your users better and reach them more effectively.

• Location-aware technologies such as geo-fencing, beacons and GPS can tell you where your mobile app users are—whether that’s your store, your competitors or anywhere that might be relevant to your brand
• Push notifications send relevant messages right to the lock screen on the app user’s phone
• Analytics provide a wealth of data about customer behavior, such as:
  • When they visit a specific location (your store, the competition, etc.)
  • How long they stay
  • Where they go before and after
  • How frequently they visit and at what intervals

By combining location insights with your back-end customer information systems, you unlock a deeper understanding of your customer than ever before. You can use this understanding to personalize very specifically—you can even target just a single person with a highly specific message. This gives your marketing much more relevance and a stronger chance to succeed.

More and more consumers are demanding a personalized experience—online, in-store, and on mobile. “Consumers want more than just an experience—we want a personal connection that identifies with who we are, our interests, expectations and abilities.” (CMSWire)  Marketing automation can help make your app super-important to your users, even as it makes their shopping experience more pleasurable and useful. And all of that helps increase customer loyalty and sales.

Want to a more in-depth look at marketing automation and insights on how different industries are using it? Download Mobile Marketing Automation: Why It Matters and How to Get Started.

DOWNLOAD THE eBOOK

The post What Can You Do with Mobile Marketing Automation? appeared first on Phunware.

New Strategies for Attracting Shoppers

By embracing mobile in a whole new way, some retailers, like a national department store (which happens to be one of Phunware’s customers), use a slightly different strategy. They use push notifications to deliver shoppers. How do they do it? Most recently, they sent a push notification to 1 million mobile devices users who downloaded their app. What did the notification say? It simply told users about an offer of 20 percent off in-store purchases.

Of course, with traditional marketing, it would be very difficult to prove the ROI of a single outreach campaign and to track who engaged with that campaign. With a mobile app, however, this kind of direct attribution becomes easy.

When tapped or swiped, the notification took the user to an offer wallet containing a coupon with a unique barcode. When the user made a purchase in-store and presented the barcode for scanning to ensure the discount, the store could attribute the purchase to the notification. Additionally, because the purchase was tied to an individual app user, the retailer gained an opportunity to learn more about its individual users—and how to market to them.

The Results Speak for Themselves

Click to view the full infographic.

So what happened when the department store sent this coupon to a million users? Within three days, 14.2 percent of the recipients went to one of the store’s physical locations, resulting in $500,000 of revenue directly attributable to the campaign. Not bad for one push notification.

Who’s on Board with Push?

Most retailers avoid push notifications, even though studies indicate that 68 percent of consumers enable push notifications and 50 percent say that they intentionally download an app to get access to special or exclusive offers.²

When you develop a push notification strategy, you must prioritize the customer experience—and their preferences—above all else. Blindly pushing notifications is a proven path to marketing failure. What’s evolving, slowly but surely, is a recognition among marketers that tailored, optimized push notifications boost response levels. The days of “spray and pray” are fading—it’s critical to create push notifications that matter to your users.

If you’re a marketer working for a brick-and-mortar store, and you’re looking for additional foot traffic, Phunware has worked with many retailers to implement push successfully (and profitably). Download the full infographic to see how we helped our customer conquer revenue goals with relevant and timely targeted messages.

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The post Can Push Notifications Boost Retail Foot Traffic? appeared first on Phunware.

When you think of a beacon, what comes to mind? A fire on a remote mountain? A blinking light at the top of a building? A lighthouse? Just like these traditional beacons, wireless beacons are designed to communicate an important message to everyone within a certain proximity.

Beacons are small Bluetooth-enabled devices that transmit a continuous signal. The signal is “heard” by devices within a certain distance (from a few inches up to about a hundred feet) from the beacon. If a device has the relevant app installed when it recognizes the beacon, it will begin to communicate with the server to “ask” if it has any relevant information to share.

Many companies today are using this location awareness as an opportunity to send contextually relevant push notifications to users’ devices—things like special offers, reminder and welcome messages, and other alerts.

In other words, beacons help people connect in context. Learn more in our on-demand webinar, Mobile at the Intersection of Hardware and Software.
WATCH THE ON-DEMAND WEBINAR

What Role Do Beacons Play in the Network?

Beacons are invaluable tools for mobile interaction, but they are only one element in the location technology universe. It’s important to understand the role of the different location technologies, and where beacons fit in.

GPS is accurate, but because it depends on satellite communication, it doesn’t work well inside a building or anywhere without a clear line of sight to the sky. Additionally, because GPS location detection is persistent, it can increase the load on network traffic and drain the battery of a mobile device.

Wi-Fi networks can be very precise at location detection, especially with multiple routers and add-on software to triangulate their signals—essentially turning the Wi-Fi network into a mini-GPS. Unfortunately, Wi-Fi users are required to consent to network connection, which adds an additional step to the interaction and may reduce the frequency of engagement.

Beacons provide the greatest accuracy; and with the introduction of Bluetooth Low Energy technology (BLE), beacons can be deployed almost anywhere. Whereas once the battery consumption of Bluetooth technology limited its applications, the advent of BLE has opened up a new world of location-enabled possibilities.

Learn more in this eBook: Location Technology 101: Understanding Bluetooth, Blue Dot, Beacons, Geo-Fencing and More.
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Each BLE beacon has a very small footprint and is designed to operate for years on standard coin cell batteries. BLE also supports enhanced range capability of up to 200 feet. Beacons are not only easy to deploy—the fact that they only interact with in-range mobile devices limits costly network traffic and reduces the drain on mobile battery life. Recently, the introduction of virtual Bluetooth beacons has made beacon management and maintenance even easier. Learn more in The No-Geek-Speak Lowdown on Virtual Beacons.

Beacons Help Drive User Engagement

Beacons enable businesses to engage users in real time, a practice that has been shown to deliver a 45 percent interaction rate (five times higher than that of traditional push messages).¹

• Retail locations use beacons to provide their most loyal customers (those with the store’s app on their smartphones) with customized offers while they are in the store. Beacons placed in a certain department or on a certain display can be detected by in-range mobile devices, and thereby trigger a message containing a coupon, special offer or additional product information.
• Schools can use beacons to keep track of district-owned mobile devices. If a student moves a device beyond a specific threshold, like a classroom door, an alert can be triggered.
• Similarly, hospitals can use beacons for asset tracking, thereby reducing time spent hunting down pieces of equipment (not to mention theft and loss). Learn about more powerful healthcare use cases in this on-demand webinar: Using New Technologies to Enhance Patient Satisfaction.
• Anyone in a large building or campus environment—hospitals, universities, municipalities and businesses—can use beacons to help people find points of interest or to trigger “you are here” notifications in a wayfinding application.

Beacons Deliver Valuable Interactions

Although they are relatively small and simple, beacons are powerful technology that can enable groundbreaking use cases. For more information about how enterprises across industries are using mobile software and location-enabled hardware to enhance the customer experience, download our on-demand webinar: Mobile at the Intersection of Hardware and Software.
WATCH THE ON-DEMAND WEBINAR

¹PR Newswire. (2014) inMarket: Beacons Done Right Increase Interactions by 5x; Beacons Done Wrong Lead to App Deletion. Retrieved October 1, 2014

The post What Is a Beacon, Anyway? appeared first on Phunware.