ISU: More engaging mobile apps spur spending
BUSINESS RECORD STAFF Sep 30, 2015 | 8:43 pm
1 min read time
236 wordsAll Latest News, Innovation and EntrepreneurshipAn Iowa State University researcher was part of a team that found that the more engaging a mobile app is, the more customers will spend on a company’s products.
“It could be a total game changer if a company provides an app that’s well-functioning and offers some consumer benefit,” said Su Jung Kim, lead author of the study published in the Journal of Interactive Marketing.
Kim, an assistant professor in Iowa State’s Greenlee School of Journalism and Communication, and researchers at Northwestern University examined mobile app data for an international loyalty rewards program. They looked specifically at information retrieval such as transaction history and looking for stores affiliated with the program to see if interactive features influenced spending.
Even though the app did not include a purchase feature, it did drive sales. Customers who downloaded the app and used it over three months increased spending by 19 to 48 percent.
The highest increase was among customers using both interactive features. Researchers tracked reward points to gauge spending patterns. Not surprisingly, younger customers were more likely to use the app than older customers.
Studies project that the number of downloaded apps is expected to surpass 268 billion by 2017. However, more than half of the apps that are downloaded are deleted after one use, Kim said. To capitalize on the mobile app market, companies must create an app that provides value to consumers, she added.Read more
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