5 Ways smartphones have changed business

16-Apr-2016 12:45 PM Digital Marketing

Smartphones are rapidly changing the way millions of individuals around the globe conduct business. Mobile phones now have the potential to augment nearly every aspect of our personal and professional lives. Mobile innovations are leading us to newer levels of connectivity, productivity, and discovery.

With 5G, blockchain, internet of Things (IoT), and other upcoming technologies, all the benefits will be augmented. It will make business easier and more powerful than it is now. At present, smartphone is already changing business for the better.

Here are five ways smartphones are changing the business landscape:

1. Streamlined communication

Smartphones have built upon the basic layer of telephonic communication, with additional layers of efficiency that make business communications more polished than ever before. No longer limited to voice only, we can now send various media through text messages, emails, cloud services, and other platforms.

Once thought of as a distant fantasy pictured in science fiction movies and novels, smartphones today allow us to have face-to-face video communication with anyone around the globe through our fingertips.

Over the years, calling plans have become cheaper than ten years ago. People are consuming more digital information, entertainment, and media content. The mushrooming of communication platforms have changed people’s life and how they do business.

The speed of the internet and the present mobile phone technology has improved productivity, enhanced interactions, and then transformed everything including our performance at our jobs through collaboration on projects and file sharing platforms at real-time.

2. More possibilities in more places

Smartphones allow us the freedom to do many things in many places. It is amazing as to how much we are able to learn and discover in this age. As long as you’ve got a signal, you can access a range of media and services from a device that fits conveniently in your pocket.

With smartphones, you can check your email, pay your taxes, shop, read the news, consult the stock market, read some interesting blogs, and check important financial information from any location.

Not only this, but now you can summon a taxi cab, or pay for your gym membership too. Online shopping has become easy and is a money saver. Sharing of information has become easier too.

3. Personal Organization Made Simple

It once was extremely cumbersome to manage one’s extensive collection of business documents and files while keeping track of correspondence. But modern-day smartphones have the ability to neatly organize and arrange everything in one’s life.

Whether you’re searching for a specific email or an obscure memo from months ago, or would like to record the last time you spoke to a client, smartphones make browsing and retrieving your personal information simple.

Smartphones also act as personal assistants, allowing users to set up reminders about upcoming meetings, bills, and deadlines. You have access to applications that can arrange, file, and organize files for you.

You can organize your photos based on when it was taken and the place it was taken, and you can organize bills. You can pull out any old information or files from these apps and refer to them in matter of seconds. It has become that powerful.

4. Payments made easy

In the coming years, more people will use their phones for payments. Apps facilitating secure payments without charging fees are mushrooming. Money is moving more freely than ever before, giving rise to easy online transactions.

These apps backed by based on government backed payment system like India’s Unified Payment interface (UPI). It has changed the way business transactions are done. These days shopkeepers and small vendors are able to collect payments using payment apps.

Governments world over are pushing for technologies that can facilitate paperless transactions as it will be the norm in the future.

For example, India Stack a government multi-layered project is facilitating presenceless, paperless, cashless, and consentless financial system. The user interface will mostly be via mobile phones.

5. Facilitated networking

Building and maintaining business relationships is a key component in today’s fast-paced world, especially with the advent of social media platforms like Facebook and LinkedIn

Smartphones provide access to these platforms and have effectively allowed us broaden our social circles. Having access to information about acquaintances and clients on-the-go makes a huge difference in daily business interactions.

For example, if you’re going to a business meeting with someone you’ve only met once, you could go to Facebook or LinkedIn to discover more about them and potentially develop conversation points that’ll help you build a rapport further down the road.

6. More accessible technology

A few years before smartphones became readily accessible to millions of people worldwide, the PDA (or “personal digital assistant”) was the device popularly used for conducting important tasks on-the-go.

However, not many people could afford the pricey PDAs and they became status symbols for the members of the upper class and business.

But with time, more companies started jumping on the smartphone bandwagon, and then access to mobile technology became cheaper.

7. Made online presence a compulsion

Smartphones are now the most common device with which people are accessing the internet. This number will increase with time as devices are becoming mobile and internet is getting cheaper.

Businesses must earmark some of their annual budget to create a mobile friendly websites and platforms to make sure their brand looks good online.

This includes making sure that the existing website or future websites is mobile friendly, and then the brands must have presence on different social media channels.

Because there will be more people online, brands must channel funds to advertising and marketing techniques.

8. Protect business reputation

Smartphones and the powerful element that it carries called the internet has given immense power to the people and businesses worldwide. One bad review from a customer online will ruin reputation of businesses.

Businesses have got to be more careful with how they represent themselves online and protect their reputation. People spend time online researching for products or solutions that can solve their problems.

To cater to this, businesses must employ people to manage their brand as well as deliver the products or services these internet users seek, a tool to increase brand awareness.

Smartphone technology is constantly evolving and is offering businesses new ways to continuously collaborate, grow, and reap monetary benefits.

Is your business mobile yet? We can help you build and grow an online presence. Contact us today.