What can I do to “smartphone-ize” my business?
A well designed smartphone app could take the place of some of the things currently done by paid staff. For example, you could allow customers to set their own appointments by showing a public calendar with unavailable times greyed out and allow customers to pick from remaining time slots.
If you have customers who have a revolving account or who regularly carry a credit balance, allow them to access their account information through the app interface.
Or your app may feature some kind of calculator for customers to figure out how much of your product they need. This could work well for paint stores, fabric stores, garden centers, etc.
A checklist could be handy for some types of businesses. For instance, if there are certain things your clients must do for themselves before you can effectively start providing services. Say you are a carpet cleaner, some things you need are for dogs to be locked up, clutter to be picked up, perhaps you even want breakable or very valuable items removed from the rooms to be cleaned.
Think of a smartphone app as a utilitarian marketing tool not much different from a calendar, calculator or ruler. Brainstorm features and functions pertaining to your business which can be automated, which help both you and your customers and especially which your customers are likely to find cool or useful. If necessary, enlist the help of a marketer who understands your business to help you come up with ideas. (If you are interested in hiring my services for this, find my contact information here.)
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A well designed smartphone app could take the place of some things currently done by paid staff.
Allow customers to set their own appointments online or through Smartphone apps.
Allow customers to access their account information online or through a Smartphone app.
Your app may feature a calculator for customers to figure out how much of your product they need.
Think of a smartphone app as a marketing tool no different from a calendar, calculator or ruler.