5 Reasons Your B2B Mobile App Will Fail. And How to Ensure It Doesn t

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Antony Campbell
6 years ago
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1 5 Reasons Your B2B Mobile App Will Fail And How to Ensure It Doesn t

2 Mobile is eating the world We are in the midst of a mobile revolution. More than 60 percent of U.S. mobile subscribers use smartphones and the number is growing every year percent of all Internet traffic now comes from tablets or smartphones. Organizations of all types have embraced this trend and developed mobile apps. 2 As Benedict Evans says, Mobile is eating the world. 3 Mobile users who conduct business on their devices While the B2B world typically lags behind the consumer world, the integration of smartphones and tablets into work life has made this trend difficult to ignore. Walk through any workplace or job site and you ll see smartphone users in full force, not just making calls and sending text messages but reading , searching for information and using mobile apps. The BYOD (bring your own device) movement is accelerating mobile momentum in the workplace. Even companies that are woefully behind the times are full of tech-savvy (and tech-dependent) employees. A recent study indicated that 70 percent of mobile professionals will conduct their work on mobile devices by Even old-line B2B industries that tend to be behind the curve cannot ignore this revolution. Mobile devices are fast becoming an essential part of the professional toolset across most industries critical to how workers stay connected and to how they find and access information. 70% by Nielsen 2 Adobe Digital Index 3 Benedict Evans 4 Gartner Inc. 2

3 Riding the curve with confidence Forward-thinking B2B organizations are already riding the mobile curve. They may have felt particular pressure to make a move when their competitors launched apps or their sales teams asked for better ways to access support materials on the go. But as with any initiative especially software development initiatives a mobile app requires a carefully considered strategy. Coming up with ideas may not be very difficult. The challenge is in determining which ideas are good and how to execute them effectively. While there is a lot to be said for wanting to move rapidly to embrace an important trend, poor planning can result in wasted time, effort and money. Sure, you don t want to have to tell the CEO that the mobile app isn t ready to launch yet and you ll be months behind your competitors but you also don t want to tell him that the company invested tens of thousands of dollars in an app that nobody used and now you ll have to start from scratch. Forward-thinking B2B organizations are already riding the mobile curve. If you take a smart approach, you can move quickly and effectively. 3

4 It s not all about the idea When it comes to building new applications, there is always a great deal of focus placed on coming up with the right idea. It is very easy to overemphasize this. Ideas are important, but they are only a starting point; the best way to execute may be very different from the way you conceived it. Few organizations move forward with truly bad ideas, but many move forward with a mistaken notion of how far their good idea can really take them on its own. Derek Sivers, successful technology entrepreneur and author, developed the chart below, which provides a useful perspective on the relationship between ideas and execution. STRENGTH OF THE IDEA Awful Weak So-so Good Great Brilliant = -1 = 1 = 5 = 10 = 15 = 20 X QUALITY OF EXECUTION None Weak So-so Good Great Brilliant = $1 = $1,000 = $10,000 = $100,000 = $1,000,000 = $10,000,000 = VALUE OF TECHNOLOGY Ideas are only part of the equation. They are multipliers. Multiply the strength of an idea by the quality of its execution to determine the value of a technology. 5 Ideas are only part of the equation. They are multipliers. Even the best ones won t go far without strong execution. Weak execution can drain substantial resources from an organization while yielding little or no value. A successful app development process begins with the development of a strong strategic foundation that will carry through ideation, execution and beyond. 5 Derek Sivers 4

5 So, what s wrong with my idea? Maybe nothing. The point is not to suggest that you and your team have bad ideas, and we certainly don t want to make you feel gun-shy about ideation. But there is a set of critical considerations you need to go through to ensure that your idea makes sense for your company and is executed successfully. It s easy to feel the pressure to skip the strategic process necessary to refine your ideas and properly plan your execution. After all, you know your customers. And the mobile app idea you had in the shower this morning certainly seems perfect. And that development shop your IT department found has built a lot of apps before, so they should do a good job right?? 5

6 Go forward with confidence Despite the title, our focus is not on failure but on success. In this e-book, we will look at the five most common fundamental problems with mobile app ideas and execution. Our focus will be on B2B apps, but the principles here also apply generally to consumer mobile development. 5 reasons your B2B mobile app will fail: You built the app for the wrong person. You built a solution in search of a problem. Your idea doesn t connect to your brand. You ve lost your core value to feature distraction. You re not removing enough friction. 6

7 1 You built the app for the wrong person.? If your mobile app (or any of your marketing initiatives) is not grounded in a meaningful understanding of your audience, it s not likely to succeed. In the B2B world, we need to engage with a wide range of audiences influencers, decision-makers, end-users, distributors, etc. Successful marketing strategies and tactics require an understanding of each audience as well as its role in the influence and decision chain for our products and services. Most companies think they understand their audiences, but once they get beneath the surface, they find they are operating with some blind spots and assumptions about what drives potential customers to make decisions. Ensure you have strong command of your audience s perspective before undertaking any significant marketing initiative. Identifying your audience At The Mx Group, we use a highly focused process to develop a picture of each of our clients target audiences. These pictures, which we call Personas, give flesh-and-blood identities to these audiences, clarifying the contrast points between different buyers and ensuring that all of the marketing strategies and tactics we deploy are aligned with audience needs. While an enormous amount of time or extensive research aren t required to develop this type of actionable understanding about your market, you will need an effective process and a commitment to uncovering the critical, differentiated concerns of the most important potential users. Most companies think they understand their audiences, but they are operating with some blind spots and assumptions. 7

8 2You built a solution in search of a problem. You built a great app so why didn t anyone use it? Because knowing your audience is just the first step. To develop an app successfully, you need a granular understanding of your audience s needs. What problems do they have that this app could help them solve? Will this resonate with your audience? Will they see your app as a solution to a problem they actually have? Users won t integrate a new piece of technology into their workflow unless it s something they really need. Think like a mobile user When addressing this issue, make sure you re thinking clearly about how mobile devices fit into your user s day. For example, you probably provide a wide range of information on your website and in your product specification literature. But when considering what type of app would deliver value, you ll need to narrow your focus. If you re building an app for contractors, does it deliver the type of information a contractor is typically looking for while on a job site or in another high-mobile-use area? If not, maybe you should be delivering a different set of information. If your app is designed to empower your sales force, have you aligned it with the sales team s process? Users won t integrate a new piece of technology into their workflow unless it s something they really need. Remember, mobile solutions should solve mobile problems. Your mobile app should address issues connected with a user s need to access information when it is not convenient to use other means (e.g., a laptop or desktop computer). 8

9 2 (cont.) What problem will your app solve? For meaningful adoption, an app must solve a real problem for its users. Examples of problems that B2B mobile apps can solve include: Users: Equipment installers in the field Problem: Installing products takes longer than it should because I don t have ready access to product information on the job site. Users: Sales team Problem: When I m on the road with potential customers, I can t easily show potential savings or ROI calculations. Users: Plant engineers Problem: I don t have ready access to manufacturer recommendations, so troubleshooting issues with equipment on the plant floor takes longer than it should. Many B2B companies have forged ahead with applications that seem to fit a user need, but really don t. A set of features may sound great to you, but if your app doesn t solve any actual problems, your audience won t use it. A set of features may sound great to you, but if your app doesn t solve any actual problems, your audience won t use it. 9

10 3Your idea doesn t connect to your brand. Mobile apps should not be planned or developed in a vacuum. Be sure that ideation around your app is rooted in your brand strategy. Many apps fail because the concept behind them is too peripheral even antithetical to the company s brand. For example, if you are a high-end, aspirational brand, it might not make sense to launch an app that helps users find ways to cut costs. If you are an IT security firm, it might seem like a good idea to build an app that helps people find IT conferences in their area. But is this app really connected to what the brand stands for? Probably not. You should not be building the mobile equivalent of a desk calendar or a logo pen. Success in developing a mobile app isn t just about adoption; it s about adoption that will help support your relationships with current and prospective customers. Is this idea consistent with what my brand is about? This is a key question you need to ask as you formulate your mobile ideas and throughout the execution process. Your brand strategy will serve as an important grounding element for your mobile strategy. Be careful not to psych yourself out of taking the mobile leap through this process. Remember, your brand isn t what you do now; it s what you should do. It s easy for B2B companies to say, We re an old-school organization. We re about face-to-face communication not technology leadership. But if your brand is about building relationships with your customers and empowering them, then you should find ways to leverage this new channel to deliver on that promise. More than a few businesses have found themselves left behind because they decided that a new technology didn t fit in with their business model or the mindset of their current customers. Mobile is here to stay. A new generation of decision-makers will rely substantially on their smartphones and tablets. Find a way to deliver your core value through this channel. 10

11 4You ve lost your core value to feature distraction. So you ve got an idea that is well aligned with your brand and will solve a real problem for your users. What happens next? You make a big list of the features and start building, right? This is where most market-facing applications fail. Use of requested software features There is a core value to your brand and the application that you ve envisioned. But capturing it in the final product takes strategy and discipline. If you re already planning several features, ask yourself if they will deliver the core value. What about the other features that you (or someone on your team) will add during the process? If you are not careful, you ll wind up adding a large list of features that will result in two critical distractions: 1. User distractions The features that aren t delivering your core value will be hard to find among the noise of marginal features. 2. Diversion of resources Money and time will be squandered developing these useless features, leaving your most important features underexecuted and draining the core value from your application. 64% rarely or never used 6 6 The Standish Group 11

12 4(cont.) Feature planning Work with your development partner to ensure your application stays focused on features that will deliver its core value. Typical feature planning flow Your ideas!!!!!!! Potential features Frozen commitment to original features Distracting feature additions and reworks Result Project late and over budget 60% of the features useless Useful features buried and underexecuted Ideal feature planning flow Your ideas Refine ideas Refined features!!!!!!! Persona, needs, brand strategy!!! Develop critical user experiences Prioritization and filtering of features Result Useful feature set focused on core value Project on time and on budget 12

13 5You re not removing enough friction. You have identified a real problem for your users and you have a way to solve it. Now you need to determine how much of an improvement your solution will be over the solutions your users are currently using. Most successful market-facing applications have one thing in common: They remove friction for users in a process. User friction consists of all elements that either require work on the part of the user or cause resistance, uncertainty or confusion. For example, a tool that allows you to easily pull up relevant information is better than one that requires you to scroll through multiple pages of information to find what you need. (A search engine is a prime example.) Generally, a tool that removes operations or confusion from a process reducing the number of clicks and simplifying the interface provides value to a user. So when planning an app, you have to ask yourself, How does this process compare with alternative ways to do the same thing? For example, if your app provides product details through a three-step interface that requires a lot of scrolling and information input, but your website (through a mobile or desktop device) will provide those details in just two steps, then you are actually adding friction to your user s process. 13

14 5 (cont.) Look at the big picture To assess how much friction your solution removes from a process, you ll need to take a wide view of the process. Let s take this example: Users: Equipment installers in the field Problem: Installing products takes longer than it should since because I don t have ready access to product information on the job site. How is the problem solved now? Installers bring manuals to a job site and thumb through them to find information. They might ask someone on the job site or even just estimate proper installation specifications themselves. Let s look at how these solutions cause friction and where they have important flaws: Friction Read from printed manuals Ask someone / estimate Time required to find the information Printed materials take up space Time required to find someone and discuss Estimation causes uncertainty and anxiety Will your app be an improvement over current solutions? Flaws Outdated information may lead to inaccurate installation Incorrect information or estimation may lead to inaccurate installation Will your app be an improvement over these solutions? You ll need to fully understand the current process and ensure that yours removes friction and adds value. Remember, an application should deliver enough value in solving a problem that users will sell it for you. When your app becomes a central part of the user s work day, they are compelled to tell their colleagues about it and that s the most effective marketing you can get! 14

15 5 (cont.) Mobile isn t frictionless By definition, most mobile applications automatically remove at least one element of friction because the user will not need to access a desktop or laptop computer to access the tool s features. But if your app forces users into an even lengthier or more confusing process, you are actually adding friction. That additional friction may cancel out the advantages of mobility and result in a tool that does not significantly improve on current solutions. Delivering a successful user experience When planning your user experience, it s important to consider how users interact with mobile content. Patterns are different than they are on desktop devices. Mobile utility is more about access to information on the go and less about having access to full or complex tool sets on every device. This concept makes sense smaller mobile screens and keyboards are generally less conducive than desktop applications to heavy form inputs and controls. In order to ensure that you are delivering the optimal user experience, make sure you are working with user experience experts and user interface designers who truly understand mobile. Since mobile remains very new, the idea of making a process or a set of information available through smartphones and tablets remains exciting. But don t let this excitement cause you to overlook the fact that to be successful, a mobile experience needs to remove barriers that users currently encounter in accessing that same content. Make sure you are working with user experience designers who truly understand mobile. 15

16 Don t be afraid The key to success is to address mobile opportunity through an effective, strategic process determining your objectives and leveraging your knowledge of the audience and their needs to create applications that will solve real user problems while supporting your brand promise. The mobile revolution has created a new playing field on which to engage and provide value to key audiences. Smart organizations will make the move to stay on this curve and ahead of their competitors. Many organizations are afraid of failure and are paralyzed when it comes to moving onto this playing field. Don t be! The tide is moving quickly, so you don t want to wait. You don t need months of meetings and hand-wringing about your mobile strategy just a smart process of ideation and execution. Ready to discuss developing a successful B2B mobile app? Call The Mx Group at: Knowing where you might go wrong will help ensure that you are well positioned to successfully take advantage of the mobile opportunity. 16

17 The Mx Group is a demand generation and digital agency that empowers companies with the competitive edge of modern B2B marketing. We integrate strategy, technology, marketing operations and sales optimization services to help companies attract, convert and retain customers. For more than 25 years, clients have trusted us to help turn their marketing investments into measurable revenue. For more information, contact The Mx Group at or getstarted@themxgroup.com 17

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