#3 Reasons #Your Startup Needs to Launch #a Mobile App_Now

Small and medium-sized business owners often erringly believe that mobile apps can be useful only for large corporations or enterprises. They consider such apps are too expensive or too industry specific for their needs and assume to have an official website is enough. In truth almost any business, regardless of industry or size, can profit from a mobile app. It is just important to understand the mobile app development process and how your app will fit with both the market niche and marketing goals. With that said, here's a look at 3 reasons why investing in a mobile business site might be the best thing you can do for your company.

1. Engage directly with your customers. Mobile apps give businesses the opportunity to interact with customers in real time with valuable information on location and other demographics through user profiles. Effective business apps produce an engaged customer, which usually translates into a paying customer.

2. Promote your products and services. Marketing research has shown that clients perceive companies that offer mobile apps more positively than those that don't. An app can make your business stand out, which will help you build relationships with customers. Aside from promoting your brand, an app can also help you feature products and services to drive sales.

3. Expand your standard customer base. You may already have a traditional site but trends are increasingly moving toward mobile search and browsing. Indeed, smartphone users spend about 90 percent of their mobile time on apps, and has about 30 apps installed on their device and spend about 35 hours a month using them. Revenue from mobile apps is expected to reach nearly $70 billion in the U.S. in 2017. You can see how companies that don't offer mobile apps and responsive design sites appealing to the mobile medium could quickly become obsolete in such a market. What's more, mobile apps, especially those integrated with social media, can reach a younger demographic that might otherwise never encounter your business.

If you remain ambivalent about whether a mobile business app is worth the cost, the good news is you can start with a prototype first- including only the features that will add the most value. If the pilot version of your app performs well in your market segment, you can begin to add more features and device types later.

Depending on your market niche and the type of field you are working in, you can build an app that will influence on your business and bring it to a new level.