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Coronavirus vs. Mobile Apps

The period of the pandemic is an even greater acceleration of mobile technologies, especially in terms of how often they’re used, but also in new ways to spend time at home. Average time spent in mobile applications in the first quater of 2020 recorded over 20% growth compared to the previous year. Interestingly the more a country affected by the lockdown, the more dynamic the growth, e.g. in Italy, the dynamics of the same parameter amounted to 30%.

The greatest acceleration in mobile games, streaming and fitness at-home

Record results were achived by mobile games, breaking the level of 1.2 bilion downloads of new games per week worldwide. Streaming applications achieved record rates in March 2020, over 20%beating the averagetime spent in this type of apps from 2019. In addition, golden times have come in the app education sector, where some countries such as UK or Brazil achieved 150% of app download from this sector. In the at-home fitness category not only downloads and time spent, but also app expenses increaded, with the record braking revenues.Those app that had built in home training functionalities definitely gained on the market and were more visible in the results of organic stores (ASO). Examples of this type can be mulriplied for social networking, fin-tech and shopping delivery applications. They will definitely stay with us for a longer time and it;s worth taking advantage of it.

New Chance for mobile transformation and consumer retention

The consumer is currently expecting a very dedicated response, directed to him here and now. Demand will always be directed to where is the best, fastes and best available response. Instead of general message, direct sales, there are more empathetic links with the brand. The applications also gain new funcionalities tailored to the situation: contactless delivery, fast and secure transaction forms, remote access using video, online identity verifications, etc. All this will force the market to develop even more mobile applications that will combine the new needs of recipents with the changing world. It is worth observing this market and sinking into a mobile application. It is they who are gaining the most at present, and the trust generated now will be maintained for a long time. The first data indicate much higher retention rates (keeping the user in the mobile application) than in the pre-epidemic period, even by ¼.

What should be kept in mind when maintaining retention is:

• Onboarding proces – transparent, short, informing about the key value and conditions for receiving them, collect only the data you really need in the initial phase

•  Notifications and perdonalization – sent messages when you have key information to provide, key in many cases means personalized, eg. Based on location, previous user behawior or devices.

Given the above for many companies the perios of the pandemic may be a further turning point. This period to be used in order to switch to mobile technologies, implement a new approach to the consumer, and provide them with a better mobile experience.

Source – data in the articule come from the report: How COVID-19 is impacting the mobile economy, Appannie, 28.05.2020