I love my smart phone. A Samsung Galaxy 5. It does everything – except FaceTime – but there’s Skype, Facebook’s talk feature, Google Hangouts and other alternatives if I need to spend some face time with someone across town or in another time zone.
My smart phone gets me out of my studio and I can stay connected with my business. You never know when an emergency voiceover will pop up. And if you are not in the media production business you might not realize just how often there actually is a voiceover emergency. Had one on Monday. The call came in at 2 for a 3 o’clock session with a client on the East Coast.
The flip side of having a smart phone is that it keeps me connected with my business. There are times when it is good to be disconnected. But I think we can all agree that one of the most anxiety producing experiences is when you are half-way to your destination and realize that you left the house/office without your phone. A blessing and a curse these digital devices.
One thing I use my phone for when I am out and about is to check prices and research items that I am interested in purchasing. But I usually head back to my desktop or laptop to actually complete an online order. Apparently I am behind the power curve here! A lot of people are buying using their phones and by next year (2017) – according to eMarketer – more than 50% of online sales will be done through a mobile device.
It is certainly becoming more and more common to have the waiter pull out a phone and a Square. As each day passes we become more and more accustomed to the idea of doing everything with our phones. The article says that many more of us are starting the process on mobile, but are going back to either another online option, or perhaps buying at a brick and mortar store. I know I’ve browsed for something while I’m at a store (like Best Buy or Fry’s) and ended up buying at the store.
What I don’t know from this article is what is driving these mobile purchases. Is it simply that so many of us have them and that they are becoming part of our wardrobe – or perhaps our DNA? Do we spend that much time away from our desktops and laptops? I suppose you could be on the bus on your way to work and suddenly have an impulse to buy something. I don’t ride the bus, but I could be on the elliptical at the Y and find I need to send a thank you gift to a client. That could happen.
There are new companies where you can pretty much ONLY do your purchase online – like Uber. My experiences so far with trying to buy something on my smart phone is that the majority of the sites can be hard to navigate. This is something the article also points out – that for these numbers to continue to grow – websites will need to cater to the smaller screen and make it as easy as possible to complete a purchase.
I’m ready for it – I know I’ll make some of my purchases in the next year on my smart phone while I am out of my office. Or maybe it will become so easy to do that it just won’t make any difference what platform you use and we’ll find ourselves whipping out the mobile even while staring at our giant monitor. Just another way to do business!
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