Tag: m-commerce apps

Lush finally makes it into m-commerce with a shopping app

| April 24, 2015

The handmade cosmetics retailer has been a holdout until now but has finally created a scent and mood application.

Cosmetics retailer, Lush, which is best known for its handmade products, has finally taken its very first steps into the m-commerce sphere with the launch of a new mobile app for iOS devices that gives shoppers the ability to browse through its items based on their mood or a fragrance they like.

The design of the app was meant to focus on the sensory experience of their various retail offerings.

The m-commerce app gives users the chance to search and browse through categories based on a number of different factors, including the scent, feel, and mood of a given product. Each of the products is then displayed in styles and colors that are detailed and rich. Next to the name of each product on its individual description page is a complete list of all of the ingredients that it contains, as well as high resolution videos and pictures.

In order to create the m-commerce app, Lush worked alongside the ustwo digital product studio.

m-commerce - shopping appThe digital product owner at Lush, Adam Goswell, explained that “Working in such close collaboration with ustwo gave us the opportunity to create something really great together, that benefits from ustwo’s experience in delivering great mobile experiences coupled with the brand knowledge and design/creative input from Lush – it made for a formidable team.”

The lead designer at ustwo, Dev Morgan added that it was challenging to be able to organize such a vast selection of varied content for the mobile commerce channel. They, therefore, used native code processing power in order to “incorporate cues from the current website,” so that it became possible for them to be able to accomplish and display a great deal more.

Goswell and Morgan will be looking to broaden the m-commerce app across the international markets at Lush over the next twelve months, but both companies have expressed their happiness and excitement over their first foray into the mobile marketplace. The cosmetics retailer may have taken its time in stepping into the smartphone based shopping ecosystem, but now that they have done it, they have made certain to do it in a way that reflects their brand.

The m-commerce war sees websites edging ahead of apps

| May 22, 2014

Applications are beginning to lose out to mobile sites when it comes to consumer shopping behaviors.

According to some of the latest statistics that were presented in a report on a recent study, consumers are now visiting m-commerce websites more frequently than apps, though they are more likely to make an actual purchase using the application.

This suggests that brands hoping for the greatest mobile shopping success may need to focus on both channels.

This also suggests that the previously recommended decision for brands to place all of their concentration on mobile app development in order to succeed in m-commerce may no longer be the ideal path. This is because the majority of smartphone users would prefer to interact with stores on their devices using websites and not applications. This is particularly true when it comes to informing themselves about the brand, store, shop locations, and products, for example.

The study looked into the way that consumers use m-commerce in order to interact with brands.

It was conducted by ICM Research, which surveyed more than 1,300 smartphone owners. It asked them about their interaction with a rather limited sample of 13 different retailers, over their smartphones. Across 12 of those 13 retailers, the websites were the most commonly used mobile shopping option. The only exception, the last of those retailers, was eBay, where the app received the largest amount of traffic.m-commerce challenges

The company that experienced the smallest number of mobile app users was Boots. Only 8 percent of the smartphone users who interacted with that brand and took part in the study did so by way of the app. Comparatively, 65 percent of them used the mobile website for this purpose. The retailer, Next, known for its fashions, experienced the second lowest use of its app – 11 percent – when compared to the interactions over its mobile website – 62 percent.

On the other hand, eBay’s m-commerce app was used by 52 percent of the respondents, whereas 35 percent of the respondents said that they interacted with that brand over their mobile browsers. Jamie Belnikoff, associate director at ICM Research, pointed out that the degree to which consumers seemed to prefer websites to apps surprised him.