Tag: mobile apps

Mobile banking has become very popular, survey

| January 8, 2015

The results of recent research show that a notable percentage of smartphone users use the device to conduct financial transactions.

A recent survey conducted by a financial analytics firm called RateWatch has shown that while a very small percentage of bank customers consider mobile banking to be their main option, accessing an account via smartphone is highly popular nonetheless.

Among the survey participants, 62 percent considered their primary option to be banking in person at the branch.

The 4th Annual Mobile Banking Survey revealed that while people may not think of their mobile devices as their main method of banking, there is still a considerable number of them who actually use those devices for that purpose. Bain & Co., a global management consultancy, conducted a survey that showed that 35 percent of customers worldwide were using their smartphones in order to complete certain bank transactions. That research involved the responses from approximately 83,000 bank account owners.

The popularity of mobile banking is reflected in the changes that many banks are making to cater to the devices.

Mobile Banking SurveyChase Bank, for example, was one of the early entrants into the world of apps and services over mobile devices. This financial institution not only created applications that could be used by customers in order to complete transactions with their bank, but it also advertised it quite heavily through various different kinds of ads. That bank currently has over 18 million mobile customers, according to the figures cited by Gavin Michael, the Chase Bank head of digital.

Michael explained that the use of smartphones to complete these transactions is “redefining how we think about banking”. This same attitude appears to be shared by the entire banking industry, at the moment. The survey from RateWatch suggested that from 2011 to 2014, the percentage of banking institutions that started to offer services over mobile devices doubled from having been 41 percent to become 82 percent.

Mobile banking has faced a number of hurdles along the way – and continues to do so. At the same time that its convenience has made it increasingly popular among some consumers, there are many who are highly resistant to using it due to concerns with regards to the security of their devices and the safety of their private and sensitive data.

Facebook will be using different mobile apps for many of its features

| January 5, 2015

The social network will be facing a number of changes in its user experience over smartphones and tablets.

Facebook has decided that one or two mobile apps isn’t taking up enough real estate on smartphones and tablets and has now announced that in 2015, it will be dividing many of its features into a number of different separate applications, instead of a more all-in-one opportunity that it previously provided.

The social network has stated that it is going forward with this decision and it will be starting quite soon.

In 2015, it plans to start to move a growing number of its features away from its main application and into separate mobile apps of their own. According to the Facebook Canada managing director, Jordan Banks, who is also the global head of vertical strategy for the company, “We’re getting away from that single app that does everything for you. We released nine different apps in 2014 and I think what you’ll see is we’ll release more in 2015 — at the demand and behest of our users.”

Facebook feels that its users wants separate mobile apps that will each do one thing very effectively.

Facebook Mobile Apps Banks explained that they feel that most of the users of mobile social media would like features in individual apps “that do one thing incredibly well.” Therefore, they have taken Messenger out of the main Facebook app, for example, and have placed it into its own standalone app. They claim that the reason they have done it is that “that’s what our users were telling us. They didn’t want to click two or three times before they got into Messenger.”

For this reason, Banks expressed that it is likely that this will be a considerable trend for the company as it moves forward. Facebook will start to be focused on issuing more individual apps with the new features from the company, instead of continuing to build on one central application.

Although at the time of the writing of this article, Banks stated that he had heard only positive feedback about the decision, users have been complaining quite loudly about the separate mobile apps for different features, particularly in terms of the Facebook Messenger option. At the Apple App Store, there are currently a larger number of one-star reviews for the decision than there is applause.