New Venture Lab: Equipping Christian Entrepreneurs

The Conventional View: Mobile commerce will be the “next big thing” to transform retailing, but it’s a slow evolution—something that’s been talked about for years and still has a long way to go before it leads to a massive shift in consumer behavior.

Our View: We are close to a tipping point in m-commerce. In 2011, global shipments of smart phones and tablets exceeded those of desktops and laptops for the first time. By 2015, more consumers will access the Internet through their mobile devices than from their desktop computers. In just a couple of years, mobile commerce is expected to exceed $100 billion worldwide, with some companies (such as Domino’s Pizza in Australia) forecasting that mobile sales will represent more than one-quarter of total sales. Over the next 12 months, m-commerce will change consumer behavior more than it has over the past decade.

To win in mobile commerce, companies need to prepare the whole organization to join in the evolution of what we call Multichannel 3.0, or the mobile revolution. This phenomenon is much bigger than the sum of the mobile transactions themselves. It bridges the gaps among three loosely connected shopping worlds: offline, online, and social networks. Companies need to move fast and respond on many fronts—for example, by ensuring a single message across multiple media, developing a one-to-one conversation with customers, deciding when and how to develop mobile apps that are practical and valuable, and developing mobile-friendly transactional sites. They must not underestimate the challenge. To capitalize on Multichannel 3.0, companies will need to break new ground, not repurpose existing websites. To respond in time, they will also need a disciplined approach that allows them to place multiple bets as the market takes off. 

– Just Schürmann, partner and managing director, and Jonathan Sharp, partner and managing director, Boston Consulting Group