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This may not come as a surprise, but large companies are still lagging when it comes to adopting and integrating mobile into their company cultures and workflows. Large companies are not exactly known for moving quickly, then again, it seems like mobile is everywhere and has been here forever. Still, a survey done by IBM/Oxford Economics found that “‘The mobile challenges that organizations are wrestling with are much the like the challenges they saw when dealing with the emerging Internet 15 years ago,’ said Eric Lesser, an author of the study and a research director at IBM’s Institute for Business Value.”
The survey covered 600 companies with more than $500 million in annual revenues (a decent number of those companies hit the $5 billion a year mark) in 29 countries. It also spoke to 30 “mobile leaders.” Only half the companies report having a structured, integrated, formalized mobile plan. From CIO:
Only 50% of the organizations surveyed agreed that their mobile strategy is aligned with the overall business strategy. Even fewer said their organizations had set up a clear funding mechanism for mobile, or had an established governance structures for mobile initiatives.
Those companies that haven’t figures out the mobile world yet are really only hurting themselves. Consumers and customers expect companies to have a mobile presence and if they don’t those customers might just go elsewhere. That’s not just lip service, embracing mobile has had strong, quantifiable results.
Of the mobile strategy leaders (about 14% of the total participants), 73% reported measurable returns from mobile investments. Some said that a key benefit of using mobile technology to improve employee productivity is faster customer response time — answering complaints and requests, or fulfilling orders.
Of the industry leaders, 51% percent of banks in the study reported measurable returns on investment from their mobile maneuvers, compared to 34% for other organizations.
Hopefully those numbers will help large companies realize that embracing mobile strategies is good for customer engagement, worker morale (another part of the study found the mobile-centric social networking helps coworker connect and solve problems), brand reputation and the bottom line.
Want to be successful in your mobile approach? The survey found that those companies who are moving ahead in mobile are also discovering that a mobile strategy isn’t just an IT or development thing – it’s a whole company thing. Getting more departments involved in the effort helps companies have a more holistic, successful mobile experience.
Mobile leaders said they have found success in bringing the Chief Marketing Officer into the mobile planning process earlier, Lesser noted. A senior advisor to an electronics company quoted as saying that it’s important in mobile strategy planning to “make sure the voice of the customer is heard by the engineer.”
