Small Business Council Success Series: Uncover the power of mobile technology
By Dr. Grace Lee
On Oct. 14, as part of Small Business Month in B.C., The Vancouver Board of Trade's Small Business Council welcomed Gary Semplonius, Vice President of Business Wireless Radio and Paging at Bell Mobility. With more than 10 years of leadership in IT solutions, Semplonius spoke about supercharging your business using mobile technology.
Wireless technology is quickly moving towards Long Term Evolution (LTE) which is the world's fastest wireless communication of high-speed mobile data. When paired with the world's fastest mobile technology, the result is a pervasive technology that allows high-speed transactions in business.
Mobile phones now have octa-processors. These processors enable effective multi-tasking features for users on the go. The mobile revolution drove the greatest technology surges of the century as smartphones became more like mini-computers.
Semplonius described the changing mobile landscape and urged business owners to understand how mobile technology is used. Currently, 80 per cent of Canadians (or approximately 20 million people) are smartphone users — a 19 per cent increase since 2013. Tablet users and smartphone users comprise 9.3 million and 19.7 million Canadians, respectively.
More importantly, Semplonius identified a number of key business challenges facing Canadian business owners. First, there is not enough time in the day to tackle the ever expanding to do list. The result is a movement towards getting more done in less time, a challenge that is overcome by efforts to increase productivity.
Second, Semplonius said businesses owners face challenges to grow their sales and attract new customers. Strategies to boost revenues are driven by the challenge of also controlling rising costs and manage cash flow. The internet has increased commoditization pressure on products. As a result, differentiating one's business from the competition remains a top challenge.
Through recognizable examples, Semplonius indicated that how businesses differentiate themselves will be experiential.
Four guiding principles for experiential differentiation:
- How you understand your customer (i.e. Amazon)
- Giving your customer control of their experience ( i.e. Fitbit)
- Serving your customer as a team (i.e. Apple)
- Adapting to your customer's situation (i.e. Uber).
In closing, Semplonius recommended some apps that can help owners run their business.
- Square for mobile credit card payment and point of sale.
- Expense Manager for accounting on the go with information stored on the cloud.
- Dropbox for business owners in need of reliable virtual storage.
When we think about how business was conducted before the mobile revolution, we can appreciate that we have come a long ways. To stay afloat of this constantly changing mobile landscape, think about mobility and transformation.
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