Businesses think mobile apps are important, but may not maintain them

The vast majority of executives recognise the value of mobile apps for their business (87%), but very few are prepared to successfully deploy and maintain those apps, finds a global Accenture study*.

Source: Accenture.

The Growing the Digital Business: Spotlight on Mobile Apps report surveyed nearly 2,000 senior decision makers across 15 countries. It found that during the design and build stages of app development, only 52% employ a testing programme that includes user feedback. Nearly half (48%) carry out usage reporting or analytics to understand any user pain points in live apps.

Senior decision makers expect enterprise apps to play a major role in adding value to their business, according to the survey findings: 

• Eight in 10 (82%) of respondents see apps as integral to their organisation
• Eight in 10 (85%) believe that apps are the dominant user interface of the future
• Nearly nine in ten believe apps to be a portal to the digital business (87%).

In Asia Pacific, a major proportion of respondents said apps are necessary to fully realise the benefits of digital technology, from 98% in India, 97% in China, 94% in the Philippines and 93% in Japan.

However, fewer than half of respondents are taking advantage of apps to improve their business efficiency. Just 46% reported using productivity apps, and only 44% are using apps as a channel for sales, customer service or information. Other apps that could represent major operational benefits to enterprises such as mobile learning and collaboration apps are only in use in 35% of businesses, although a further 38% of respondents not using them today intend to adopt them in the next two years.

Abhijit Kabra, Mobile Applications Practice Lead, Accenture Digital - Mobility, noted that many companies are not bothering to improve their existing apps, which could put their investment in jeopardy.

“Businesses are not keeping a close eye on their apps. Nine out of 10 respondents told us that they see high customer demand for effective mobile apps, but despite that half of respondents felt that mobile apps cannot be appropriately secured for business purposes, and only 45% of them have crash reporting in place,” he said.

"To get the best results from apps, businesses must do rigorous testing before launch and robust app management once deployed. Not only does this help to provide the best possible user experience, but it will also help make sure that security challenges are addressed as an ongoing priority.”

App management throughout the app lifecycle helps avoid impaired performance that can frustrate users and create a poor user experience, or lead to weak security. 

· Half the survey respondents (49%) cited security as the greatest challenge faced in managing and developing mobile apps.

· After security, the second biggest challenge cited was performance issues, such as crashing and bugs (37%). Just over half (55%) make use of any bug fixing or tracking tools to help overcome this.

“Apps are becoming critical to access business data for real-time decision making, whether it’s to manage industrial processes, employee collaboration, training programs or the customer experience,” said Kabra. “So, user experience and app performance are more important than ever. Our research shows that business leaders clearly need to raise their game in app management to make sure they make the most of their investment.” 

Interested?

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Read the TechTrade Asia blog post on Accenture's just-opened Internet of Things Centre of Excellence for Resources

*The study is based on a combination of online and telephone interviews, conducted in December 2014 and January 2015, with 1,925 senior decision-makers for digital strategy and technologies. Participating companies represented 15 countries and nine industries, and over 85% had revenues of more than US$1 billion.