The 5 Apps Your B2B Company Needs

Next up in our series: B2B companies

As we previously stated in our original post, The 5 Apps Your Non-Profit Organization Needs, mobile phone and mobile app usage has skyrocketed recently and will continue to do so in the coming years.

Based off a 2015 Internet Trends Analysis, the average person in the US spends 5.6 hours of their day interacting with digital media. The average person spends a majority of that time – 2.8 hours – on mobile phones rather than computers or other connected devices. These numbers have only been increasing over the past 7 years, and we don’t expect that trend to stop now. Furthermore, 90% of time spent on mobile is spent in apps. These statistics make a pretty compelling argument for developing a mobile strategy. Reach your customers with their preferred platform or risk damaging user engagement and conversion rates.

But how exactly can companies use mobile to boost their strategic goals? Look no further, here are some ideas we have for mobile apps B2B companies can build to launch their mobile strategy, or add to it.

 

1. Keep your Clients Updated with a Project Management App

For companies that provide a service via projects, this is the most beneficial app your organization can make. A good project management app would show clients how the project is progressing with messaging capabilities and a metrics dashboard. Visualizing key metrics for your clients can improve communication and ensure that both parties are staying up to date with the situation. This kind of transparency ensures both clients and company are held accountable.

Example Features to Include:

• Metrics Dashboard
  • current date/project finish date
  • actual budget/estimated budget
  • % of time spent on each stage
• Connection to custom web portal for:
  • status reports
  • project files & documents
• In-app messaging

 

2. Keep Your Clients in the Know with an Account Management App

An account management app is a sister to the project management app for companies that provide products to businesses. B2B product companies have inventory that they typically ship in bulk orders on a semi-regular basis. The ideal account management app would have easy order placement and tracking capabilities to make this re-ordering process quick and easy.

Features to Include:

• order history
• catalog of inventory
• click & order feature
• shipment tracking
• customer service components
• metrics dashboard to visualize account data

3. Create a Portal for Your Partners or Ambassadors with an Affiliate App

In the tech industry, we see a lot of companies offer partner or ambassador programs to other organizations in the industry. Affiliate programs can focus on selling products/services to more companies; giving partners exclusive access to a product/service; or even just spreading the brand name. Either way, there is a strategic goal associated with each affiliation and creating an app to support that goal is important.

Features to Include:

• Level-up training resources and progress reports
• Sales and marketing collateral with presentation capabilities
• Dashboard for level progress or results of partnership

4. Build a Tool App Your Clients Can Use in Relation to Your Product or Service

This is the type of app your company can get really creative with. The good thing about this app is that it only needs a slight connection to your core business. The key is to make sure the tool is useful or engaging so that clients and other users regard your company in a positive light.

App Examples:

• Security-check tool for Network Security Company

 

• Adobe PaintCan

• Word Flow Keyboard with Microsoft

Miscellaneous Tool App via Microsoft Word Flow Keyboard

 

5. Let your Clients and Fans Come Together with a Community Support & Collaboration App

We recommend this app for companies with a complex product (Salesforce or Microsoft Excel) or one with a pretty large user base (Slack). Community support is vital in these industries but adding a collaboration section can really help you stand out. Businesses are always looking for new connections, so why not leverage your support community to help foster business relationships.

Features to include:

• Customer Support Chat
• Personal/Business Profiles
• Discussion Areas
• Private Messaging
• Smart suggestions based on  business profiles

 

There are many ways to integrate mobile apps into your strategic plan, these are just a few examples. We hope this post helps you understand that mobile can and should be an essential element of your B2B company. Your clients and consumers are on mobile, meet them where they are.