Increase Consumer Engagement in Your App With a Retail-Branded Mobile Keyboard

Recent research from Square highlighted the importance of customer engagement for retailers. According to the shoppers surveyed, 86 percent wanted to engage with retailers. 

Email is typically the preferred form of communication. But with consumers spending more time and making more purchases from their mobile phones, what if you could engage with them in real time on their mobile phone?

Data from SaleCycle’s 2023 Ecommerce Stats & Trends Report shows that 55.25 percent of online sales originate from a mobile device vs. 44.75 percent from a desktop device. But when one takes a deeper dive, we see that mobile represents 75 percent of total online sessions vs. 25 percent for desktop. And when analyzing cart abandonment, mobile devices have an 83.22 percent abandonment rate vs. only 71.81 percent on desktops.

One way to help your mobile shoppers engage and complete their purchase journeys is by providing them with a mobile keyboard. In the same way that the desktop keyboard is our gateway to accessing and optimizing our time on our desktop devices, retailers now have an opportunity to offer their customers a branded and dedicated mobile keyboard to make online shopping as seamless as it is from a desktop. And with the average branded keyboard user accessing their mobile keyboard on average 80 times per day, mobile keyboards provide a lot of user utility and branded engagement time.

Provide Social Engagement Opportunities Directly From the Phone

According to the aforementioned research from Square, 91 percent of the retailers surveyed are now selling to consumers via social media. And as the data from SaleCycle shows, most shoppers are making purchases directly from their mobile phones. 

A retailer-branded mobile keyboard enables retailers to take advantage of the growth of both social and mobile commerce. Retailers can engage with consumers by making special offers or inviting them to physical or digital events via retailer-branded mobile keyboards, as well as sharing branded GIFs, stickers and other social media marketing.

The average mobile-branded keyboard user accesses their keyboard 80 times per day. This means that they provide retailers with strong engagement metrics which should result in greater conversions, too. And with consumers receiving on average 46 push notifications per day, the branded mobile keyboard provides retailers a way to cut through the noise to further increase conversions. 

Moreover, based on internal data, users of a dedicated mobile keyboard open their mobile keyboards 50 percent more than the brand’s dedicated app. This creates an engagement opportunity to increase app usage and, ultimately, revenue thanks to the retailer-branded mobile keyboard. 

Facilitating a New Retailer Revenue Stream

While mobile keyboards improve engagement opportunities for retailers, they also enable a new revenue stream from the integrated on-keyboard search engine. As one would expect from a retailer-branded keyboard, users run queries that are contextually relevant to the keyboard’s brand and product availability. And in the same way that marketers run ads on Amazon.com, marketers selling through a retailer will want to advertise on that retailer’s branded keyboard. Based on revenue share agreements between the retailer and the keyboard, retailers profit when marketers bid to serve ads via the on-keyboard search engine.

Beyond on-keyboard search, other potential monetization opportunities for retailers include on-keyboard notifications, buttons, banners and quest-based actions. 

Given the challenges consumers have completing their shopping journey on mobile devices, coupled with strong daily usage metrics for branded mobile keyboards, now is the time for retailers to consider their own retailer-branded mobile keyboard.

Leo Giel is the CEO of Tappa, a human-first mobile technology company empowering individuals to express and experience more while engaging with the brands they love.