Raam Thakrar, CEO of Touchnote, discusses with Mathias Peña Grez why SMEs should look to make sure they have a mobile presence and the advantages this can bring.

During the last decade a cold war was waged between small businesses as they struggled to take full advantage of the online space. The key advantage of e-commerce - that it can quickly introduce your services to a global audience - also presented small businesses with the issue of massively increased competition. The web is, after all, an environment where consumers can compare prices, reviews and customer feedback at the click of a button.

Businesses in every sphere have battled to differentiate themselves online, engaging in a virtual arms race to take advantage of the latest technological developments and win a greater market share. Yet, this crowded online marketplace has left many small businesses searching for the next platform that can provide a competitive advantage for customer engagement.

Meanwhile, mobiles have become a ubiquitous accessory with over 4 billion mobile handsets in use worldwide. Nokia, the world's largest handset manufacturer, sells 13 phones a second, while Chinese mobile operators see 5 million new subscribers each month. Mobile phones are also increasingly common in countries where access to laptops or PCs is extremely rare. Thus mobile handsets represent a means to not simply reach more consumers, but also to monetise markets previously inaccessible to e-commerce.

UPWARD MOBILITY

There are a number of routes through which businesses can take advantage of the growing mobile marketplace.

The widespread uptake of smartphones has blurred the lines between online and mobile payments, with many handsets now capable of recreating a PC-quality internet browsing experience. With an estimated 10% of UK retail sales taking place online in 2010, the uptake of mobile transactions will only continue to increase as mobile technology is no longer a barrier to making mobile purchases and it will be increasingly easy to reach customers.

As an alternative small businesses may wish to create their own mobile applications. The rise of mobile applications has already changed the way businesses interact with consumers and many app stores are now enormously popular. Apple's App Store has seen over 2 billion downloads of 100,000 applications by 60 million users, while more than 200 million users worldwide can access Nokia's Ovi Store and Google's Android Marketplace. Mobile applications can offer consumers anything from an easier means to make purchases via their phone, to providing useful services or simple entertainment.

Undoubtedly, now is the time for every entrepreneur to ask themselves how can their business take advantage of mobile.

Top Tips for making your business go mobile:

• DO:
o Understand which elements of your business translate to mobile
o Discover which handsets your key customers are using and target the appropriate app stores
o If creating an offering for mobile internet users, be sure to streamline your website for mobile browsing

• DON'T:
o Try to develop an offering for every app store
o Try to sell extremely high-value products via m-commerce
o Fail to take advantage of the unique properties of individual handsets (e.g. accelerometers)

Raam Thakrar, CEO of Touchnote