With 41% of iPhone users apparently actively checking prices, it’s obvious some retail CMO’s see these competitive applications as a threat. However the majority of big name retailers have already adopted and created their own integrated shopping applications to compete with these consumer advocate apps that threaten their pricing. North Face, Best Buy, Home Depot, Target, Nike, Gap, Wal-Mart, and Banana Republic all have integrated shopping applications, while Crate & Barrel, and Disney stores have their applications in development.

The challenge however is not to just develop a mobile shopping application, it is to create an incredible user interface that makes it simple and fun for your customers to shop with you. It is to create a fundamentally different way for customers to interact with your store.

For example, the NikeID store let’s you pick shoes out based on colors from photos in your phone. I found some great Nike Dunks just by showing a photo of a Fuji apple. Wal-Mart’s application lets you snap a picture of your living room wall to figure out an appropriate television size.

As more retailers enter the mobile ecosystem, it becomes clear that they must create a mobile shopping experience that goes above and beyond just acting as a portal if they want to keep their customers shopping with them over strictly shopping by price. With a combination of loyalty points, cool customization, interactive features, and convenience it’s still possible for the big name retailers (and brands) to win out.

Learn more about mobile application development at our resource center.