The upwardly mobile enterprise

Gareth Mackown, Mobile Leader for IBM GBS Financial Services Europe discusses some of the findings of IBM’s recent study “The upwardly mobile enterprise”.

In a world where mobile seems to be the growing customer engagement channel,  you would be forgiven for thinking that those responsible for mobile interactions would have a well defined mobile strategy in place. However, according to a recent study by our Institute for Business Value, less than half of all companies surveyed have a funding mechanism and executive-level oversight for mobile initiatives. Worse still, over a third have only a limited strategy or no strategy at all.

The “upwardly mobile enterprise” study was conducted in collaboration with Oxford Economics and included a survey of over 600 companies and interviews with 30 across the mature and growth markets.  A small segment (14%) of the respondents was identified as mobile strategy leaders who have demonstrated their leadership in defining and executing their mobile strategy. 

The difference between these mobile strategy leaders and the rest of those surveyed is pretty stark. For instance, nearly three quarters of leaders are seeing measurable ROI from their mobile investment, compared with only a third of everyone else.

Perhaps one of the reasons for this is that for leaders, mobile is higher on the agenda across the whole organisation, involving CMO. CIOs and CEOs  and this is certainly something we are seeing in IBM Interactive Experience as we work with clients to help them launch new mobile apps.

One thing that the majority of all our respondents did have in common though is that they plan to keep spending on mobile developments, with over 90% of respondents looking to sustain or increase investment in mobile technologies over the next 12-18 months.

So, it might be worth asking yourself, is your organisation a mobile leader compared to your competitors? Our study shows that there are clear benefits for your customers, your employees and the organisation as a whole if you are. But if you are not, then perhaps it’s time to make some changes?

You might be interested in reading the report, “The upwardly mobile enterprise", and you can also view a summary presentation on Slideshare.