Knowband Blog | Ecommerce Modules

E-Commerce App: The Present & Future Of Grocery Shopping. Know Why?

In the last few years, eCommerce has completely changed the way people shop for things. Since smartphones became a necessity for everyone across the globe, eCommerce Apps have become widely used apps for both android & iOS users.

From expensive gadgets to software to everyday groceries, various eCommerce apps are available for almost every kind of product. Speaking of grocery shopping apps, more customers have switched to ordering their groceries online in just the past 5 years.

Groceries are something that customers buy very frequently i.e. at least once or twice a week. For such cases, eCommerce grocery shopping apps have been thriving. It is not only profitable for businesses but also for the customers in more than a hundred ways.

Some of the well-known grocery apps are Walmart, BigBasket, Flipkart, InstaCart.

Benefits Of Grocery Shopping Apps Over Brick & Mortar Stores:

1. Time Saving & Convenient:

With mobile apps, customers don’t need to worry about strolling heavyweight grocery carts & standing in a queue for the billing process. They don’t need to indulge in such time-consuming & hectic activities on an eCommerce grocery app. All tasks can be handled with just a few clicks when they opt for grocery shopping apps.

2. Booking Out-Of-Stock Product In Advance:

If a product is out of stock, e-shoppers can either book that product in advance or mark themselves in for notifications when it comes back in stock or saves it in their wishlist. The eCommerce grocery store owners can allow them to pre-order the sold-out stocks & they can also utilize automated push notifications to notify the customers when their products come back in stock. Push Notifications are a great perk of Native Mobile Apps.

3. Recurring & Scheduled Orders:

When it comes to grocery shopping, there are certain products that consumers need repeatedly throughout the week or month or even daily. With eCommerce grocery apps, customers can subscribe for recurring orders, for example, an order for certain fruits every 4 days. Also, the customer is provided with fresh products every time they receive their order. This further eases the task of manually ordering the same products every few days.

4. Secure Payments Options:

Customers can opt for their choice of payment methods or even the pay-on-delivery option. Most of the online payment gateways are secure, especially with eCommerce mobile apps.

5. Special Offers & Loyalty Programs:

Customers can utilize various promotional offers, coupons/ vouchers, etc. Online grocery businesses can make the best out of their services by providing personalized suggestions & running loyalty programs.

Check our loyalty points extension from here. The same can be made compatible with apps, read from here.

6. Improved Marketing Opportunities:

Apps provide personalized and streamlined experiences and even keeps the app users engaged once they walk out after successful order placements. With the Push Notification feature provided with apps, store owners can effortlessly offer personalized services and deals to each customer.

Based on the users’ data, their browsing pattern, wishlist, and purchase pattern, store owners can make effective marketing campaigns digitally to further boost their business. The possibilities are endless with mobile apps.

Different Types Of Grocery Apps that Can Be Developed:

1. Single Store App:

This kind of app is handled by a single company. They are responsible for carrying out every task i.e. Inventory management, taking orders, taking payments via payment gateways (/ pay-on-delivery options) & most importantly delivering (using their own fleet, in case of groceries). These could even be a proprietorship business.

If you’re an eCommerce store owner and looking for native apps (Android and iOS):

PrestaShop Mobile App Builder

OpenCart Mobile App Builder

Magento Mobile App Builder

Magento 2 Mobile App Builder

WooCommerce Mobile App Builder

2. Grocery Chains:

A very popular example of this is Walmart. Customers can place small scale grocery orders on their on-request platform. The Walmart Store, usually nearest to the app users, delivers the orders right at their doorstep. 

3. Aggregators:

These grocery apps list multiple markets on their app & the ones near to specific app users are presented to them. App users can choose among them & place the order to their choice of supermarkets near to them. The supermart that receives the order can then quickly pack & ship the ordered groceries either via their own fleet or utilize the fleet provided by the grocery app company (if it provides any). The company that owns the aggregator type grocery app is a mediator in this case.

4. Marketplace:

These kinds of apps may be owned by a commercial center. Through a retail mobility arrangement, a marketplace app owner may have their own network of fleet/ delivery personals to handle deliveries.

Out of these types of grocery apps mentioned above, some may deliver the orders on the same day, some within a single hour & some may schedule the orders 1 to 2 days from ordering. But in all the cases, the customers are provided with fresh groceries dispatched mostly on the same day. This is very important for businesses with grocery apps to maintain the quality of the products they are delivering.

We do offer a combo pack of Multi-vendor Marketplace and Mobile App Builder for various eCommerce platforms:

PrestaShop Advanced Marketplace With Mobile App

OpenCart Advanced Marketplace With Mobile App

Magento Advanced Marketplace With Mobile App

Magento 2 Advanced Marketplace With Mobile App

Ease Of Building And Managing An eCommerce Grocery Shopping App:

With the advancement in technology, it is way easier and faster than ever to build an eCommerce mobile. In fact, store owners can even choose which type of an app they would wanna build – Native, PWA, Hybrid.

Store owners willing to go mobile can simply opt for popular & trusted eCommerce platforms like Magento, PrestaShop, OpenCart, etc. to build their mobile apps in just a matter of a few weeks. These platforms are automated CMS and do not require coding from scratch.

For businesses that currently have their eCommerce website up & running, it is a smarter move to automatically build their grocery shopping mobile app from their own website using an extension i.e. the eCommerce Mobile App Builder. It is a lot easier with the eCommerce Mobile App Maker plugins developed by KnowBand, a leading eCommerce solution provider.

Main Features of Grocery Apps on the User-End:

1. Quick Logins/ Signups:

App users are so used to easy onboarding steps these days that time-consuming steps like manual logins are not a pleasant thing anymore. The eCommerce Mobile App Maker extensions by KnowBand provides the store owners with social login/ signup options using Google / Facebook accounts just via a click. It even offers fingerprint authentication. App users can choose the options they like.

2. Smarter Search Methods: 

This app creator extension also provides searching via voice commands. The app would hence utilize the microphone of users’ devices to allow then to perform voice search right from the grocery app.

E-merchants have the benefit of having certain products marked as featured on the app, for instance, ‘bestseller’, ‘top-rated’, etc. It is highly useful for app users as well.

4. Push Notifications:

These notifications are the most useful things both for the app users as well as the app owners. Push Notifications are popup messages that get sent directly to app users’ devices. They have proven their worth in retaining the app users & improving sales.

Some of the common ones are for successful orders, order status & the abandoned cart notifications. App owners can create/ schedule these notifications with relevant redirects (when a user clicks it), with catchy title & message & even a graphic. Creating, sending & managing is very convenient for store owners/admins from the backend of the eCommerce Mobile App Builder developed by the KnowBand team.

5. Chat Support:

This plugin also provides Whatsapp & Zopim Chat Support by default. App users can make their queries & interact with the chat support team of the grocery app company.

6. Secure Payment Gateways:

App users must be provided with secure payment methods. Store owners must choose the right payment gateway as per the location of the audiences, the availability of a particular payment gateway service provider & the services/ charges they have.

Features for Admin & Grocery Store Owners:

1. Simplified Backend:

The backend dashboard of this eCommerce Mobile App Builder is highly convenient/ easy yet very efficient for the app admins.  There is no need for coding with these. The visual & interactive dashboard allows quick edits & configurations that instantly reflect on the app.

2. Real-Time Sync & Catalog Management:

If you do own a grocery shopping website & if you want to build an app out of it, then this app maker plugin keeps both the site & the app in real-time sync with each other. This also keeps the catalog management automatic for the app admins.

3. DIY Home-Page Customizations:

Using this plugin, those days would be gone when a modification required programming/ coding. The visual editor on the backend allows the admins to customize every element on the home-page using simple drag & drops. They can even switch up the graphics, add relevant redirect activity on each element/ banner/ slider & even app count-down timer banner.

Read in detail from here.

Some Beautiful Grocery Apps Developed By Us:

1. Alep Market

2. Jericoo:

3. GujuFoods:

4. MrRythu:

5. Salamifoods:

6. Koakoo:

Conclusion:

Whatever your business needs may be, every task has become way easier than before especially now in 2020. Without the need to spend hours on coding, debugging & testing, apps can be built within a few weeks using this eCommerce Grocery App Builder.

Not only the front end is user-friendly for the app users but also the backend is a lot more convenient for admins to manage their app. A lot more is offered with these eCommerce platforms & mCommerce mobile app builder plugins.

In the present, grocery shopping apps are thriving and will continue to thrive more in the future to come. Be sure to take a deeper look into these & opt for a quick consultation or assistance if you are willing to launch or customize your grocery shopping app. Email our experts at support@knowband.com. Our team would be very delighted to assist you.