Mobile Apps Save Small Businesses Time And Money, Study Finds

Small businesses that use mobile apps to help manage their operations are saving more than 370 million of their own hours and over 725 million employee hours annually, according to a study by the Small Business and Entrepreneur Council.

The study showed that 31 percent of small firms with 20 or fewer employees were using mobile apps. Of those using apps for their business, owners estimated that they saved an average of 5.6 hours a week. In conjunction with the total number of small firms in the U.S., the study estimates that 1.28 million small-business owners are saving time with mobile app usage.

"Hours of paper-pushing, administrative work, customer research, extra driving trips and unproductive downtime add up very quickly," SBE Council President and CEO Karen Kerrigan said in a statement. "Mobile apps are allowing small-business owners and their employees to get more time from their day and to focus on higher value work."

Based on the amount of employee hours saved and the average pay for small-business employees, the study estimates that small firms are saving $275 per week, adding up to an average of over $14,000 per year.

The use of mobile apps, which can spare firms time spent on monotonous tasks like bookkeeping, document sharing and travel can save small-business owners an average of $377 per month, adding up to over $4,000 per year. The study emphasizes that such estimates are conservative, since only firms with 20 or less employers were surveyed.

As a result of app usage, 49 percent of the owners surveyed said their firm was able to spend more time on increasing sales and creating new revenue streams, while 36 percent said app usage allowed them to cut overhead costs. Perhaps most significant, 51 percent of small-firm owners said app usage allowed their business to become more competitive and better able to maneuver through an uncertain economy.

Comments

[csapps]

12:58 PM on 05/12/2012

We build & sell mobile apps to businesses. This is the new & fast way to advertise your business. They say mobile internet will take over your normal desktop internet by 2014.
We are here to help business owners get there bisiness found on mobile
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[SBMarketingTool]

07:47 AM on 03/04/2012

I agree with some of the comments about mobile apps not necessarily being the best way to increase productivity and sales...

Here are some other communication technology tools that can have an impact on saving money and time:
http://www.sbmarketingtools.com/communications-technology-tools-to-increase-sales-productivity

[Nick Lachey]

08:13 PM on 02/28/2012

Perfect post. Here’s a tool that lets youbuild your database apps in the cloud fast and without coding, suitable for small business http://www.caspio.com/customers/industries/online-database-smb.aspx

[John Thumb]

02:15 PM on 02/21/2012

What a ridiculous article. There are only about 30 million small businesses in the US, first of all. Hell, the entire labor force of the US economy is 159 million, yet somehow small business are saving 750 million hour PER YEAR on mobile apps?

What a steaming pile of awful.

[Foday]

08:11 PM on 02/12/2012

The article was not clear as to how it is helping business owners. Yes, the article made mention of things but was NOT clear as to how it is helping the owners to save

[SNVBiz]

06:13 PM on 02/12/2012

This seems like a really great way of managing time and resources of an established small business. For anyone who has yet to start up their small business and is still looking for ideas, check out www.bizinverter.com for suggestions about where to get started!

[The App People]

05:46 PM on 02/12/2012

You don't Say?
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--The App People
www.apppeople.com
Twitter.com/TheAppPeople
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[trendslide]

09:14 PM on 02/11/2012

Mobile Apps are helping businesses become more efficient and drive profitability. With a slew of apps for document sharing and note-taking (like Dropbox and Evernote), and Finances it's incredible the time-savings that have come as a result of new developments in applications.

I'm part of a startup entitled trendslide (http://www.trendslide.com) working on bringing business intelligence to a mobile experience. Business is no longer conducted just at your desk in an office, but around the world at airports on flights while in a cab on the way to your next appointment. Given that all this is happening, it's a natural extension to have all of your critical business data while on the go.

[mrpotatohead]

03:16 PM on 02/11/2012

Having worked in IT for years, I am very skeptical about these type of numbers. Most people over-estimate the increases in efficiencies and often ignore the real costs of implementing a technology.

That's not to say that apps don't, at times, save money - I'm sure they do. I am also sure that they waste a lot of time and money too. In either case, it's not very easy to measure the efficiencies or costs in dollars because those costs just aren't tracked that closely.

Also, it should be "fewer employees," not "less employees."