Mobile Commerce Technology

 

Mrs.Shalini K

Asst.Professor, Department of Commerce 

NCMS

Mobile commerce also known as M-Commerce which involves using wireless devices like cellphones to do the commercial transaction such as buying and selling of goods through internet.  It has become an integral part of modern life, reshaping the way we shop, pay, communicate and do other activities. Mobile phones are one of the most commonly used gadgets in today’s world. As per the 2023 survey there are 6.8billion smartphone users are there in world wide. It has become a significant part of E-commerce, these devices serve as a primary platform for consumers to access online stores and interact with the business. Mobile marketing is a common technique that almost every companies are using.

Types of mobile commerce

Mobile shopping: In a busy schedule it is very difficult for an individual to visit the physical store to purchase necessary requirement. Mobile shopping helps them to buy the items at doorsteps through shopping applications, advertising in social media platform such as Instagram, Facebook, twitter etc., mobile shopping helps to know the product availability, can track the product and get updates of product delivered.

Mobile Banking: It is very convenient in today’s digital age with many bank offering impressive apps for customers like YONO SBI, Canara ai1, I Mobile Pay, bob world, Vyom bank etc., this helps the customer to get their financial statement without visiting a bank. Mobile banking allows customer to get information of deposit, pay for merchandise, transferring of money, we can receive money whenever we required without visiting bank.

Mobile Payment: Hard cash is very difficult to carry nowadays hence cashless payment can be made easy. Mobile payment enables users to buy products using digital wallets such as Gpay, Phone pe, Apple pay, paytm many more. Mobile consumers also use QR codes to pay for things on their mobile phone with mobile payments or users can directly send money to cell phone number or bank account of the recipient’s.

Main Mobile commerce technologies

SMS: Short message service is essentially structured interaction protocol used among mobile platform to share text message. It is easy to use that everyone can access it no matter what type of mobile they are using. With this mobile commerce technology user receive notifications such as bank updates, government news, alerts, offers and other kind of information.

WAP: Wireless application protocol is very suitable for users who do not have smartphones but they can use mobile WAP access services to transfer files, documents and images. It was a protocol specifically designed to enable internet access and web based services on mobile devices with limited capabilities. For an example with the help of Bluetooth we can easily transfer file, images, documents and applications.

USSD: Unstructured supplementary service data is a communication services controlled by mobile network operators. It enables customers to send instructions to mobile financial services provider along with their personal identification number for authentication while enabling the mobile financial service provider to send responses to clients and confirm transaction. With the help of USSD on their mobiles users can check their account balances, pay bills, transfer money and perform other banking transaction.  It provides access for information related to price of the product, availability of the product and confirm the expected delivery of the product.

STK: SIM toolkit developers build an application that is stored on the subscriber identify modulecard. It allows the apps to request receiver information from SIM and gives command to mobile devices. Banks and financial institution uses the SIM toolkit to provide mobile banking services such as balance inquiries, fund transfer, bill payment directly from SIM card. It enables mobile to store payment information, allow customers to access discount coupons and rewards directly from their SIM cards.