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Over the period, phones have transformed from being a traditional voice-based function to the smartphones that facilitate multimedia exchange, financial transaction, social media and mobile games. This has powered the development of mobile applications (apps) that satisfy customers’ multiple expectations (Techcrunch, 2014). With the increasing usage of smartphones, mobile apps have become popular communication tools that connects businesses with their customers. Defined as “software downloadable to a mobile device” (Bellman et al., 2011), mobile apps offer a large gamut of benefits like time and location independence, easier administration and ubiquity, and context awareness (Nikou & Economides, 2017). Displaying brand identity throughout the user experience (Bellman et al., 2011), branded apps serve users with a variety of content and extend services any time through smartphones. While using mobile apps, shoppers have control over their decisions according to their requirement and brand preference. It is pertinent that an app stands on customers’ expectations and have essential features such as simplicity, social media integration, easy payment and customization (Rose, 2017).
The worldwide mobile commerce revenues are expected to rise from US$ 96.34 billion in 2015 to US$ 693 billion in 2019 (Statista, 2015). Half of all e-commerce site traffic emanated from mobile users, with smartphones and tablets contributing forty and ten percentages respectively (Dynamic Web, 2015). While Android has launched 2.8 million apps globally under twenty-nine categories, its competitor Apple has 2.2 million apps across twenty-one categories in 2017 (Statista, 2017). Owing to the rapid growth of smartphones, India has emerged as the fastest growing (71%) country in the mobile application market in terms of downloading (268 million) and usage of apps in 2017 (Saifi, 2017). As against the global average of thirty-eight percent, Statista (2016) reported that forty-nine percent of respondents in India used mobile devices for purchasing goods or services.
It has been reported that mobile ecommerce triggers impulsive buying owing to the availability of multiple pathways through which shoppers are exposed to cues both from surroundings and within the actual devise (Dynamic Web, 2015). Besides being simplistic in browsing and buying, the ease of use of mobile devises catalyze urges to buy product instantaneously.
Upon the scanning of existing literature, it has been observed that studies on mobile apps largely pertain to factors influencing the installation of mobile app (Harris, Brookshire & Goyal, 2016), app adoption (Bellman et al., 2011; Kim et al., 2013), usage of mobile app (Hew et al., 2015; Kim et al., 2016), factors influencing continuous attachment to app (Furner et al., 2014; Kim et al., 2016; Kim et al., 2015) and usage commendation (Xu et al., 2015; Yan & Chen, 2011), and relationship with personality traits (Xu et al., 2016). A study by Yang and Lin (2014) examined satisfaction with and purchase intention on apps.