Flipkart backtracks on app-only strategy, rolls out slick mobile website

Someone at Flipkart finally has their head screwed on the right way. The pompous and flawed app-only strategy has, for now, taken a back-seat. The move to Flipkart Lite (Mobile Website) comes in the wake of consumer backlash and ridicule at Flipkart's decision of forcing customers to buy certain deals and categories through its mobile app only.

We vehemently opposed the view but ours, as well as customers' plight, fell on deaf ears as Flipkart continued with its dictatorial strategy. Although we do understand that by using data from a device, Flipkart would have been able to provide a better shopping experience customized to each user, we are not debating the usability/experience of a mobile app but its forcing customers to use it that's flawed. Doubting your customers' intelligence in understanding the utility of a platform specific mobile app rather than a generic mobile website is what is flawed. In the long run people would have jumped on Flipkart's app simply because it provided a better user experience.

Instead Flipkart tried to shove its strategy down our throat. But as we came to know today, the company has launched a new mobile website dubbed Flipkart Lite. Its a redesigned user experience, resembling nothing from its app or desktop platform. The retailer says they worked with Google, Opera and Firefox to make this light website which behaves similarly across all platforms and you have the ability to get notifications as well as launch the mobile site from your phone's homescreen. Even though Flipkart insists, this is not the first time anyone has done this.

Moving on, the new mobile website is quite light. I was able to browse for products even on 2G quite easily. The interface doesn't lag and seems to be carefully thought about keeping mobile users in mind. You can just swipe from the bottom to reveal categories of products and you can apply a range or filters to find the product you want and sort them.

Product pages are similar to the mobile app with product shots, details, ratings and reviews. The mobile site seems to have been designed from the ground up with the focus on speed, fluidity and lower footprint on system resources.

This is what Flipkart's strategy should've been from the start. Being mobile-first instead of app-only. More people today are using smartphones to buy on-the-go, and eventually they will switch to apps on their own with increasingly powerful smartphones with larger displays becoming cheaper, till then providing customers with another, easier and less resource hungry way to shop online is a win-win for both.