TL;DR

Flipkart, India’s largest e-commerce site, decided to combine their web presence and native app into a Progressive Web Application that has resulted in a 70% increase in conversions.

In 2015, Flipkart, India’s largest e-commerce site, adopted an app-only strategy and temporarily shut down their mobile website. The company found it harder and harder to provide a user experience that was as fast and engaging as that of their mobile app. But then, Flipkart decided to rethink their development approach. They were drawn back to the mobile web by the introduction of features that made the mobile web run instantly, work offline, and re-engage users.

Flipkart Lite

They soon began building Flipkart Lite, a Progressive Web App that combines the best of the web and the best of the Flipkart native app. It leverages new, open web APIs to offer a mobile web experience that loads fast, uses less data than before, and re-engages users in multiple ways. Users visit via their browser and find a fast app-like user experience. When they come back, it loads nearly instantly, even on flaky networks. Users can choose to add the site to their homescreen with just two taps, making it easier for them to come back. Amar Nagaram, an Engineering Director at Flipkart shares, "We know that everyone needs to build mobile-first experiences. With Flipkart Lite, we've developed a powerful, technically-advanced web app that performs as well as our native app. We now feel we have the best of both worlds."

A fast and streamlined site

With 63% of Flipkart Lite users reaching the site via a 2G network, a fast user experience was essential. To decrease load times, Flipkart added service workers and streamlined the site to help consumers quickly reach the product they are looking for. Users can even continue to browse categories, review previous searches, and view product pages—all while offline.

Taking advantage of the web's low friction

Reaching a broad set of users is important for Flipkart. With Flipkart Lite, users are one click away from accessing content and many new users are first-time internet users. In addition to easy access, Flipkart Lite requires less data. A key metric for Flipkart is tracking data usage to complete first transaction: when comparing Flipkart Lite to the native app, Flipkart Lite uses 3x less data. Nagaram continues, "Having a strong and engaging mobile website means we’re no longer turning away potential shoppers who don’t want to use data or space to download an app."

Bringing users back with home screen icon

Flipkart wanted to be able to re-engage with mobile web users just as they would with mobile app users.

The company implemented an "Add to Home Screen" prompt. Now, 60% of all visits to Flipkart Lite come from people launching the site from the homescreen icon. Add to Home Screen also delivers high-quality visits, with customers converting 70% more than average users.

These two activities alone resulted in engagement numbers that were 40% higher than before.

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TL;DR

AMP helps the Washington Post increase returning users from mobile search by 23%

Results

23% increase in mobile search users who return within 7 days

88% improvement in load time for AMP content versus traditional mobile web

1000+ articles The Washington Post publishes in AMP HTML daily

View/Download Washington Post Case Study PDF

Using PWA ON AMP

With nearly 55% of their traffic coming from mobile devices, The Washington Post knows that providing a great reading experience on mobile devices is critical to their long-term success.

In particular, The Post is focused on making their mobile content load as quickly as possible, because data shows that people abandon websites after just three seconds if the content doesn’t load quickly.

In June 2015, The Washington Post joined a group of publishers and technology companies to create the Accelerated Mobile Pages Project, a new open standard for publishing content which loads instantly, anywhere across the mobile web.

“We are committed to improving speed across the board,” said David Merrell, Senior Product Manager at The Washington Post. “If our site takes a long time to load, it doesn’t matter how great our journalism is, some people will leave the page before they see what’s there.”

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TL;DR

The Weather Channel sees mobile web success with Progressive Web App, launching in 62 languages to 178 countries.

Results

Progressive web app now available in 62 languages and 178 countries

80% improvement in load time

Based on this successful global test, the team will expand the PWA to its U.S. site in 2017

Challenge

The Weather Channel has always leveraged the latest technology innovations to help do its job in being the number one destination for weather reporting. The team’s goal is to supply timely, accurate information when it matters most. Weather is volatile, and delivering important data when people need it isn’t always easy, so the team was interested in improving its mobile web experience.

On mobile, The Weather Channel has pushed vital information to their native-app users for some time. But this represents only half of their mobile traffic, with the other fifty percent accessing their site via the mobile web. The mobile web is also an extremely important discovery portal in markets where users don’t have the latest smartphones, reliable connectivity, or there’s significant cost for downloading an app.

Weather looked to progressive web app technologies for a solution, approaching it in steps. Being a site that focuses on immediacy, especially related to real- time weather notifications in severe situations, the first area the team tackled was to create browser push notifications when severe weather hits. They also wanted to re-engage mobile users who hadn’t downloaded their app but were likely to be affected by severe weather.

Solution

To scale quickly, The Weather Channel implemented push notifications for mobile web users on Android and desktop users on Chrome. The experience looks and feels like a native app, and works even if the browser isn't running. The team used a technology called service workers to provide offline processing and deliver messages quickly. Within three months, The Weather Channel had seen almost 1 million users opt in to receive web push notifications, with 52 percent coming from mobile.

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