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Its no secret mobile usage is up. In 2015 alone, 1.4 billion smartphones were sold. Even more staggering, the average American adult spends over 4 hours a day on their smart phone. When stretched over a lifetime, that usage amounts to approximately 5 years and 4 months of phone time. This is more time than the average person will spend on eating and drinking (a meager 3 years and 5 months) in their lifetime, or the equivalent of climbing Mount Everest 32 times.As a result, companies within traditional industries that aren’t taking advantage of the strengths smartphones have to offer are missing the majority of the market. Luckily, this is a problem with an easy solution. Simply switching from an old school framework to a mobile app platform can exponentially grow your business.In an age where competitive marketing is always at our fingertips and our phones cross more and more boundaries of intimacy and dependency, we expect them to work harder and faster to make our lives more efficient. Thus, creating the rise in mobile app reliance. This desire to maximize efficiency has even evolved the manner in which we communicate.For example, texting and other messaging platforms have become the most dominant form of communication, surpassing phone calls. Cutting reliance on calls in favor of mobile platforms allows greater flexibility and bandwidth in reaching customers. This is true whether your company is as large as Coca-Cola or a one-man show.The growing preference for mobile app platforms, has emerged from a generation (Generation Y) raised on smart-technology, one that finds phone calls intimidating, invasive and often anxiety inducing. So much so that we avoid them at all costs, choosing instead, apps for a whole range of services from simply ordering take out, to the New Orleans crime-reporting app (in lieu of calling 911). Particularly, mobile platforms are increasingly popular in the livery industry; as ride hailing apps are more customer oriented, efficient, and safer in comparison to their traditional calling-based counterparts. Specifically in terms of efficiency, one study found that people waited an additional three minutes for a taxi, compared to the ridesharing equivalent. Coincidentally, the same generation of tele-phobes now dependent on apps, makes up the largest consumer group in history; known for their rejection of traditional marketing and need for the technologically savvy. With this knowledge, smart marketers, regardless of industry, should rely on smart app platforms; eliminating the call as a means of interaction with their consumer.Even across generations, apps account for 89% of mobile media time (the other 11% is spent on websites). Furthermore, as one Google study suggests regardless of platform (mobile site or app) it must be well designed and user friendly; as 61% of users are unlikely to return to a mobile site they had trouble accessing and 40% will visit a competitor’s site instead.With foundations of quality and accessibility, smart app-based companies have the tools to thrive while cutting the cord on calling.