Report highlights the growth of mobile sales and traffic

IBM has released a new report concerning the performance of e-commerce on Thanksgiving and Black Friday of this year. The report shows that online sales reached new heights this year, with mobile sales showing record growth. Retailers had been anticipating that mobile commerce would have a strong showing during the 2013 holiday shopping season, but many have been surprised at just how many people have taken to shopping from their mobile devices this year.

Black Friday proves popular with mobile shoppers

According to IBM’s report, the average order value for online consumers was $135.57 on Thanksgiving Day, a 2.2% increase over what order value had been reported in 2012. Thanksgiving Day saw the greatest degree of foot traffic to physical stores, but consumers opted to shop from their mobile devices during Black Friday. The report shows that mobile traffic to retail websites grew by 39%. Mobile sales also showed healthy growth, with sales spiking 43% over what they had been on Black Friday of 2012.

Smartphones are leading the charge in mobile commerce

Smartphones were the most popular mobile commerce platform for most consumers. Many favored iOS devices for their mobile shopping forays, but Android devices have been growing more popular for mobile commerce in recent months. The report shows that the majority of mobile sales came from consumers based in Atlanta, Georgia.

Efforts of retailers may be paying off

Retailers have been hard at work trying to engage mobile consumers. Throughout 2013, many retailers have been teaming with mobile commerce firms in order to provide consumers with different and more convenient ways to shop and pay for products. In order to entice consumers, many retailers have been offering special discounts specifically for mobile shoppers. These initiatives have proven quite effective, as IBM’s report shows the strong growth in mobile sales and traffic that have been reported this year.

This AR technology has been used by TexTales so that it can be woven right into the child’s bedding.

TexTales is a newly launched product out of Eindhoven in the Netherlands, which uses augmented reality for kids worked into sets of bed sheets for children, so that they can bring bedtime stories to life.

The images appear to come alive directly out of the printed patterns on their bedding.

When a tablet or a smartphone is directed at the bed sheets with this augmented reality for kids, the bedding displays three dimensional images of fairy tale characters. When the sheets are purchased, they come with a free accompanying app that gives parents the ability to either play pre-existing stories or to create their own special stories. These can then be played for their children during playtime or before bedtime.

The images that are created on the fabric are recognized by special software using augmented reality for kids.

When the app is open and the device is aimed at the images on the sheets, the custom made software detects these specific images and activates various elements, allowing parents and children to be able to interact with those images, that appear to move around on the screen.

The TexTales app is compatible with devices based on Android 2.3 and higher, as well as those based on iOS 5 and higher. To work with the AR technology, they have to be equipped with a rear-facing camera. This product was developed based on another project that had been previously pursued by Kristi Kuusk. It is considered to be a collaborative venture among studio Toer, Unit040, Johan van den Acker Textielfabriek, and the Eindhoven University of Technology. It is also part of a greater project which is known as CRISP Smart Textile Services.

In order to be able to raise the funds to create the sheets with augmented reality for kids, and to be able to develop the project so that it would be possible to create more characters and stories, TexTales launched a Kickstarter campaign. This allowed them to custom create the software necessary for these added elements.