Tag: m-commerce trends

The latest data from BI Intelligence has shown that shoppers are increasingly adopting this channel.

The most recent report from BI Intelligence has revealed that m-commerce made up 11 percent of all online shopping throughout the holiday season in 2012, which is a staggering increase over 2010, when it comprised 3 percent of the total.

This amount currently represents about $18.6 billion in consumer spending, not including travel purchases.

This m-commerce growth, according to BI Intelligence is, in part the result of the growing popularity of the channel. The company has predicted that by the end of 2013, its share of the total will have increased to 15 percent of all online purchases.

The report not only examined the proportion of m-commerce, but also examined the cause of its growth.

The BI Intelligence report not only provided the figures regarding the growth of the channel, but it also looked into many of the latest m-commerce trends that can help to explain why the growth is occurring in the way that it is.

The following are some of the reasons that the report used to explain the trend toward m-commerce that is leading it to grow:

• At the moment, more than half (54 percent) of adults in the United States currently own smartphones and about a quarter of American adults own tablets. The report predicts that in three years, there will be more tablets than there are PCs among American consumers. By the end of the year 2016, the worldwide sale of tablets will have reached 450 million.
• Data is already indicating that there is more traffic heading to m-commerce websites than the actual percentage of its penetration. That is, while 25 percent of American adults own tablets, those devices account for 40 percent of the traffic to those sites.
• Almost 50 percent of all smartphone owners between the ages of 12 and 17 years old use that device as their primary connection to the internet. Therefore, among younger consumers, it is more natural for them to use m-commerce as a primary online shopping channel than it is for older consumers.

The results of a recent study have indicated that Apple smartphone users shop over applications the most.

Arbitron has just released the results of its most recent marketing research study, and has revealed that when it comes to m-commerce apps, iPhone owners are using them much more often than Android smartphone owners.

The difference in the proportion of device owners who are using these apps is a considerable one.

The study showed that 67.5 percent of iPhone owners also use m-commerce apps, when compared to Android smartphone owners, among whom only 43. 9 percent use these applications. This could suggest that for companies with apps, iPhone customers may be their sweetest plum.

There was also a difference in the amount that the device users were spending over m-commerce apps.

Among iPhone users, the average number of m-commerce trips over apps every month was 35. Moreover, they spent an average of 105.5 minutes shopping using their smartphones every month. On the other hand, Android smartphone users went on an average of 29.5 virtual shopping trips every month, during which time they spent an average 87.6 minutes on the task.

The report on the results of the survey did not suggest any conclusions as to why this difference exists between the m-commerce app usage habits of iPhone owners and those of Android smartphone owners.

There has been third party speculation that while there are about the same total number of apps available in both formats, there may be more m-commerce apps that are available exclusively for Apple devices. Moreover, there has been a trend of releasing some apps over iOS first, with a wait time of several weeks or months before an Android option becomes available. Instagram has been used as a well known example of this trend, as there was an 18 month wait for Android users after iOS users were already enjoying the application.

That said, this data was not included in the Arbitron research, which examined only the m-commerce app usage habits. It did not go on to investigate what might be the causes behind those behaviors by each type of device user.