Category: Mobile Commerce

British smartphone users have the largest percentage of shoppers among European countries.

According to the results of a recent study, among all of the leading eight European markets, it is the U.K. that leads the way in terms of the use of mobile commerce among its shoppers.

The study showed that the United Kingdom is by far the most oriented toward smartphones and tablets.

The study, conducted by vente-privee.com, which is the leading Europe-wide flash sale pioneer online, indicated that 37 percent of the turnover in the U.K. comes from mobile commerce. The other countries that were considered within this research included Belgium, Italy, Spain, Germany, The Netherlands, Austria, and France.

Among all of those countries, mobile commerce contributed to approximately 32 percent of online sales.

That figure has grown by 6 percent since the close of 2012, which represents tremendous growth. In terms of the use of the devices for mobile commerce, 47 percent of the sales originated from smartphones, while the remaining 53 percent came from tablets.

That said, the lead of the United Kingdom is a considerable one, above the other seven European countries that were included in the study. Compared to its 37 percent, the country in second place, France, saw a figure of 29 percent. Though this is still a notable percentage, it is well below that of the U.K.

Another area in which vente-privee.com found that there was a considerable lead by the United Kingdom in mobile commerce was in the percentage of customers who shopped over smartphones and tablets. The U.K’s figure was 41 percent, with Germany in second place at a much lower 35 percent.

Among all of the company’s mobile commerce using customers in the United Kingdom, 71 percent were women. The average age of the smartphone and tablet using shoppers was 39, in comparison to the average age of those using other channels, which was 41.

When the study looked into the number of mobile commerce orders that were made, the average was 7 online purchases per year, among which over half were made on a smartphone or tablet. Among those using other online channels, only 5 purchases were made per year through the company.

Marketers are honing their strategies in order to time their ads to appeal to females with smartphones.

In the United States, approximately 85 percent of all shopping decisions are made by women, according to a tremendous amount of recent research, and this is making them a highly desired target for many mobile marketing campaigns.

According to many marketers, the key is to attract and influence them while they are in retail stores.

An in-store marketing provider called Swirl has released its own recommendations regarding the way in which retailers can become more appealing to female consumers as they shop, and how they can influence what they buy. One of the reasons that the strategy is seen as highly important in-store as opposed to before they even head out is that women like to be able to see and touch the products that they are thinking about buying, and they like the social experience of heading out to purchase products while they are with their friends and family.

Though this is not entirely new, the difference is that they have their smartphones with them and can be reached with mobile marketing.

This has made smartphones an extremely important device when it comes to making decisions about what to buy. Retailers are now starting to see this opportunity to communicate and interact with female shoppers to help to encourage them to buy their products through various forms of encouragement.

A study conducted involving 1,000 women shoppers determined that 76 percent had a preference for shopping for clothing and apparel while in-store – as opposed to buying online – and that only 22 percent favored buying this type of product online, and only 2 percent preferred to shop over smartphones or tablets.

That said, what mobile marketing experts have realized is that while women may not be making their actual purchase over smartphones and tablets, they are using those devices to inform themselves about what they are thinking about buying, as well as to find better prices and savings opportunities such as discount coupons. A survey recently commissioned by Google showed that more than 66 percent of smartphone owners use their devices to assist them with shopping while they are in a brick and mortar store.