Category: Mobile Commerce

Thanksgiving may be the holiday for mobile shopping

Black Friday and Cyber Monday are fast approaching. Both days are very important for physical retailers and online businesses as sales made on these days can more than make up for an entire year of lackluster performance. Black Friday and Cyber Monday have been major holidays for the retail industry and e-commerce respectively, but the growing prevalence of mobile commerce and technology may establish a similar day that could be a major boon for mobile shopping.

More consumers showing interest in mobile shopping

Thanksgiving is a well known holiday in the U.S. As such, the holiday typically means that traditional brick and mortar stores are closed for business. Online retailers, however, remain open throughout the holiday, providing consumers with services that they might not be able to find from physical stores. According to data from IBM/Coremetrics, 15% of U.S. consumers used their mobile devices to visit retail sites on Thanksgiving in 2011, up from the 6.5% that did so in 2010.

Digitas survey shows growing support for mobile commerce and e-commerce

This trend is expected to continue this year, with the possibility of mobile traffic increasing by as much as double for some retailers. Companies like eBay already have plans to begin offering deals on Thanksgiving day, rather than wait for Black Friday or Cyber Monday. According to a recent survey from Digitas, a provider of integrated technology and marketing solutions, shows that many retailers are preparing to serve mobile consumers on Thanksgiving, following the same route as eBay in offering mobile applications that will assist with online shopping.

Survey shows shopping from computer is easier than from mobile device

The Digitas survey does shed some light on the problems facing mobile shopping, however. The survey notes that approximately 76% of the 2,059 respondents surveyed say that shopping from a computer is much easier than from a mobile device. Many consumers attribute the difficulty associated with mobile shopping to the small screens of most mobile devices. Nonetheless, consumers are still likely to heavily participate in mobile shopping during the holiday season.

Reaching consumers once they’ve walked into your shop.

If you’re expecting your mobile commerce strategy to simply be a version of your e-commerce efforts, only suited to a smaller screen, then you will be missing the majority of the opportunities that are available to you through this channel.

The smaller screen is just the jumping off point, since it makes sure that your content is accessible.

In the United States – which isn’t even the mobile commerce world leader – there is double digit growth being seen in this sphere. It has been predicted that by 2015, the marketplace will be worth almost $300 billion. So it is important for retailers and merchants of all kind to make sure that they are making proper use of this channel, and aren’t missing out on tremendous opportunities.

The key to m-commerce is the fact that it is (obviously) mobile. Instead of reaching consumers while they are sitting at home or at work, retailers can connect with them no matter where they are or when it is. This includes when consumers are actually within the physical store locations. Why is this important? Most retailers would think that once they’ve drawn the consumers into their stores, then their marketing has worked. Job done.

However, if you stop there, then you’ve stopped showing your customers why they should choose you over the competition.

Why does that matter when they’re already in your store? Because a consumer with a smartphone can wander into your shop, look over a product, and then use the mobile device to comparison shop with other merchants, you need to take actions to make your offers more attractive than what can be found online.

In-store mobile commerce has, therefore, become a vital part of an overall marketing strategy. What it means is that advertising and promoting over the mobile channel doesn’t necessarily need to be done with the online shopper in mind. Instead, it fuses brick and mortar retail with the virtual world, so that technology can help to make sure the shopper in the store actually makes a purchase.

There are a full range of techniques already being used for in store mobile marketing, ranging from location based offers that send discounts, coupons, and other promotions to consumers that have entered the shop, to the use of QR codes, simplified mobile payment transactions, self checkouts, and other features for savings and convenience.