Tag: mobile commerce trends

Next year will be huge for mobile commerce sales, says Forrester

| October 14, 2015

A new report from the research firm has shown that by the close of 2016, sales will break the $142 billion mark.

Forrester Research has now released a new report that it has entitled its “U.S. Mobile Phone and Tablet Commerce Forecast, 2015 to 2020” and within it, it has shown that the close of this year will break $115 billion in transactions and they will only head upward from there.

The report also goes on to say that by the end of next year, m-commerce sales will explode past $142 billion.

Principal analyst at Forrester Research, Sucharita Mulpuru, who is also the firm’s vice president, explained that “We project that mobile phones will generate 15 percent of eCommerce sales by 2020, and tablets will generate 33 percent of eCommerce sales in the same time frame.” She also explained that as smartphones are rapidly becoming a main computing device for many consumers, it is surprising that those mobile commerce figures aren’t even higher than they already are.

The report from Forrester has placed the spotlight on many of the challenges creating a barrier to mobile commerce.

Mobile Commerce - Mobile ShoppingAlthough merchants have said that about a third of its current online traffic comes from mobile devices, the number of actual sales that are occurring over smartphones and tablets is only 11 percent. This shows that while people are visiting sites to check out brands, products, and stores, they aren’t actually using those same gadgets to make their purchases. When they do buy, it’s more likely to be in person or over a laptop.

Mulpuru stated that “Shoppers experience slow download speeds on smartphones in particular, and few retailers have managed to increase their mobile conversion rates over the years.” Most of the sales that are occurring over m-commerce are happening within three primary categories, which means that the majority of sectors remain underpenetrated and still have a great deal of unused potential. Those categories will need to go a long way before they will be able to experience success over that channel.

At the same time, there are also retailers who have been successful by way of mobile commerce innovations. In Forrester’s report, the firm explained that eBay and Amazon, combined, take in about one third of all shopping that is completed over smartphones and tablets in the United States.

M-commerce is becoming increasingly commonplace in Africa

| October 13, 2015

A new report from the GSMA has shown that smartphone shopping and transactions are on the rise.

The most recent GSMA: Mobile 360 Series report, which focused on the Africa conference, showed that digital and m-commerce are rapidly rising in Africa and that this is being greatly driven by a boost in internet penetration throughout the continent.

The report’s findings were based on consumer research data that was collected in March 2015 by Ipsos.

What the report showed was that 20 percent of internet users in South Africa have made a purchase online either over computers or m-commerce. It also revealed that an additional 48 percent said that they expected to shop online in the future. It also said that mobile shopping will become a key component in the growth of the overall digital commerce market within Sub-Saharan Africa, since most internet users within that part of the world will be accessing the internet by way of smartphones and other mobile devices.

These findings and conclusions align well with those made by other m-commerce focused reports.

M-commerce - AfricaA survey released by In Mobi in 2014 was already showing that 83 percent of consumers said that they intended to shop online over a smartphone or tablet in the following year. This was an increase of 15 percent over that firm’s figures from 2013 and it involved the participation of 14,000 people across 14 different countries.

This is only being helped by the fact that there are now several established online shopping sites within the Sub-Saharan African region and many of them are offering transactions that can be conducted cross-border. Jumia stands out among them. It has been around since 2012, at which time it was launched through the funding provided by Rocket Internet. That company has been greatly successful and has undergone a considerable expansion throughout that part of the continent, starting in Nigeria, but moving outward to a number of other countries such as Uganda, Kenya, Tanzania, Ghana, Cameroon and Senegal.

A central component of Jumia’s strategy is m-commerce. It has already entered in to partnerships with Millicom and MTN to push growth into the future through increases in traffic from mobile users by way of promotions, cross-selling, joint advertising campaigns and payment facilitation.