Tag: online shopping

Consumers begin growing more interested in mobile commerce

Consumers are becoming increasingly mobile. That does not mean that they are moving around more often; it means that mobile technology is beginning to play a very important role in their daily lives. This trend has become most apparent in the shopping behavior of consumers, who are beginning to rely more heavily on their smartphones and tablets to make purchases. Mobile commerce is on the rise, and it may soon replace traditional retail due to the convenience it offers consumers.

Report shows that consumers are spending more time on mobile shopping

comScore, a leading market research firm, has released a new report titled “State of the U.S. Online Retail Economy Q1 2013.” As the name suggests, the report details the trends that exist as well as those that are emerging in the retail industry of the U.S. The report shows that mobile commerce has begun gaining significant momentum as more consumers begin to favor their smartphones and tablets for shopping online.

Mobile shopping has become an overwhelmingly popular pastime

According to the report, the time that consumers spent in online retail rose by 104% in February of this year over the levels it had been in February of 2010. Consumers spent a cumulative total of 34.9 billion minutes in online shopping, the vast majority of which was devoted to shopping through mobile devices. The report suggests that mobile commerce has become a powerful force in the U.S. retail sector, driving many companies to develop and utilize their own mobile commerce services in order to appeal to consumers.

Smartphones trump tablets when it comes to mobile commerce

The report also shows that smartphones continue to be more popular than tablets when it comes to mobile commerce. As of March 2013, 34% of the time spent by consumers in online shopping came from smartphones, where 14% came from tablet devices. Tablets are gaining some momentum in mobile commerce, however, as they garner acclaim for their larger screens that allow for better navigation and a more enjoyable shopping experience.

According to a new study, mobile transactions will become more prominent in the future.

The results of a recent study, conducted by Javelin Strategy and Research, has found that mobile payments have increased in popularity and that over the course of the next five years, they are likely to be the payment method that grows the fastest compared to all other types of transactions.

More consumers will turn to mobile devices to make in-store purchases. 

While online shopping has gained a lot of attention, researchers who performed the Javelin study discovered that despite the popularity of e-commerce, 93% of the entire U.S. retail dollar volume is made up in brick and mortar retail stores. The study went on to report that it will not be long before mobile payments start to have a profound effect on the retail POS (point-of-sale) market.

Mobile payments are predicted to exceed $5 billion by 2018.

Results of the Javelin study revealed that the POS retail market is developing at an incredible speed. This is due mostly to the ever-increasing popularity of both the mobile payments and e-commerce markets. Consumers of today want a fast and convenient shopping experience and it is believed that digitized transaction methods will allow shoppers to achieve the superior in-store experience they not only crave, but expect.

Although mobile payments have yet to become one of the top payment options among retail shoppers, this is anticipated to change within the next five years. According to the study, by 2018, mobile payments in the U.S. will hit $5.4 billion. That being said, the researchers did also point out that they approximate retail POS purchases on the whole will be worth closer to the $4.2 trillion mark in 2018.

However, despite this much larger overall number, the amount estimated for mobile transactions appears to be nothing short of extraordinary. What’s more, the Javelin Strategy and Research study mentioned that, within five years, mobile payments will surpass all other types of payments in terms of having the biggest compound annual growth rate. Thus, in such a rapidly changing environment that is becoming more and more mobile-friendly, a big change in POS retail market trends is highly likely.