Tag: smartphone shopping

A recent market analysis has revealed that smartphones will become a major game changer in shopping.

Though slow to get started, mobile payments could soon prove to be extremely important to the retail shopping experience, as consumers begin to feel that using the devices as digital forms of credit and debit cards, as well as for loyalty programs, is trustworthy and convenient.

This trend would dramatically change the consumer experience as everything will be contained in one place.

Though wallets are stored, locked away, or left behind, in various situations, the odds are that a person will always have his or her smartphone in hand or pocket. Retailers are already using mobile commerce to appeal to online shoppers who access the internet with their smartphones and tablets, and now they are beginning to see the potential benefit from receiving transactions through these devices, as well.

Some feel that mobile payments could be the biggest revolution in retail in many decades.

A recent Business Insider report has stated that the “old dream of the digital wallet is coming true in a very mobile-led fashion.” The report indicated that by the end of last year, in the United States there were already approximately 7.9 million consumers who had adopted a system compatible with NFC technology (near field communications) or QR codes. These include examples, such as MasterCard PayPass, Visa Wallet, Google Wallet, and others that use apps for processing the transactions.

Equally, mobile payments through credit card readers on devices, such as PayPal, Square, and I Love Velvet reported processing transactions worth more than $10 billion last year.

Another report, this one recently issued by Gartner, has predicted that around the world, mobile payments transactions will break the $235 billion mark by the end of this year. That would be an increase of 44 percent over the figure from 2011.

When it comes to examples of mobile payments successes, Starbucks is typically said to be the leader as it has effectively implemented a range of different types of transactions, including everything from loyalty cards to QR code based purchases with a refillable retailer account.

Research in the United Kingdom has shown that smartphone shopping is considerably on the rise.

Absolute Digital Media’s online marketers have conducted an analysis of eMarketer data and have discovered that mobile commerce sales in the United Kingdom are expected to make up 26.5 percent of overall online sales by 2017.

The company published a report that has provided a great deal of digital sales insight.

The article that was published was entitled “Mcommerce Takes 15% of UK Retail Ecommerce Sales”. What it showed was that digital sales, such as online and mobile commerce, in the United Kingdom, are making up a larger proportion of total retail sales than is the case in the majority of countries worldwide. It is expected that smartphone and tablet based sales, alone, are expected to reach £6.61 billion.

The research went on to reveal a great deal more about mobile commerce and its impact on shopping overall.

For example, it was predicted that the sales would make up 11.5 percent of total British retail sales by the end of the year. This, compared with the 10.2 percent, which was the figure last year. eMarketer had predicted that among digital shoppers, 58.3 percent will browse or research the products that they are considering this year.

Using this data, the Absolute Digital Media marketers, who work at length in the retail sector, have looked more deeply into what the figures mean in a practical sense. In their article, they wrote that “The UK has always had relatively high online shopping rates, but it’s interesting to see such a sharp growth specifically in mobile sales. It highlights the importance for those in the retail industry to ensure their websites are optimized for mobile, smartphone and tablet devices in order to take advantage of this.”

The data from the eMarketer study has made it clear that there is a great deal of importance in retail for mobile commerce. This means that companies that wish to succeed will need to focus on making sure that they use the right marketing strategies and that they provide the right optimized online experience for people who are looking into products by way of their smartphones and tablets.