Tag: tablet commerce

The retailer’s event will start early, at 6:00 pm on Thanksgiving Day, and will target smartphone users.

Walmart is hoping to get the very most out of the mobile shopping trend this holiday season by starting its event earlier and ensuring that consumers who are interested in buying gifts over their smartphones will find it very convenient to do so.

The retail giant plans to add thousands of deals to its mobile app and official website on Thanksgiving evening.

Walmart has predicted that mobile shopping activities will make up about 75 percent of the holiday traffic that it sees online, this year. For this reason, it has now made it possible for its mobile app to be used to discover products and make purchases in as few clicks as possible. They are even hoping that some consumers will be willing to make their smartphone based purchases directly through some of their strategically placed ads.

The mobile shopping app has also had a number of improvements made in order to better the in-store experience.

For instance, the mobile app has been designed to make it possible for shoppers to be able to browse a map of the store in which they are currently standing, in order to be able to discover where the Black Friday sales are situated in relation to their current physical location. The hope is that this will help to reduce some of the confusion that consumers face in trying to navigate the stores to find the sales, particularly on the busiest shopping days of the year.

Moreover, the mobile app will also make it possible for users to read reviews of the products they are seeing in front of them, through the use of their smartphones. Reviews have become an important part of the decision making process for many shoppers, so having them handy while in store could be a considerable advantage.

The mobile shopping app will also provide individuals with the ability to add products to a wish list that they can create and then share with other people. Walmart is also hoping to make it easy for consumers to check in once they’ve arrived so they can pick up what they’ve ordered in advance. The check in notifies employees at the location that the consumer has arrived, allowing them to have the order ready for the completion of the transaction.

A growing number of shoppers are using smartphones to buy products they want during the holiday season.

According to Google, a rising number of consumers are choosing to skip the long Black Friday marathon shopping experiences for small bursts of mobile commerce purchasing through the use of their smartphones.

These m-commerce purchases occur in scattered moments over time instead of all at once as is the Black Friday tradition.

Google has labeled these little bursts of mobile commerce shopping as “micro-moments”. In its blog, the company predicted that “This holiday season, shopping ‘moments’ will replace shopping ‘marathons,’.”

Approximately 54 percent of shoppers who will be making purchases this holiday season have said that they plan to do some of their shopping on their smartphones during periods of free time, such as while they are eating breakfast in the morning or during their daily commute, said Google. This data was generated through an analysis conducted between that company and Ipsos MediaCT from a consumer survey on their holiday season shopping behaviors.

The research showed that people would rather use mobile commerce and are less likely to take marathon in-person trips.

Last year, Google observed a steady increase in mobile shopping throughout the length of the holiday season and noted a decrease in the number of spikes on the traditionally preferred shopping days such as Black Friday morning.

The company explained in its blog that “This type of shopping has lead to shorter, more purposeful mobile shopping sessions.” It also went on to say that “In fact, while shoppers now spend 7% less time in each mobile session, smartphone’s share of online shopping purchases has gone up 64% over the last year, and 30% of all online shopping purchases now happen on mobile phones.”

Ahead of the Thanksgiving weekend, approximately 61 percent of holiday shoppers will already begin researching the products that they are thinking about buying. That is an increase of 17 percent over last year, despite the fact that Thanksgiving fell very late in the season in 2014. That said, Google still pointed out that while shoppers may start researching early, most purchases will still happen later on in the holiday season.