The holiday season is in full swing and the throngs of people have wiped the shelves clean in 2014. While the statistics from this one day are still being calculated, they are only a part of the holiday shopping season.
While 2013’s overall spending on Black Friday dipped a few billion as compared to 2012, Internet sales have remained on the rise. However, that billion-dollar number now needs further explanation, as marketers seek to capitalize on mobile retail. Updated, responsive and optimized mobile websites are key for the holiday season this year.
Mobile Payments
It will be interesting to see how new online, one-click payment methods and virtual wallets affect mobile sales. With Google Wallet already available for a couple of years, will the early adopters take it under their wing and push the platform? Will Visa Checkout, formerly V.Me, corner the market for one-click shopping? Or perhaps, as always, Apple will lead the way with Apple Pay, their take on virtual wallets, with layers of fraud protection to comfort the consumer into cardless consumption.
Beyond a more streamlined checkout process, it is clear that consumers are using their phones to aid their in-store shopping experience as well as make purchases. Mobile couponing apps like Retailmenot and Shopular use geo-location to “push” deals to your phone while you are shopping. This creates a tantalizing blend of mobile marketing and brick and mortar retail. Other apps like Checkout51 and Ibotta actually pay you cash back to shop. They have weekly sale items that, if you buy and submit your receipt, will earn you cash back. With apps like these, you end up adding things into your real-life cart that you would not have purchased without your electronic push.
Mobile is Filling a Void
Even finding the stores you want has grown more mainstreamed through Google’s easy to use Google My Business that streamlines search engine results with results in Google Maps. Now you can get turn-by-turn directions to your retail outlets this shortened holiday shopping season.
Once inside the store, large numbers of customers use their phones to research their potential purchases to ensure they are getting a good deal. Others don’t wait until the last minute and have already used their phones to locate the best deals, which is the reason they have landed in the shop to begin with.
According to a new report released by Criteo, a performance marketing technology company, Mobile devices will play a major role in consumer purchase behavior this year with a projected 27 percent of purchases coming from mobile devices.
With a shorter amount of time between Thanksgiving and Christmas this year, retailers are looking for any way to capitalize on interest and convert sales. Mobile is being looked at to fill the void that a few extra shopping days usually afford. Couple that with the increasing number of American adults who own smart phones and the potential is there for Black Friday and Cyber Monday to become less and less important as the consumer becomes more and more aware of what is a good deal, and where to find one during the holiday season.
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