Public Relations & Social Marketing Insight

The latest tally, based on more than 1 billion transactions in 3,000 online retail and travel businesses measured by Criteo, shows mobile in the first quarter of this year accounting for more than a third (34%) of all online transactions globally.

In the U.S., 29% of all online sales now are via mobile, led by fashion and luxury, mass merchants and travel.

The mobile share of ecommerce transactions grew 10% in the last three months, according to Criteo, which projects yet another 10% growth in the U.S. by the end of this year. That would put mobile transactions at 33% of U.S. online purchases and 40% globally....

In a world where the importance of mobile optimization is being increasingly vocalized, brands are still experiencing a low number of online sales and conversions through mobile products. A new study from Opera Software, however, aimed to better explain the shopping behaviors of consumers while browsing and buying through mobile and desktop devices.

Opera Software’s report compared traffic and conversions through different platforms for each day of the week, and their research produced a few interesting discoveries. First off, while the holidays are always thought of as the most popular time of the year to shop online, Opera found that June was the month which experienced the highest global volume of traffic to mobile shopping sites. On a weekly basis, it appears that mobile traffic to ecommerce sites spikes on Sundays, while desktop traffic is highest on Mondays.

Overall, shopping traffic tends to be more consistent and strong on weekdays; however, Friday experiences the lowest number of mobile visits. The company explains this phenomenon with a notion that shoppers tend to research and browse on their mobile devices on weekends, but add the the actual purchasing of the item to do their to do lists during the week....

Apple Pay makes up more than $2 out of $3 spent on purchases using contactless payment across the three major US card networks. I agree with my colleague Sucharita Mulpuru that this is likely a big chunk of a small pie, considering the lower maturity of the mobile contactless ecosystem in the US. It's always better to look for absolute value. In this regard, PayPal processed $46 billion in mobile payment volume in 2014, up 68% over 2013.

Should marketers care about mobile wallets? Yes. Mobile wallets are not just about mobile payments. Consumers want a better shopping experience. Offering faster or more-secure payments is not enough; wallet providers will have to solve real pain points, such as giving consumers the ability to see what’s on stored value cards at any moment in time, access loyalty points, or automatically receive digital copies of payment receipts. In particular, 57% of US online adult smartphone users are interested in having access to loyalty program points and rewards within a mobile wallet. Access to loyalty rewards from brands is the most wanted feature from consumers, and it's the one least integrated in mobile wallets today....