79% growth in 2016. That is the staggering number highlighted by the Zanox Mobile Performance Barometer 2016 with respect to the growing share of sales using mobile phones worldwide (percentage of transactions and sales made through a mobile device as opposed to on a computer).
The growth rate is impressive, however, smartphones are far from replacing desktops for e-commerce. They now account for 31% of sales globally compared to 69% for desktop. The key point we shall see is that m-commerce has gained momentum, leading to the emergence of a virtual retail outlet literally in customers' back pockets.
Mobile phones are now part of our day-to-day life. The growth of internet use on mobile phones has been steep since the democratisation of smartphones (beginning with the iPhone 1 in 2007), and has been supported by an ever-increasing mobile data speed in the past decade. Some studies indicate that phones reached the tipping point over desktops in terms of time spent by users per day. As pointed out by the Global Web Index, only the 19-25 year old segment has reached that level of activity, but it also predicts it will rise by 2019 across all age segments. According to the same research, smartphones have conquered the youth, with 45% stating it is their main or favorite device. This age segment is usually an early adopter, so we can expect the upper age segments to follow.
Switzerland
According to Zanox statistics, Swiss consumers are not fast-movers, with only 14.8% of mobile sales share in 2015. Compared to the UK, with a 40.7% m-commerce share over desktop, or to the Nordics with 36.6%, Switzerland is far behind other Western countries.
The upcoming e-Com expo in Geneva (26-27 April) might update us and give us further insights on this growing trend.
What about m-marketing?
In order to put this in perspective, we may look at some insightful market research from SalesForce, which found out that 68% of the best performing marketers have adopted a “customer journey strategy”, and 65% have created personalized omni-channel customer experiences. We may then question the extent to which we can use the mobile phone as a channel for marketing, sales, and the customer journey (with useful tools such as geo-localisation enabled by mobile devices).
If the surveys backing this article are led by private organisations who provide services related to the findings, we may, of course, question the total absence of bias. What we cannot question, however, is the ever-increasing amount of space mobile phones take up in our lives. It certainly keeps marketers on their toes, since it is their job to anticipate what's next, and use these tools to communicate more efficiently and sell better.
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