Mobile commerce is still small relative to the overall e-commerce market. But it's on a steep upward trajectory thanks to the increasing use of smartphones and rising mobile internet usage. I read that m-commerce sales will reach $6.7 billion this year in the United States, a 91% increase over 2010. M-commerce sales in 2012 are predicted to rise another 73% to $11.6 billion. Approximately 37.5 million U.S. consumer will make at least one purchase on their mobile phone next year, up from 26.8 million this year. And in total, 72.8 million mobile users will research or browse items on their phone in 2012 but not necessarily make a purchase.
At the beginning of e-commerce, I remember we were not trusting this virtual way to shop, so we were researching the products online and then go buy in store. But as the industry showed its reliability and improved its slate of mobile offerings, the opposite trend started: the consumers were visiting stores to research products and then went buy them or something else from home through their desktop.
We have now reached a new step with the mobile devices: mobile commerce is acting as an engine of overall commerce growth by converting potential brick-and-mortar sales to digital sales as consumers use their smartphones while shopping in-store. Brick-and-mortar retailers run the risk of becoming showrooms any online retailers, since many discounts are offered online. But on the other hand, if the traditional stores are clever, the shift to mobile shopping could benefit them as well: if a retailer has robust mobile offerings, it can steer in-store shoppers to look online for more information or find out-of-stock sizes and items on its own mobile site or app, retaining the sale via a different channel.
The good news is that whatever classic in-store shopping or m-commerce shopping, this new way of shopping are beneficial to the consumers. And whatever the way how I shop, no mobile device application will be able to compete with the pleasure of a walk in Soho.
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