Mobile Shopping Trends - Consumer Sentiment with Online Holiday Shopping Experience Improves but Retailers Have Long Road Ahead with Mobile and Social

Mobile Commerce (mCommerce) and Digital Marketing are having an increasing effect on consumer purchase behavior across all sectors.

Mobile Shopping Trends 2011

Studies for the period from Cyber Monday and Christmas Eve 2011 are showing dramatic shifts in "how we buy" and the iPhone and iPad are key drivers of "in the moment" purchase facilitators.

The Food & Beverage sector is not immune changes in mobile shopping trends which is creating new buyer behavior as I have written in Kraft Foods iPhone Assistant Appeals to Time Starved Consumers, to not only facilitate the purchase of a brand BUT to understand consumer intent and tailor the message and the brand to individual consumers.

Baynote Online Shopping Research

Baynote's 2nd Annual Holiday Online Shopping Experience Survey unveiled what buyers did during the holiday shopping season and I see things that point to new food shopping trends in 2012.

The attributes consumers said were most important to ensuring a positive online shopping experience included a smooth checkout process, effective on-site navigation and search, informative user reviews and comments, and personalized product recommendations. Cconsumers were generally satisfied with privacy controls across eCommerce channels this year, except on Facebook. No surprise here and I am hearing more frequently consumers moving away from Facebook to Twitter which does not seem to be "messing around" with complex security changes.

"With so much hype around emerging channels this holiday season, our survey shows online retailers which of them actually delivered the best online experience," said Anurag Wadehra, chief marketing officer for Baynote. "While social, mobile and tablets all have tremendous potential, retailers need to improve the customer shopping experience across these new channels. This holds particularly true for the tablet, which we expect will dominate all other emerging channels in the coming year."

Key findings of the Baynote Holiday Online Shopping Experience Survey include:

The future of mobile commerce is the tablet(iPad):

49% of tablet owners used their tablets to make purchases. 60% of tablet owners expect to use their tablet to research or purchase products in 2012, 3x the rate of mobile phone users. Think you need to address how you can make the iPad an entry point for your brand or retail store?

Despite the hype, social commerce has yet to deliver on its promise:

Nearly 80% of consumers said social media did not influence shopping decisions but over 50% get advice from their friends and family. This says social media still has an "influence gap" related to word of mouth.

20% of consumers purchase through an ecommerce site vs 9% who say they go through the retailers Facebook page. This tells me that Facebook is a tactic, vs the end all... be all... that should drive consumers to your site. So make Facebook compelling... make it deliver the message of "the reason to buy" your brand

Personalized recommendations are driving sales:

We all like digital that recommends products to purchase and 57% of buyers purchased those recommended items. But only on the regular sites and not the mobile and tablet versions. It appears that emails delivered the most relevant personalized product recommendations. Daily deal sites like Groupon were not very effective according to these consumers.

What this tells me is Social Media (Facebook, Twitter, your blog)  should drive consumers to your web site. The site needs get consumers from undecided to decided on a purchase. As important, your site needs to understand the consumers behavior and preferences and then tailor your next brand message to the customer via email.

Ignore mCommerce, Digital Marketing and Consumer Analytics at your own Peril

Baynote says they provide "... intent-based personalization solutions for multi-channel retailers. Using Baynote's patented approach, retailers are able to understand buyer intent "in the moment" across the shopping experience to deliver compelling offers, content and product recommendations that increase engagement, conversion and average order value."

That is a powerful statement and that means food & beverage brands must recognize that consumers are  more "in the moment" with mobile technology whether it means researching a product on their couch, in the store or at work OR making the purchase with any of their 3 screens, computer, tablet and smartphone.