More Shoppers Are Going Mobile

Traffic might appear lighter at some malls this holiday season, but that’s because people are shopping on their smartphones, according to a report by CNBC.

Mobile spending during the holidays is expected to continue to climb this year, as retailers have been investing to improve their apps, and shoppers are growing more comfortable with ringing purchases up in just a few clicks. A large fraction of the pressure on retailers to improve the mobile shopping experience has been driven by Amazon, which has roped in more than 100 million people in the U.S. to pay for a Prime membership that includes perks within Amazon’s own app.

“That phone is in everyone’s hand all the time,” Adam Sand, CEO of shopping rewards app Shopkick, told CNBC. “Even around the dinner table. You try to stop to put it away, but it’s an ever-present thing now.”

With online holiday sales forecast to hit nearly $125 billion in 2018, smartphones are expected to drive nearly half of shopper traffic on the web, more than desktop computers, according to Adobe Analytics, which measures transactions for 80 of the top 100 internet retailers.

Smartphones will make up 48.3 percent of visits to retailers’ websites and apps, compared with 42.9 percent for desktop computers and 8.8 percent for tablets, Adobe said. But smartphones will still just account for 27.2 percent of revenue (up 11.6 percent from a year ago), compared with a whopping 63.1 percent for desktop computers and 9.6 percent for tablets. Although more and more people are browsing retailers’ websites during the holidays, not everyone completes a purchase there. Many shoppers say they use it more for browsing deals — at least for now.

In fact, that statistic implies there’s still a big opportunity for retailers to improve the mobile shopping experience with better apps.