This month in the world of app commerce – September
This month the changing behaviour of shoppers has featured prominently in the news. It’s a fascinating topic and something we’ve written about recently too!
Customers are differentiating less between channels and engaging with their favourite brands across several touchpoints.
Here’s some of the research we’ve uncovered around the trend this month.
‘Want it now’ culture
Naturally, customers will choose the shopping methods most convenient to them and they won’t hesitate to use more than one channel when shopping if it enhances their experience. One study has found that 54% of UK customers choose which channel to shop on, dependent on the type of item they are purchasing. It was found that the more complex the purchase the greater number of channels a customer will use to research their decision. Consumers tend to turn to mobile when they need information quickly or when they’re on the move. It gives them the ability to be agile when shopping, so brands and retailers will need to keep pace. Google found that smartphone users are 50% more likely to expect to make immediate purchases on mobile than a year ago and almost a quarter of shoppers are classed as ‘digitally obsessed’ and therefore more likely to shop with digitally advanced retailers.
Apps add value
The demand for mobile is growing and having a mobile presence is increasingly important. With 85% of mobile time spent within apps, offering a mobile website alone is no longer enough. The seamlessness of the experience, speed and ease of use of apps make them attractive to consumers. Even amongst sectors known to be most successful in-store; two-thirds of luxury shoppers prefer to use mobile. Shopping cart abandonment has raised some concerns within both mcommerce and app commerce, though this can be tackled by addressing consumers’ expectations. Consumers expect a frictionless checkout experience – even fixing design improvements alone can improve shopping cart conversion rates by 35%.
Omnichannel is a necessity
Customers now navigate between many touchpoints for a single purchase. They are increasingly in control of how and where they want to be engaged and serviced.
To ensure you’re meeting customers’ expectations you need to tackle the issue from every point your customer interacts with your brand, both online and in-store. A recent study found that although 60% of shoppers start researching a product online, 58% prefer the in-store experience. Shoppers rarely engage with just one channel, they interact with your brand across multiple channels, often simultaneously. Fifty-nine percent of shoppers use their mobile in-store on a regular basis.
When building out your omnichannel strategy, it’s important to consider how each channel can complement and interact with the other from the customers’ point of view. The online experience needs to be easily integrated into the store for a seamless shopper journey. By creating a channel agnostic experience, retailers can benefit from their customers researching on mobile in-store.
Omnichannel strategies do work; Macy’s has seen online shoppers spend 25% more when they pick up an order in-store and Barclaycard found 38% of shoppers research clothing online before going in-store to make a purchase.
Preparing for the future and anticipating consumers’ expectations should be a main priority. With younger generations becoming more digitally orientated, blurring the lines between channels and enabling shopping by whichever means shoppers demand, will be vital to retail success.
Learn how you can incorporate a mobile app into the omnichannel experience in our blog post.
Reported by Samantha Rigg
