Eli Greenblat
February 19, 2013
The Age
MOBILE phones and tablets have emerged as the preferred way to search online for shopping ideas, particularly over Christmas, while a new breed of consumers engaged in ”couch commerce” – shopping late at night when the kids are asleep – is also growing in popularity.
This meant that shoppers were ”always on”, and only a finger-stroke away from computers at work, iPhones on the train and tablets on the couch to access retail websites, search for the best offers, check prices and store opening hours.
Data collected by Google looking at online trends and behaviour over November, the peak time for online Christmas spending to ensure presents arrive in time, show for the first time a majority of shopping-related online searches were conducted away from a traditional desktop computer.
”It all boils down to the uptake in mobile and the centrality of mobile phones to people’s shopping decisions,” said Google head of retail, Ross McDonald.
He said Google figures revealed 53 per cent of online shopping searches came from these handheld devices, such as iPhones, iPads and tablets, the first pre-Christmas period in Australia a majority of this online activity was done away from computers and laptops.
”People are moving across the day from a laptop or desktop at work to a mobile when they are on the go or a tablet in the evening,” Mr McDonald said.
Mr McDonald said Australian shoppers are typically using a variety of devices to now access online retail information to make their decisions. ”It’s big screens versus small screens. Small screen is … often used to confirm a purchase or confirm the price … very much at the end of the shopping process.
”The big screen, which is laptops and tablets, is for ‘what type of product do I want to buy?’, so product comparison and therefore which retailer can help me with that.”
Mr McDonald also referred to a growing class of consumers doing ”couch commerce”.
”Some people call it ‘couch commerce’, where the kids are in bed, TV is on, glass of wine and let’s do a bit more of what [shopping] I was doing today or start looking for some shopping stuff.”
Google estimated that online sales for the year to November hit $12.6 billion, and was growing at an annual rate of about 27 per cent.
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