San Francisco, CA - TechBargains.com, a leading deal curation website for electronic products, released its 2011 Holiday Mobile Shopping Survey, revealing that while the number of mobile shoppers is increasing dramatically, they are using their mobile devices to research products more than they use it to make purchases. Shoppers are comfortable making purchases from their home computers, but are more hesitant using their tablets and mobile phones to buy online. The survey found that 58% of shoppers have made purchases via their mobile phone as compared to 94% who have made purchases via laptops and 75% via tablets. For those who shop with their phone, 79% use it to research products, 73% to browse stores and 77% to compare prices. Of the 58% percent of shoppers who make purchases via their mobile devices, 69% use both the mobile browser and apps to buy products (18% only use apps, 13% only use a mobile browser).
What consumers are purchasing also differs from their buying behavior on laptops. Laptop shoppers' most popular items to buy online are consumer products like clothing and electronics, but shoppers buy more digital products like music and apps on their mobile devices. On mobile phones 70% of shoppers purchased digital goods, 60% purchased consumer products, 46% purchased services, and 38% purchased consumable goods. The majority of shoppers (76%) say ease of use is the reason they would buy one category of products over another and 34% cite price point as the reason why they would buy in one category over another.
"While the use of mobile devices is increasing, our survey results strongly indicate that mobile devices are currently much better for window shopping than for buying -- especially when it comes to consumer products," said Yung Trang, president, TechBargains. "Mobile shoppers are still more comfortable purchasing using their laptops, although tablets are widely used for research and shopping. This demonstrates that consumers are open to new technology, but until mobile shopping is as easy as shopping on larger devices and security concerns are addressed, they will be more reluctant to fully embrace mobile buying."
iPhone v. Android
As the iPhone v. Android debate continues, the survey reveals iPhone users make more purchases online via their iPhone than Android owners.
71% of iPhone users make purchases via their phone compared to 64% of Android users.
71% of iPhone users who make purchases using their phone use both a mobile browser and apps to make purchases, 22% use only apps to make purchases, 6% only use a mobile browser, while 70% of Android users who make purchases using their phone use both mobile browser and apps to make purchases, 14% use only apps to make purchases, and17% only use mobile browser.
34% of iPhone users who make purchases using their phone say half or more of their holiday purchasing was done via phone, while 20% of Android users who make purchases using their phone say half or more of their holiday purchasing was done via phone.
"Our survey indicates that Apple's 'There's an App for that' campaign is really striking a chord for mobile shoppers. iPhone users are finding apps that can handle more of their needs in a simple and secure manner without needing to open a browser," said Jeff Haynes, editor of TechBargains. "Android users aren't consistently finding the same experience, either because of convoluted interfaces or security problems. As a result, if they want to shop with their devices, they're being forced to use the web browser whether they want to or not."
iPad 2 vs. Kindle Fire
Tablet users don't demonstrate the same reservations about mobile purchasing that mobile phone shoppers do. People are using their tablets to research and make purchases, supporting the popular claim that tablets could eventually cannibalize laptop use due to ease of use and portability.
75% of tablet owners use their tablet to make purchases, 90% use tablets to browse stores, 89% research products, and 85% compare prices.
86% of iPad 2 owners make purchases via tablet, while 74% of Kindle Fire owners make purchases via tablet.
79% of iPad 2 owners who make purchases via tablet use both their web browser and apps to buy products, 14% only use apps, and 8% only use the mobile browser.
80% of Kindle Fire owners who make purchases via tablet use both a web browser and apps to buy products, 20% only use mobile browser, and 0% only use apps.
81% purchase digital goods via tablet, 77% buy consumer products, 55% buy consumable goods, and 51% buy services.
Men vs. Women
Men and women's top two concerns when making purchases via their mobile devices were similar-- security concerns and difficulty purchasing-- with women most concerned about the difficulty of completing purchases and men more concerned with security.
59% of men and 54% of women make purchases using their mobile phones. Of those who don't use their mobile phones to make purchases, 42% of men and 38% of women cited security concerns and 54% of men and 59% of women cited difficulty completing purchases.
While more men make purchases on their mobile phones than women, more females are purchasing on tablets. In both cases women are making more of their holiday purchases through mobile devices than men.
74% of Men and 77% of Women make purchases using their tablets
35% of Women and 21% of Men made half or more of their holiday purchases via their tablets.
32% of Women and 25% of Men made half or more of their holiday purchases via phones.
TechBargains.com provides additional helpful resources for consumers with video clips on its YouTube channel that focus on product reviews, product deals, gadget giveaways and holiday shopping tips. TechBargains.com also released its 2011 Holiday Gift Guide which includes 30 consumer electronic products predicted to be best selling items this holiday season.
About TechBargains
Founded in 1999, TechBargains.com is a deal aggregation website that combines unbiased expert hand-curation and a real-time price/value discovery algorithm. Over $150 million worth of products were sold via TechBargains.com over the last year. 80% of the people that visit the site are repeat visitors and they give TechBargains.com a 98% customer satisfaction rating. The site is actively pursued by manufacturers based on the quality of channel and sales achieved. The company is a top partner to Dell, HP and NewEgg. For more information visit http://www.techbargains.com or join the conversation on Twitter @techbargains or http://www.facebook.com/pages/Techbargainscom/33983412764.
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