Mobile dominates UK e-commerce marketplace

Performance marketing technology company Criteo has released its 2015 State of Mobile Commerce report, which reveals that mobile apps generate almost 50 per cent of mobile transactions for some of the largest e-commerce players who have made their app experience a priority. This is due to much higher conversion rates than mobile browser or even desktop, says the research. In addition, 40 percent of ecommerce transactions now involve more than one device as smartphones, desktops and tablets are used in a variety of combinations to research and make purchasing decisions.

“The customer purchase journey has become increasingly complex as consumers have stopped using a single device to make their purchases,” said Jonathan Wolf, Chief Product Officer, Criteo. “Delivering an engaging app experience and connecting seamlessly with consumers across multiple devices are key to capturing ecommerce sales in this new world.”

The findings in this report are based on Criteo’s analysis of 1.4 billion individual ecommerce transactions totaling more than $160 billion of annual sales globally. Additional key takeaways include:

• Mobile is huge: UK mobile transactions now account for 46 percent of all ecommerce transactions. As a result, the UK is now ranked second highest with regards to mobile share of retail ecommerce globally, surpassing South Korea and remaining behind only Japan.  Of these top three, the UK is the only country to have maintained growth of mobile share since Q1, with both Japan and South Korea seeing a decline following the busy holiday period.

• Optimise or bust: Sites that are optimised for mobile see a 3.4 percent conversion rate, more than double that of non-optimised sites where only 1.6 percent of consumers convert. The UK leads the West in conversion rates – surpassing the US benchmark of 100 – due to better usability and consumer experience on mobile websites.
• iOS users outstrip Android: Despite Android’s dominant global market share, its users in the UK (as well as the US and Japan) are far less prominent than their iOS counterparts when it comes to shopping from their handsets.
• Smartphones are first choice: Globally, smartphones are the most popular mobile shopping choice, however the UK bucks this trend, with more people buying from a tablet than their smartphone. This gap is closing, though.
• The UK is ahead of the curve: Global mobile share of ecommerce transactions is forecast to reach 40 percent by the end of this year – a figure that the UK is already well ahead of.

“Consumer adoption of mobile continues to be the biggest trend in both ecommerce and advertising today, and the pace of growth remains astounding,” said Wolf. “Marketers’ ability to leverage new technologies to accurately identify and reach consumers wherever they are is going to become critical as this trend continues towards a world where the majority of transactions will take place across multiple devices.”