Mobile retail sales worldwide will reach $220bn in 2016

Mobile is disrupting how commerce works in India. With more and more people accessing internet for the first time via mobile phones, it presents a golden opportunity for retailers in India.

Mobile is changing not only how consumers buy, get entertained and transact online, it is also changing how retailers do business and connect with customers.

Leading retailers are taking an omnichannel approach and incorporating mobile apps to meet consumer demand and expectations.

Going mobile, experts say, is a smart play.

Mobile retail continues to explode globally. Estimates from industry experts vary, but all expect continued and dramatic growth over the next few years.

• Internet Retailer predicts worldwide mobile retail sales will reach $220 billion in 2016, a 53 percent increase versus 2015.
• Org, Forrester and Bizrate have revealed, in ‘The State of Retailing Online Report 2016’, that mobile represents 44 percent of retailers’ online traffic, and 31 percent of sales. This is even more evident in mobile-first, emerging markets — for example, Amazon states that more than 70 percent of its online traffic comes via mobile in India.
• Salesforce and Demandware have estimated even more aggressive growth, and predict mobile retail will dominate online retail in the near future.

This is truly a global boom. Apps, as they say, are eating the world. Savvy retailers are using sophisticated mobile technologies to engage customers via apps.

Here are some ways they are making discovery easy for customers.

• Beacons are used to trigger push notifications with special offers once a patron enters a store.
• Store layouts are incorporated into the app experience to pinpoint where a specific item is located.
• Multiple mobile payment options like Android Pay and Apple Pay make checking out a breeze.

According to App Annie Intelligence, a market data solution for the app economy, “Mobile disruption to retail is no longer a distant threat, it’s happened.” In a recent research report on the ‘Growth of Retail Apps’, it found that…

• The mobile retail sector continues to grow. For the countries analysed, a total time spent in bricks-and-clicks retail apps increased by nearly 40 percent over the past 12 months.
• Online-first apps increased by more than 50 percent.
• Apps from online-first retailers are seeing more sessions per user and faster growth than those from bricks-and-clicks companies. There are significant opportunities for traditional retailers to learn from online specialists.
• By following best practices for retail apps, including effective user acquisition and engagement strategies, traditional retailers can further enhance their success on mobile. This can result in higher conversion, increased loyalty, and more frequent engagement.

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