News Byte: Online Sellers Had a Mobile Little Christmas
Next year NORAD may well have to be enlisted to track mobile-enabled holiday purchases, which soared as high as Santa's sleigh in 2013. Here are highlights from the final holiday online scorecard from IBM Digital Analytics Benchmark.
- Mobile traffic on commerce sites leaped 40% over 2012, accounting for nearly 35% of all online traffic. Nearly 17% of all online purchases were made via mobile devices, buoyed by a 46% rise in activity.
- Smartphones accounted for nearly twice as much traffic as tablets, but tablets produced twice the sales volume of phones. Tablets drove 11.5% of online sales with average orders of $118.09 to $104.72 for mobile phones.
- iOS-operated devices were the Apples of e-coms' eyes during the holidays, driving 12.7% of sales compared to a mere 2.6% for Androids.
- Overall Q4 online sales rose by 10.2% over 2012, making digital purchasing the star of the season in the face of overall retail increases in the 2% to 3% range, according to several trackers.
