2017… Not the Year to Play Chicken with Sales!
Well, we are officially in the Fire Chicken Year! 2017 is the Chinese year of 4714, so the Chinese Astrological sign is the Chicken and because the color red is connected to “fire,” it is also known as the Red Chicken Year. However, don’t misinterpret the year of the “Red Chicken,” as meaning you should be cautious in how you as a digital seller should approach 2017 for business!
Over the next several weeks we will explore different ecommerce marketing trends that experts in the digital commerce industry have uncovered that should assist you in successfully navigating a marketplace that is more competitive than ever.
Mobile vs. Desktop Sales
Speaking of “trends,” let’s take a look at one of the most perplexing issues facing digital sellers for 2017. Specifically, we are focusing on digital buyers and how they compare based on the devices they shop with. In short, do mobile device shoppers or desktop consumers buy more?
While everyone recognizes the fact that mobile devices now make up over half of all web traffic, which continues to grow in market share, it may surprise you to learn that the majority of mobile device users will not actually commit to a purchase from their mobile device. It is thought that this lack of purchasing commitment is based on privacy and security concerns resulting from their mobile device possibly accessing unknown digital networks.
Market research has confirmed that although mobile devices accounted for 59% of all “shopping sessions,” on ecommerce sites, these mobile browsers made up just 38% of sales revenue. In fact, Desktop (laptop and personal computer) ecommerce shopping while only responsible for 41% of web traffic…..generated 67% of digital marketplace sales revenue!
Hence, ecommerce industry observers have begun to ask serious questions about why the “conversion rates,” for browsing to buying is so low for mobile device consumers and how can that information be used to enhance the shopping experience for both the digital buyer and seller?
Are Desktop and Mobile Consumers Different Customers?
Digital Sellers need to stop thinking of mobile device shoppers and desktop shoppers as different people. Research seems to indicate that mobile device or Smartphone browsers will visit digital websites to view, compare and consider the purchase of a product. This is when they are in their “research phase,” of the transaction. Then the majority of them appear to go to a more traditional desktop device to make their actual purchase. However, this was basically in many cases a continuation of the same transaction.
Smartphone’s have the lowest conversion rate of any devices from “researching” their product to actually purchasing it. Yet, industry wide market research has found strong correlations between high percentages of mobile traffic on a marketplace website and high overall ultimate sales rates.
While this may seem an odd variance of data, it actually is not. This confluence of data is caused by people researching products on Smartphone’s, making the key decisions related to the actual purchase and then concluding the transaction on a desktop device later.
How to Use this Data to Grow Sales…
While you can attempt to increase your conversion rates between mobile devices and completed transactions, it may make more sense to simply ensure your potential customer effectively transmits their mobile device efforts to their desktop device for a later completion of that transaction.
As an example, your email strategy should reflect this type of campaign. If your customer finds your site and a product of interest using their mobile device, then you should be sending them an email featuring the products the user spent time looking at on their mobile device. This email may well be read when they are on their desktop device and thus ready to conclude the purchase transaction.
For 2017 playing “chicken” by attempting to force immediate sales off of a mobile device (perhaps blowing the sale completely) may mean that you are missing the opportunity to simply nudge the customer to click “buy,” later on their laptop. Developing a subtle strategy to drive sales from mobile to desktop devices, may be all it takes to ensure that a “Red Chicken Year,” refers only to the Chinese New Year and not to 2017 “red” sales reports!
