Dive Brief:
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Mobile shoppers (61% on smartphone, 69% on tablets) prefer browsers to apps, unless the apps are user-friendly and often something a mobile browser doesn’t, according to a survey of 1,000 U.S. consumers by Bronto Software.
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Web shopping is thriving especially in the West, where more than three-quarters own a smartphone; 66% report shopping online at least once a month. In the Northeast 60% shop online, and in the South and Midwest 58% shop online, according to the report, “Consumers Tell All,” which was conducted by market research firm Ipsos.
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Men shop online during the week more than women do, though that could reflect differences in how men and women define “shopping.” Women may not count browsing around, for example, according to Bronto.
Dive Insight:
In previous research, men have also been found to shop online more often than women, so the results here shouldn't be too surprising. But as before, it’s not clear what that exactly means. In an era when the lines between shopping online and in store are ever more blurred, it may behoove researchers to tease out exactly what "shopping" entails. Do men research products online without buying? Are they really buying more online than women? In the omnichannel/no-channel era, this would be useful to know.
This report does show how profoundly mobile has driven online shopping, and gives some clues about how to fashion mobile browsers vs apps.
“This multi-device, cross-channel behavior goes beyond the actions of what has traditionally defined online shopping — visiting a product page on a retailer’s website, adding an item to the cart and starting the checkout process, for example, the action of buying something,” Jim Davidson, head of research for Bronto Software, told Forbes.