M-commerce ideal for snap purchases, study finds.

Tuesday, August 16, 2011 - 09:44 by Simon Crisp

Impulse buying is common both online and off, but new research suggests that UK consumers are more comfortable making more expensive purchases on their home PC, while confining spontaneous, cheaper buys to their mobile phone.

A report from OpenMarket and Mobile Squared has found that 36 per cent of UK consumers would be confident in buying products and services up to a value of £10 on their mobile phones.

Around 1000 people took part in the study and two thirds said that they would be more willing to take part in marketing promotions on their mobiles if incentives, such as extra calling credit, were offered by companies.

Almost a fifth said they would pass on details of a promotional offer delivered to their mobiles via a friend, although only 6.5 per cent would be happy for the company to get back in contact with future offers.

One big roadblock identified by the study is that around 54 per cent of respondents would not feel comfortable buying products via m-commerce if they had to give out payment card details on their smartphones.

There are obvious security concerns about broadcasting your details when you are out and about, which is why many prefer to use trusted sites for safe shopping online, as they will already have passed on payment information at a previous point and thus will not need to re-send it when using the m-commerce site.

Sixty-seven per cent of those questioned said that they thought security should be at the top of the agenda for any retailer considering a move into the m-commerce market.

When gender was taken into account, security and safe shopping online were actually more important to women than men by a difference of almost eight per cent, highlighting a clear difference in concern levels amongst consumers.