UK consumers lead the way with m-commerce use

Friday, November 18, 2016 - 10:29 by Paul Tissington

A study from Ve Interactive has dug down into the popularity of smartphones and safe shopping online on both sides of the Atlantic, concluding that Brits are far more engaged with m-commerce than those in America, according to The Drum.

Browsing data from thousands of websites was assessed to draw firm conclusions about the state of play at the moment, with 58.7 per cent of all web-based purchases made in the UK originating from mobile devices.

By comparison the dominance of desktop browsing and shopping is still in effect stateside, where 54.6 per cent of sales are made from PCs and laptops.

Analysts have pointed out that one of the reasons that the UK is forging ahead while the US seems more reluctant to embrace m-commerce is that smartphone use is much higher in the former than the latter.

The rise of safe shopping online from mobile platforms really kicked off in Britain from 2012 onwards, but it took another two years for Americans to catch onto the trend and accelerate sales growth.

The UK has a higher level of internet penetration than the US, as it is ranked 15th in the world for this factor, with close to 90 per cent of people being regular web users. This has made consumers far more comfortable with the concept of making purchases using smartphones and tablets, since they are innately more familiar with all that the digital realm has to offer.

For some people, mobile devices are the best way to research products while desktop computers are their preferred platform for actually committing to purchases. For others, every online interaction in their lives is conducted solely through a smartphone, with everything from shopping to social media and communications handled on a portable device.