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Report: 45 Percent Made Retail Purchase After Seeing Mobile Ads

Findings suggest optimal times to target mobile shoppers.

Greg Sterling on September 18, 2014 at 1:58 pm

Mobile advertising platform NinthDecimal released its Q2 “audience insights” report. The findings are focused on retail and contain a number of useful insights for marketers.

The data in the report reflect that smartphones are increasingly being used to research retail purchases. That’s no surprise. However NinthDecimal also found that research on tablets had declined year over year, which is surprising.

The company attributed this decline to increasing consumer comfort with shopping on smartphones — also larger screen sizes is probably having an impact on smartphone usage for shopping (Apple Pay will also favorably impact smartphone shopping).

Another unsurprising but useful finding is that consumers tend to conduct shopping-related research before “heading out” rather than while in stores, although there is a fair amount of in-store usage.

As you also might expect the length of time that consumers spend researching products before buying is directly correlated with cost. Products under $50 on average saw 10 days or less of research, while products above $1,000 saw an average of 45 days of research lead time before purchase, according to NinthDecimal.

There was widespread use of multiple platforms, sites and resources in the consumer shopping journey. Retail stores, smartphones, tablets and PCs/laptops all saw heavy usage/visits. Interestingly the favored channel or device appeared to have an impact on where the product was ultimately purchased.

In other words, those who started their research in stores ultimately favored offline retail locations as the point of sale.

NinthDecimal data also showed that within the last month roughly 45 percent of consumers reported making a retail purchase as a result of seeing a mobile ad. While we don’t know what other influences and media might have impacted these purchases, this is a significant finding.

In parallel with the consumer shopping-research pattern cited above, the best time to serve retail-related mobile ads was before a shopping trip (e.g., at home). Nearly three-quarters of survey respondents said they were more likely to engage with a retail-related ad before they went shopping.

The types of ad content most likely to influence mobile users, in order, were: product discounts/sales, reviews, product information, giveaways and store-location information. In stores smartphone users are most interested in coupons and sales (see indoor location/marketing).

Another impressive finding was the fact that consumers exposed to retail-related mobile ads “visited stores 65 percent more” than a control group not exposed to the ads.

About The Author

Greg Sterling

Greg Sterling is a Contributing Editor at Search Engine Land. He writes a personal blog, Screenwerk, about connecting the dots between digital media and real-world consumer behavior. He is also VP of Strategy and Insights for the Local Search Association. Follow him on Twitter or find him at Google+.