Survey: 25% Do In-Store Price Comparisons on Phone

Tue, 08/17/2010 - 06:44 by Greg Sterling

A survey of 3,600 US mobile consumers by Sterling Commerce found that 15% of mobile users have made purchases on their phones.This number is broadly consistent with other studies and surveys (see links below) for the US market.

In this survey population slightly less than 50% of respondents reportedly owned smartphones, whereas the number is 23% to 25% in the overall US mobile population. So the results can't be directly extrapolated to the population of mobile users. 

More findings (nearly verbatim):

  • 60%+ [of respondents] believe being able to verify product availability (on mobile device) at a particular store location is important to very important.
  • Nearly 25% use their phone while in a store to competitively price shop an item.
  • 20% of consumers currently use their phones to create shopping lists or baskets . . .
  • Two thirds are interested in using their mobile phone to scan and purchase items, thus enabling them to bypass checkout lines.
  • 25% of [respondents] believe that receiving specials/promotions (such as coupons) would be an important use for their mobile phone when shopping, although they were less enthusiastic about receiving advertising via their phones.
  • The survey also highlighted mobile shopping frustrations (small screen, keypad, slow speeds) and m-commerce concerns around security (for 28% of respondents).

A striking datapoint above is that 60% want store inventory information; while "only" 25% want offers or coupons while shopping. An equal percentage said they performed in-store price comparisons. As barcode scanning becomes more commonplace and easier to use, this latter figure will go way up. 

Separately, Insight Express recently found that 82% of survey respondents used their mobile phones while shopping in stores.  

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