Five things to know about online grocery shopping
From nielsenwire blog & mashable
Consumers love online grocery shopping, but it takes time getting used to. You can simply the process by improving the online experience with navigation, search, online help and porting over shopping lists. Deliver a better time-saving experience and consumers will hang on.
Online baskets are different than offline baskets. The average transaction size is much larger for food and beverages ($80 online / $30 offline) and health and beauty purchase ($30 online / $10 offline). And online shopping offers a greater mix of pack sizes and categories.
Consumer perceptions and purchase behaviors are affected in important ways. The interactions with the online ‘store’ environment are fundamentally different than an in-store experience. The online experience is fueled by a needs-driven experience as a greater variety of options are made available on screen.
Online shopping “levels the playing field”. Big brand ‘physical’ advantages do not translate online. With universal distribution and search functionality an inherent bias toward niche players is created. Ultimately, price transparency, connectivity and open content favor a purely ‘rational’ market.
Large and small brands can win online by combining marketing savvy with digital capabilities to add value. With interactive websites, smartphone applications and social media connections, expanding your brands in new and innovative directions is virtually limitless.
Mobile commerce trend
Mobile pur chas es are on the rise: 47% of smart phone own ers and 56% of tablet own ers plan to pur chase more prod ucts on their respec tive devices in the future. Rough ly half of smart phone and tablet users believe there are ben e fits to shop ping on a mobile device, a num ber that would like ly be high er if users found mobile apps and web sites eas i er to use (see last bul let).
Device dic tates behav ior: One-third of smart phone own ers use their devices to make mobile pur chas es, while less than 10% of fea ture phone own ers make pur chas es with theirs.
Vir tu al wal lets are catch ing on: A full 20% of smart phone own ers have used their devices as a vir tu al wal let (we sus pect many of these have done so with the Star bucks app) and 28% expect to do so more in the future. A quar ter of tablet own ers — con sis tent ly the most will ing to exper i ment with new tech nolo gies — have used their tablets as a vir tu al wal let in stores; 39% plan to do so more in the future.
Mobile coupons and bar codes are catch ing on more quick ly: Although vir tu al wal lets usage is increas ing, more smart phone and tablet own ers expect to increase their use of mobile devices to look up more infor ma tion about a prod uct (between 55% and 57%) or use a coupon (between 53% and 54%). Near ly half of smart phone and tablet own ers also said they planned to scan bar codes more often to get addi tion al infor ma tion about a prod uct, sug gest ing that bar code scan ning might indeed be poised to hit the main stream in the next few years.
Data secu ri ty and user expe ri ence are the two biggest bar ri ers: Wor ries about the secu ri ty of their per son al and finan cial details might be pre vent ing many from embrac ing m-com merce fully. More than 60% of both of smart phone and tablet own ers said they believe it is not safe to share those details on their mobile devices, under lin ing a need for edu ca tion about secu ri ty issues. Fur ther more, 54% of smart phone users and 61% of tablet users said they find mobile appli ca tions and web sites inef fec tive and dif fi cult to use, fur ther dis cour ag ing pur chas ing on those devices.
