Mar 2010 – Mobile Retailing
Strategy – Mobile Numbers
In the final days of 2009, eBay announced the ‘dawn of the m-commerce era,’ after a year in which items bought via mobile phone from the online auction site included a $19,000, 23ft boat, a $10,000 Boston grand piano, and a $495,000 1965 Shelby Cobra. Chloe Rigby checks out the mobile figures.
EBAY’S ANNOUNCEMENT is some of the first real evidence of the major headway made in mobile commerce. It’s a revolution in shopping habits that’s been forecast for years but until now has never quite come about. And the effect has been to lay down a challenge that all retailers must now address – or risk being left behind. For, says eBay marketplaces president Lorrie Norrington, “Consumers want to shop for what they want, when they want and where they want, and that’s not necessarily when they’re sitting in front of a computer or even walking through a store.” eBayers in more than 165 countries buy by mobile every two seconds, according to the site’s own figures.
