The average order value for a consumer using a tablet to shop is $132, 37.5% higher than the average order value for a consumer using a smartphone to shop, $96, according to the monthly Shopgate Mobile Commerce Index. The average order value for shoppers using Apple Inc. iOS mobile devices (iPhone, iPad, iPad Mini, iPod Touch) is $115, 15% greater than the average order value for shoppers using mobile devices running Google Inc.’s Android, $100, the Shopgate index finds. And the average order value for men shopping on mobile devices is $120, 25% higher than $96 for women.
Thus, the most valuable shopper in mobile commerce is a man using an iPad, according to the Shopgate Mobile Commerce Index. The index looks monthly at mobile commerce platform provider Shopgate Inc.’s 5,500 retailer clients worldwide. Shopgate builds m-commerce sites for smartphones, tablet-optimized shopping sites, and smartphone and tablet m-commerce apps, and is measuring m-commerce activity at its thousands of clients exclusively for Internet Retailer.
“Tablet shoppers are more valuable because the tablet is replacing the traditional PC: Instead of going home and booting up a PC in their home offices or spare rooms, consumers increasingly are using tablets while watching TV,” says Wladimir Baranoff-Rossine, chief operating officer and chief marketing officer at Shopgate. “Although shopping on smartphones also is soaring, the screen size on a tablet is much larger and thus more convenient. Consumers with both smartphones and tablets tend to research using their smartphones but make purchases on their tablets.”
Click here to view complete results in chart form of this month’s Shopgate Mobile Commerce Index.
By comparison, the average average order value (e-commerce and m-commerce combined, with e-commerce dominating) for all the merchants in the 2014 Internet Retailer Top 500 Guide is $204.
The Shopgate mobile index this month focuses solely on average order value. It breaks down average order value by product category. Following are product categories and the mobile average order value for the categories, according to Shopgate’s findings:
- Computer/TV/Multimedia, $212.
- Books, Music & Games, $198.
- Home & Furniture, $148.
- Office Supplies, $142.
- Jewelry, $113.
- Apparel & Accessories, $93.
- Pet Supplies, $77.
- Health & Beauty, $72.
- Baby, Kids & Toys, $72.
- Groceries, $68.
- Flowers & Gifts, $41.
“The Computer/TV/Multimedia category has always been high due to the high prices of those products,” Baranoff-Rossine says. “Books, music and games have always been very successful in mobile commerce because consumers do not need to try the products on. As for office supplies, these products have sold particularly well via mobile because mobile devices have made re-ordering such products especially easy. Office managers can easily scan bar codes on ink cartridges, for example, to re-order the product.”
Shopgate’s retail clients’ annual total web sales range from $100,000 to $800 million. Clients include: Gameday Merchandising, a U.S. firm that manages online stores for National Hockey League and National Basketball League teams; Office World, a Swiss office supplies retailer; and Thomann, a German musical instruments retailer.
Follow Bill Siwicki, managing editor, mobile commerce, at Internet Retailer, at @IRmcommerce.