Consumers turned to mobile devices more than ever before on the year’s biggest retail weekend, with mobile traffic accounting for more than half of all online traffic this past Saturday and Sunday.
In addition, Cyber Monday mobile traffic accounted for 41.2 percent of all online traffic, up 30.1 percent over 2013 according to data from IBM’s Digital Analytics Benchmark app. Mobile sales were also strong, reaching 22 percent of total Cyber Monday online sales, an increase of 27.6 percent year-over-year, and overall online sales grew 8.5 percent compared to 2013, with mobile sales up 27.6 percent year-over-year.
During “Cyber Week” (spanning from Thanksgiving through Cyber Monday) IBM Digital Analytics
Benchmark found that overall online sales increased 12.6 percent, with mobile sales up 27.2 percent compared to last year. The data showed that Apple iOS devices continued to lead in mobile shopping with traffic more than twice–and sales nearly four times–that of Android devices during Cyber Week.
“For the first time mobile devices drove more than half of Thanksgiving online traffic, a trend that continued throughout Cyber Week,” said Jay Henderson, Director, IBM Smarter Commerce. “As the holiday shopping season becomes less concentrated on a single day, retailers and marketers took advantage by making it easier for consumers to find the best deals on the go, whenever and wherever they chose to shop.”
Data from retail personalization technology provider Monetate showed that ecommerce traffic spiked 10.33 percent over 2013 to 30,518,366 sessions, with mobile driving this spike as smartphone traffic increased 51.90 percent year-over-year, and smartphone revenue increased 49.10 percent YoY.
“The Black Friday hangover impacted retailers in a very positive way, as there were significant
spikes in traffic, revenue and conversions on the Saturday after Thanksgiving. Mobile continues to drive this trend, as it appears that shoppers browsing on Black Friday decided to make purchases via smartphones and tablets on Saturday as many deals and specials continued online,” says Monetate ceo Lucinda Duncalfe.
Data from Demandware, which supports websites for more than 900 for retailers globally, monitored US site traffic and transactions during the peak shopping days – last Wednesday, Thursday and Friday. Demandware found that Thanksgiving Eve (Wednesday) is emerging as a big shopping day, as 2014 site visits were up 18 percent and the number of orders was up 28 percent over last year.
In addition, 11 a.m. (local time) on Black Friday was peak shopping time, and smartphones were device of choice on Thanksgiving, with mobile visit share reaching its highest traffic peak (42 percent) at 5 p.m. local time on Thanksgiving at 5pm, with a peak in orders at 9 p.m. local time. Demandware data showed that smartphones alone accounted for 36 percent of traffic, up 29 percent year-over-year, and seven percent higher than the same days last week.
More on Cyber Weekend
Take a look at these stories from our colleagues at Multichannel Merchant for more details on Cyber Week:
What We Learned From Cyber Weekend 2014
Network
