42% of US mobile users have clicked an ad on the mobile web

Print

Posted 02 August 2012 11:11am by David Moth with 1 comment

• Tweet

• Tweet

Android shopping apps provide greater user satisfaction than iPad apps, and almost half of mobile users have clicked an ad on a mobile site.

These are two of the more surprising findings from Adobe's Mobile Consumer Survey 2012, which surveyed more than 1,200 US mobile users in March.

It found that Android devices lead the way in overall popularity at 51% followed by iPhones at 38%. 

The numbers for Android devices are skewed even higher for the young age group at 58%, showing that marketers must ensure that their sites are equally optimised for apps and web browsers via Android devices as they are for iOS devices.

Here are a few more findings from the Adobe report.

Shopping for consumer products

When shopping for consumer products on mobile, Android users proved to be more satisfied with the experience than iOS users.

88% of consumers who shop using mobile apps on Android tablets report the highest levels of satisfaction compared to 71% of iPad users. Similarly satisfaction among Android smartphone users is 69% versus 66% on iPhone.

However the reverse is true when looking at the mobile web - iPad users reported the highest satisfaction levels at 75%, followed by Amazon Kindle at 73%, iPhone at 66%, Android tablet at 66% and Android smartphone at 60%.

The report also highlights the importance of designing a quick and easy checkout process for mobile shoppers.

An 'easy checkout process' was found to be the second most helpful criteria when purchasing on a mobile device behind 'product information and price.'

We have previously blogged about mobile checkout best practice and reviewed the top 20 online retailers. Above all else mobile shoppers want simplicity and speed, so checkout processes need to be a frictionless as possible.

The Adobe report also asked what visual features would increase the respondent's likelihood to make a purchase. Product comparisons were deemed to be the most valuable feature, followed by a 360 degree view.

Mobile advertising

The report found that 42% of respondents had clicked through ads on mobile sites while 37% had clicked ads in mobile apps.

Consumers also reported that a majority of advertisers provide mobile optimised experiences when they click through ads on both mobile websites (73%) and mobile apps (77%), suggesting that optimisation of mobile ad content appears to be prevalent.

Optimising landing pages and websites is vital if brands want to convert users who click through mobile ads.

We recently looked at mobile search and PPC in the finance industry and found that many companies direct users to desktop sites, meaning their investment in mobile search ads is wasted.

Furthermore, as the mobile display industry is still relatively new there are huge opportunities for marketers.

In a talk at Econsultancy's Future of Digital Marketing event, addictive founder Simon Andrews said companies that are buying display on desktop should be doing the same on mobile. 

There is a great deal of inventory but low demand so costs tend to be lower.

"The average cost for mobile is around 70cents, whereas desktop will cost more than $3. You should be trialling campaigns and learning from it, as if you're not then someone else is."