Mobile Apps in Retail: an Infographic

Thanks to Baynote, Flurry, and GetElastic, we’d like to share a new infographic tracking the efficacy of retail apps for mobile. It’s important to note that consumers spent 132% more time overall using various mobile apps compared with last year’s figures—this is a growing trend, well worthy of our continued attention. Let’s take a look at some notable conclusions:

By type, time spent on mobile apps breaks down as follows:
•    Social: 387%
•    Media & Entertainment: 268%
•    Shopping: 247%
•    Productivity: 237%
•    Utilities: 206%
•    Travel: 198%
•    Gaming: 107%

The extreme growth in the Social and Media & Entertainment categories points toward rapidly expanding possibilities both in terms of advertising and social-media-native retail extensions. And, of course, shopping apps themselves are right behind in 3rd place.

Year-over-year, retailers experienced a solid jump in time spent per shopping category, compared with general stagnation or decline across other aspects. Between 2011 and 2012:

•    Retailers jumped from 15% to 27% of users’ time allotment
•    Online marketplaces fell from 25% to 20%
•    Purchase assistants fell from 18% to 17%
•    Price comparisons remained the same at 14%
•    Daily deals fell from 20% to 13%

Ultimately, the status quo is embracing design-friendly, attractive mobile apps that better appeal to users’ needs and sensibilities. Still, we must remember that mobile technology as a field is still barely out of its infancy. Further efforts must be made to convert mobile users to retailers’ apps from third-party platforms.