With the arrival of November comes the arrival of aggressive holiday marketing across every available channel and platform.
With online holiday shopping becoming more prevalent and profitable with each passing year, it comes as no surprise that this growth accompanies augmented retail spending on mobile marketing and more savvy social media marketing.
By all accounts, online and mobile shopping will have a banner holiday season in 2014.
In a recent study conducted by the National Retail Federation, 56% of shoppers admitted that they plan to buy at least one holiday gift online in 2014, which is an increase of 51% percent over last year.
Bolstering these numbers, without question, is the fact that consumers in general plan to spend more this year than they did in 2013.
The NRF’s Holiday Consumer Spending Survey indicated that the average person celebrating Christmas, Kwanzaa or Hanukkah will spend $804.42 in the next two months (vs. the $767.27. spent by the average consumer during the 2013 holiday shopping season).
“If it wasn’t official last year, it will be this year – holiday shoppers are eager to shop online for their gifts and other needs,” says the NRF. “The average person plans to do 44.4 percent of their shopping online, the most since NRF first asked in 2006.”
It goes without saying that more consumers than ever will be in place this holiday season to react — and quickly — with their credit cards to a mobile message, email, or ad should the underlying promoted product be relevant and desirable to their known tastes or purchase history.
“As mobile grows in use and scope, consumers this holiday season will turn to their on-the-go devices for a plethora of reasons,” the NRF says, noting that the survey found the majority of smartphone owners (55.7%) will use their device in some fashion, up from 53.8 percent last year. Specifically, 35.8 percent will research products/prices, the highest amount in the four years NRF has been asking. Nearly one-quarter (23.9%) will redeem coupons and 19.1 percent will actually purchase items – another survey high, the data shows.
Not surprisingly, almost two-thirds (63.2%) of tablet owners will use their device to research and purchase holiday items. Nearly half (47.4%) will research products and one-third (33%) will purchase items.