Phone Phears

According to IDC, smartphone sales will jump roughly 50% to 450 million units in 2011, up from 303.4 million in 2010. Those sort of numbers scream for mobile sales growth, and according to Forrester Research, consumer purchasing on mobile phones will grow 39% a year from 2011 through 2016, from roughly $6 billion in 2011 to $31 billion in 2016. But all those dollars account for only 2% of online retail sales in 2011 and will rise to only 7% in 2016. So far, only 13% ever bought anything except digital products like ringtones on a mobile phone.

That's good, but not jump on your desk and do a happy dance good. Pity. The industry just started pushing those fancy square barcodes -- Quick Response Codes -- just so smartphones can scan and tune into websites.

The lag stems in part from customers often using smartphones to check on items and pricing, then turning to more traditional retail and web shopping for the actual purchase. However, two major barriers exist in consumers' minds that inhibit mobile phone purchases: fear of not keeping the mobile phone numbers private (45%) and fear that mobile sites lacked security (44%).

From the retailers' perspective, it's not easy figuring out which technology to back. Web sites? OK, that's easy -- a must. But which of the scores of tablets? Apple? Probably. The rest? Crapshoot. Now along comes smartphones. iPhone? Android-based? Other? One app should do for all phones using that operating system, but considering how something as 'stable' as the Microsoft Windows platform often causes crashes between programs, what are the odds that apps will do the same? IDC noted that Android would grab 40% market share by end 2011

Any indecision has plenty of company. According to Forrester: 29% of the retailers surveyed have implemented a mobile strategy that they are now refining, 19% have a strategy that they are beginning to implement, 9% have a strategy, 34% are in the early stages of developing a strategy, and 9% have no strategy.

Indeed, the report noted that the most compelling app for retail is to help store employees find items in the store for customers, and if not, order them to save the sale.

Other Retail Bulletin articles:

Mobile Is As Mobile Does
Smartphones As Virtual Wallets
Smart Retailing With Smartphones
Barcodes Squared