What is mobile shopping

By Catalogs Editorial Staff

Learning what is mobile shopping and how to do it efficiently ia a time-saver

The Internet has changed our lives in a huge variety of ways since it was first introduced to the American home. While the World Wide Web was once mainly a place to get news, information and emails it has turned into a huge source of commerce.

People are shopping more online than ever before and entire companies, like Amazon and Zappos, have managed to build empires based entirely on using the web to make sell merchandise. If the Internet has changed how we do our shopping, then mobile devices have changed it even more.

Whether or not it is for the better has yet to be seen, but it is a safe bet that retailers have to like the changes that have occurred so far.

So what is mobile shopping? The concept really isn’t that difficult. If online shopping is using a laptop or desktop computer to buy any anything you have your heart set on, then mobile shopping is simply doing the same thing using a mobile device. It’s not surprising that it took no time at all for people to realize that the average smartphone and tablet computer — such as the iPad — were even better ways to get people to buy whatever they wanted quickly and easily.

Once companies understood the massive implications of using an iPhone or an Android device to shop, there was a huge number of companies looking to attract those consumers.

One form of mobile shopping is the old reliable bringing up of a web page on your mobile device’s web browser. Companies all over the globe understand that people tend to make more impulse purchases if they can make those impulse purchases when they are out and about. Having to wait until you get home to look up a product or store means they may not make the purchase at all. Any retailer on the mobile edge has made sure that either their site is easily readable on a mobile device or they actually have a mobile version of their site set up.

The most popular way to carry out any mobile shopping these days is to use an actual mobile shopping application. It seems as if every store, from Target to WalMart has their own mobile application. Using these mobile apps, potential customers are able to browser through the vast library of goods that these stores have more quickly and easily than on the web.

The mobile applications are getting more advanced all the time. If you download a shopping application for your smartphone you can browse the inventory of a bricks and mortar store while basically shopping online at the same time.

Once you have found the item you are interested in at the store you are currently in, you can scan the barcode of that item using the application. The barcode search will bring back the item, as well as its availability and price at a the store owning the app you are using. With the app, you can basically comparison shop and get the best price for whatever you are on the hunt for, with quite a bit more ease than actually typing the item into a browser and opening a dozen windows.

Mobile shopping has actually become so popular these days that companies are finding ways to get involved without actually selling anything. Shopkick is the leader in this category thanks in large part to your mobile device’s GPS system. When you go into a brick and mortar store that is on the Shopkick list you will get points as the app registers you have crossed the threshold. The truly savy mobile shopper will see the opportunity to win Shopkick points (which can be redeemed for prizes such as giftcards) and the Amazon application. Go into a Target, scan an item, then have your Amazon app look it up. Buy the item through your mobile shopping application and you get a cheaper price and the Shopkick points to boot.