Shopping habit shift: Global data reveals that fashion shoppers now spend more via their phones than their computers

Nosto’s findings are based on an analysis of the first comprehensive analysis of shopper behavior in growth-stage fashion ecommerce for 2019 based on an analysis of 1.2 billion site visits for the 12 months of 2018. : 95% of the stores in the sample generate online sales between $500k and $30m, a minimum of 1k monthly site visits and a minimum of 300 orders a month. Merchants with a similar sales profile were selected to get a good sample of what is happening with this sector.

However, this revelation sets retailers new challenges. Along with website over-hauls that we have seen many jewellery retailers undertake recently in a bid to not only bring their image up to trend, but also to update responsiveness; creating an easier, more enjoyable shopping experience. The importance of these practices is made even more poignant by the second finding of the study: that each visitor will spend roughly 30% less time on a site when they come via mobile- On average fashion shoppers browse for 164 seconds when they visit a

site on mobile - and 239 seconds on desktopWith the waining attention span of contemporary shoppers, retailers now face the trial of making their mobile sites slick enough for potential customers to navigate quickly, to ensure maximum sales in the now shorter window of time. 

More trials are that consumers are less likely to make a purchase on mobile, with the conversion rate averaging 1.32% on smartphone (compared with 2.4% on desktop). The average order value (AOV) is also lower on mobile at $103 compared with $120 on desktop. 

So what does this mean for your business? Jeff Lofgren, CEO of Nosto, whose fashion retail customers include Gymshark, Agent Provocateur, Everlast, Helly Hansen and Volcom, gives some advice:

“Mobile visitors continue to take less time on site, are spending less per visit and are less likely to make a purchase. How do you maximise the precious seconds mobile visitors give you? Part of the solution is about ensuring a mobile optimised website with fast page speeds and easy to view images and content. But the reality is that with a small mobile screen you have less on-page real estate to work with as well as having less time to woo the customer.”

This means personalising the experience based on the shopper’s online behaviour becomes incredibly important in fashion ecommerce according to Lofgren:

“Using artificial intelligence and machine learning to drive personalisation, you can maximize the space on a mobile screen by automatically showing shoppers the most relevant selection of products and complimentary items, including their preferred brands and styles - all in real-time. You can even instantly change the layout of the page and ensure shoppers are seeing the most appropriate images, offers and related content - such as blogs about fashion trends that might interest them. This will be the biggest driver for increasing both mobile sales and order values in fashion, as well as encouraging shoppers to spend longer on your site and to stop by again,”