Consumers Increasingly Turn to Mobile Retail Websites As They Shop to Find Products, Special Offers and Competitive Prices

Mobile retail websites have emerged as an indispensible in-store tool for consumers as they shop, according to a new survey conducted by Hipcricket, an Augme Technologies, Inc. company (OTCBB: AUGT). The fourth annual Hipcricket Mobile Marketing Survey revealed that consumers”particularly smartphone owners”are turning to mobile retail sites as a critical tool for locating the products they want, searching for coupons and special discounts, and comparing prices at competitors' stores.

Sixty-three percent of smartphone users have visited a retailer's website from their mobile device”up from 53 percent in 2010”and 41 percent have done so while in the retail store. Of interest, 50 percent have checked a competitor's mobile website while in another store.

While mobile retail sites have historically served as "brochures," lightweight versions of retailers' full websites that provide limited information such as store locations, directions and hours, today's mobile-specific retail sites are now providing more significant benefits to consumers as they move along their path-to-purchase.

The survey found that smartphone owners are visiting mobile retail sites to:

Research prices (46 percent);
Search for coupons and offers (36 percent);
Research products (28 percent); and
Purchase products (13 percent)

In general, consumers are finding more value in the mobile Web. Seventy percent of all smartphone users regularly use their phone to access the mobile Web, second only to SMS/texting among media usage on mobile devices.

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