Mobile e-commerce is e-commerce conducted using wireless terminals such as mobile phones and PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants). With the advancement of the times and technology, people’s demand for mobility and information has risen rapidly, and mobile Internet has penetrated into all areas of people’s lives and work. Compared with traditional e-commerce, the biggest feature of mobile e-commerce is that it is available anytime, anywhere and personalized. At the same time, from the perspective of the popularity of computers and mobile phones, mobile phones have far surpassed computers.
Reasons for the rapid development of mobile e-commerce
At present, mobile e-commerce has developed rapidly around the world. The reasons are as follows.
1. Increase in mobile devices
By 2017, the number of mobile phone users worldwide reached 2.6 billion, and mobile shopping has changed from a function to the preferred way of consumption in a very short period of time. Consumers use mobile phones to visit e-commerce websites more frequently than any other device, making mobile shopping the primary focus of retailers.
2. Reduced resistance
The difficulties that previously seriously hindered the development of mobile e-commerce are being solved one by one, especially in terms of payment methods and identity authentication. All e-commerce giants are focusing on solving this problem.
3. APP and mobile network optimization
At present, the continuous improvement of smartphone performance and the continuous maturity of technology have enabled many retailers to meet consumers’ diverse consumption experiences through APP and mobile browsers, which has benefited consumers a lot.
4. Distributed commerce
Retailers have turned their attention to interacting with consumers through popular and distributed channels, such as social media, messaging, browsers and online shopping platforms. Mobile devices not only serve as a medium for shoppers to participate, but also help shoppers complete transactions with brands. It doesn’t matter where shoppers find these brands.
Cross-border mobile e-commerce has developed rapidly. For example, in 2017, the “Double 11” full-day transactions on the AliExpress platform covered more than 230 countries and regions around the world, and wireless orders accounted for more than 62.3%. In 2017, Amazon had 42 million unique visitors per month on PC in the United States and 126 million unique visitors per month on mobile terminals in the United States, and mobile traffic accounted for 75% of the total. The famous mobile cross-border e-commerce platform Wish only allows buyers to purchase through the mobile APP, not through the PC. It is foreseeable that more and more online shopping behaviors will shift from the PC to mobile devices (especially smartphones and tablets).