eTail: Mobile Strategy Panel

by August 16, 2012

At the eTail East Conference, the Developing A Holistic Mobile Strategy panel featuring Alaska Airlines, StubHub, Etsy, and Mobify talked about the mobile growth they are experiencing and how their companies are reacting as a result. Here's my notes from the panel:

  • Alaska Airlines: has grown much faster on mobile than assumed. Mobile has doubled even in just the past few months. iPhone engagement and usage is off the charts compared to Web. Purchases being made on phones are often last minute (48 hours before). Purchases are growing the fastest on mobile. Alaska Airlines approaches mobile with a deep sense of humility. It’s like ecommerce 10 years ago. Measure, track, and learn as you go.
  • Engagement rate on iPhone app for Etsy is tremendous but mobile Web is great for reaching new audiences. iPad beats the desktop Web in all core measures. iPad use is like a water table rising -many companies don’t see that change until it’s to late. Sellers on Etsy don’t run their business on the desktop.
  • Same average size of orders on iPhone and iPad as desktop on Stubhub. Android users spend less, even though there are more of them. Stubhub sellers want to access all features on all screens. –this is a large challenge.
  • It’s rare you can see any metric in your business double over a few months but that’s what is happening on mobile.
  • Your brand and experience needs to be where people are.
  • While you are tackling the harder things (iPhone/iPad apps), there are simple things you can do right now to reach people on mobile (SMS).
  • There are huge challenges in scaling across desktop, mobile, and tablets. Especially when you build native applications in addition to Web.
  • Put touch target considerations into your designs today because mobile and tablet adoption is only going to grow.