The Couch Potato Path-to-Purchase
The Use of Mobile from the Comfort of Home
9pm. The kids are asleep. The dishes are done. The coffee is made for tomorrow. After a day that began with a sick cat, a needy significant other and a pouty 5 year old, it is finally magic hour. It’s the one time of day when you can just be “you,” the one time when you can just lie there and let it all hang out. What time is it? It’s couch time.
Though not all of us can relate to the sick cat, the needy significant other or the pouty 5 year old, “couch time” is a fairly universal and dare I say, sacred time for people around the globe. In the past, it may have involved kicking back with a good book or magazine; in more recent times, perhaps a movie or popular television show.
Today? According to Nielsen, 85% of tablet/smartphone owners use their device while on the couch, watching television at least once a month with 40% of them doing it daily. (1)
The State of Mobile: You Say You Want a Revolution?
While desktop search has been at the center of the consumer journey in years past, the mobile revolution has begun to shake things up a bit. A recent eMarketer article states, “desktop is finding a long-term home as a piece—but no longer the center—of the consumer journey.” (2)
This consumer journey, this “path-to-purchase” is taking place across devices, especially mobile ones.
2013 Black Friday and Cyber Monday boasted record-breaking mobile sales and traffic, claiming 40% of all online Black Friday purchases and one-third of all online Cyber Monday purchases. (3) Just for a point of reference, in 2010, only 4% of all online purchases were mobile.
You Don’t Get a Second Chance to Make a First Impression…
More and more often, people are using mobile devices as their initial touch-point, especially while hanging out on their couch researching a product they may have just seen on television. Why? Because it’s convenient. Leroy Supith of Stragiare Internet Marketing recently commented to Readz about his couch-time conduct of convenience:
“At home I only use my mobile for product research when I’m sitting on my couch and see a interesting commercial about something. In that case, it’s faster for me to grab my phone and look it up instead of using my laptop.”
Supith is not alone, according to a recent report from Nielsen, “Smartphones and tablets are most often used as shopping devices from consumers’ homes.” (4) Consumers are seizing the moment through the convenience of mobile.
Over the River and Through the Sales Funnel, Down the Path-to-Purchase We Go!
By paving the path-to-purchase with mobile, our journey from cognizance to commitment can be made on-the-go, in real-time or, entirely from the comfort of our couch. Studies are showing that even with the success stories that are part of the boom of geo targeting, the vast majority of us are using our tablets and smartphones while assuming the couch potato position.
As illustrated above, an overwhelming majority of us are making mobile purchases from home, as opposed to in-store, on a commute or other location. As the study conducted by Nielsen reports,
“Even though smartphones and tablets are made to be mobile, some mobile shoppers never leave the couch while they’re shopping, as 95 percent of tablet shoppers and 72 percent of smartphone shoppers who make a purchase with their device do so at home” (1)
“Oh, What a Plethora of Eyes You Have, Mr. Potato!” “The Better to SEIZE You with, My Dear!”
Knowing that consumers are mostly “seizing the moment” from a position of comfort and via their mobile device, it is vital that we, as marketers, “seize the moment” as well. How?
Twitter CFO, Adam Bain, recently spoke on the phenomenon that we, as marketers, need to be “owning the moment.” All too often, brands think a smaller screen means a smaller ad when, instead, it is in need of a far bigger ad in concept, personality and personalization. (5)
It really comes down to one of the most basic principles: know your audience. Know their problems, their needs, their habits and where they like to hang out. Apparently, for many of them, it is right there on the couch.
