Search engine marketing is the driving force behind every e-commerce company, and analyzing and adapting to the latest trends is crucial if you want to stay on top of your game. From the shift in mobile marketing to the tourism industry and everything in between, the statistics from March told us an interesting tale, and we picked the very best to share with you.

 

Here are 3 stats from March 2016 that e-commerce companies absolutely need to know about:

 

Buyers are using mobile to shop more

 

According to the statistics, 73% of online buyers use mobile to shop online. We already knew how popular mobile was for customers, but what this number shows is that it is becoming more and more prevalent amongst buyers as time goes by. Making your content, stores, and shopping carts more mobile-accessible is a must. As opposed to online shopping, only 21% were using their mobile phones in stores.

 

Mobile ad spend has overtaken desktop

 

The time has finally come: there is now more mobile ad spend than desktop spend. This comes after a long period of domination for the latter. More than 50% of the annualised 7.8 billion dollar ad spend was spent on mobile ads. Some takeaways from the month include:

 

  • Social is dominating the market with 71% of spend
  • 60% of display conversions happened on a smartphone
  • Smartphone clicks and spend rose 13% and 11% respectively

 

App installs are up 196%!

 

An increase in the spend on mobile app ads has led to an explosion in installations. The numbers from March indicated that total installs had increased 196%. The spend increased 155% on ads and the cost per install decreased 14%. This clearly shows the power of well-placed mobile app advertisements. The shift toward in-app advertising dominance has only just begun.

 

Each year, new and exciting statistics come out about in the industry which show new trends, new behaviours, and ultimately new revenue streams for e-commerce companies. These 3 stats are not only eye-popping; they are extremely important to companies that do business online.