Reader Forum: 2011 Web performance predictions for the mobile industry

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The past year was a big year for mobile, as network infrastructure expanded and a huge range of devices were released in the market. Now that consumers have their mobile devices in hand, we’re going to find out that their expectations are high as they demand that mobile sites deliver the same functionality and performance they’ve come to expect on their desktops.
1. Companies will generate at least 15% of Web sales via their social presence and mobile applications.
I’ve mentioned this number to a few people and they’ve all looked at me like I’m crazy. But not only do I think this estimate is realistic, it’s even conservative. Here’s why:
According to IDC Retail Insights, mobile shopping “warriors” and “warrior wannabes” (hyper-connected individuals and moderately connected individuals, respectively) will account for $127 billion of the $447 billion predicted to be spent during this holiday season. That’s 28%. Based on these numbers, it’s reasonable to expect that this holiday season will officially break the ice for mobile shopping, and that this consumer behavior will stick in the new year.
It’s also important to note that in Japan, which is just a couple of years ahead on the mobile curve, mobile shopping accounts for 17% of all online shopping. There’s every reason to believe that, as the economy recovers, the United States will quickly catch up.
As for social shopping, I see tremendous growth from group buying sites such as Groupon and LivingSocial. As a form of live social marketing, these are the most widely used online shopping tool – ranking ahead of reviews, retailer emails, price comparison sites, shopping portals and social networks. There are currently more than 500 group buy companies, with new ones being introduced all the time. Groupon, the current leader, is present in more than 100 U.S. cities and 23 countries, and is still in rapid expansion mode. I think we’ve only begun to see the power of group buying and social shopping. 2011 is going to serve up some big surprises.
2. Android will become the No. 1 mobile platform, surpassing the iPhone in terms of units and usage.
Simply put, this is why:
–Symbian is unstable.
–iOS is closed.
–Symbian-powered devices are cheap.
–Apple devices are expensive and occasionally hard to get.
Android is stable, open source, and available – a claim that no other mobile platform can make. This is the winning combination that is going to catapult Android to the No. 1 spot.
Consumers want phones that work. They want their phones to be affordable. And they don’t want to stand in long line-ups to buy them. This is the practical need that savvy smart phone manufacturers are going to address. This is already starting to happen, as manufacturers are beginning to exploit the opportunity to create a wide range of stable, affordable Android-powered devices. According to a Gartner report from August 2010, Samsung Electronics Co. Ltd.’s launch of inexpensive Android devices – followed closely by Sony Ericsson, Motorola Inc. and LG Electronics Co. Ltd. – will push Android into the mass market.
And as more Android devices flood the market, developers will recognize this opportunity to build a diverse range of Android apps. These two activities – manufacturing and development – will fuel each other and drive Android to the top.
3. Retailers will realize that mobile shoppers have a goal-driven “hunter” mentality.
People using their mobile devices are task-driven and on the move. These two factors make them more likely than desktop users to be impatient with sites that don’t deliver what they want quickly and seamlessly.
Gomez proved this with the Retail User Experience (UX) Index they designed to monitor the 2010 holiday shopping season. They found that user satisfaction was consistently high for desktop users of the top 15 websites in its index. But when these same sites were visited by mobile users, they received failing user experience scores.
In the year to come, site owners will realize that having an excellent mobile site is as important as having good customer support on the floor.
4. As a result of No. 3, mobile Web performance will become as important as desktop Web performance.
Online retailers will recognize that they can offer a powerful set of tools to empower in-store mobile shoppers at point of sale – tools such as product reviews, comparison shopping, coupons and other in-store promotions.
The mobile world is like the Web was 10 years ago, when site speed barely registered as a critical usability element. It’s taken until now for speed to get the spotlight. I see mobile following a similar path, but the timeframe will be seriously compressed (i.e. 10 years of progress will take place in about two years).
We tend to improve speed on things we can measure, so the first important step will be measuring and benchmarking mobile Web performance across industries. We are already seeing some movement on measurement, but this remains difficult for a couple of reasons:
–Not enough companies have a true mobile Web presence. Instead, they’re serving the desktop version of their site to mobile browsers. According to a recent Forrester report 57% of companies surveyed either don’t have a mobile strategy or are just beginning to work on one.
–With dozens of mobile browsers in use, each with its own preference for rendering mobile sites, it is incredibly difficult to find a “one size fits all” performance test.
In 2011, we’re going to see more companies launching a true mobile presence and monitoring its performance against key performance indicators like conversion rate and revenue.
When there are a significant number of mobile sites, and when there have been some compelling mobile performance studies, we’ll see the business and development communities rise up and start taking mobile performance seriously. In conjunction with that, we will see the transformation vendors start coming out with specific mobile features.