Mobile
commerce is likely to overtake e-commerce in the next few years,
spurred by the continued uptrend in online shopping and increasing use
of mobile apps, says an industry report.
“It
is estimated that the mobile app download would grow six-fold by the
end of this year to 9 billion apps,” said a KPMG report, adding the
country has been the fastest growing mobile app market in both 2014 and
2013.
India contributed to 7% of the global app downloads, ranking fourth behind Indonesia, China and the US, the report said.
The
optimism comes from the fact that people accessing the Internet through
their mobiles had jumped 33% in 2014 to 173 million and is expected to
grow 21% year-on-year till 2019 to touch 457 million.
The report also said that among the entire app usage, shopping tops, with mobile commerce likely to overtake e-commerce.
“With
online shopping platforms seeing an impressive growth in the number of
transactions executed through mobile apps, it is not surprising that
major e-commerce portals are contemplating discontinuing their
full-version websites altogether, to focus solely on the mobile
platform,” it said.
Mobile apps are particularly seen as a significant new avenue to target consumers.
The
report said that with several such avenues opening up, marketers,
content creators and advertisers are expected to continue working
towards new and more innovative ways to reach out to their target
audience.
The
report indicated that in keeping with the trend of increasing mobile
app usage, there has also been a considerable cut in the usage of
on-deck services that can be directly accessed through the handset
screen offered by the telecom operator portals.
However,
despite growth in the number of apps developed and downloaded,
companies are finding it difficult to encourage users to switch to paid
versions.
This
has been a critical challenge, said the report. “As much as 90% of the
apps downloaded in the country are free,” noted the report, adding
nearly 98% of Google Play’s global revenue from apps and games is coming
from the ‘freemium’ apps.
These apps allow free access for limited services or a ‘lite’ version of the app.
Users are expected to pay for additional services or a premium version.
Posted by : Gizmeon
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