Is an iPad a Mobile Device?

By Mike Duffy, Director, Product Design – Product Management & Strategy

Is an iPad a mobile device? Most people I have asked start to give an immediate answer of “Yes” but then they hesitate as they really think about what I am asking. Google (or insert favorite search engine) the question and you will see that there is no consensus on the answer.

Digging deeper you will discover that the answer to the question changes depending upon why it is being asked. The iPad is a device that you can carry with you so it is “mobile” but many companies that support both a mobilized online site as well as a traditional PC site have chosen to serve the PC version and not the mobile version to iPads. A usage report for these sites would probably include iPad traffic in the non mobile category. For this situation the answer to the question is now “no”.

As we define our future online ticketing experience it is critical that we focus on how our customers will be interacting with our systems. We look at customer’s physical location, their device screen size, their device’s interaction capabilities (touch screen, mouse) and their market expectation. A tablet’s screen size is closer to a small laptop but includes a touch screen like most smart phones. Stretching a smartphone interface to fit the larger screen tablet does not make efficient use of the increased screen real estate. In some cases shrinking the traditional PC interface to fit the tablet may make better sense in the short term but doesn’t capitalize on the tactile interaction between the user and the device, or the mobility of the device. Solutions include the creation of a mobile application specifically designed for the tablet interface (see our other blog entries) or the creation of a device specific online interface.

As you can see from the graph below, the iPad and other tablets are changing the definition of “mobile” as their use becomes more prevalent. As the technology continues to evolve we will need to define a more granular device classification system. The real question should be; “How do we optimize our customer’s experience for whichever device they choose to use?”

Planning Your Mobile Image

By Ed Gow, VP Sales & Marketing, Tickets.com


According to the International Association for the Wireless Telecommunications Industry, at the end of 2010 there were 302.9M wireless subscriber connections in the U.S. Considering that the population of the U.S. at that time was 308.7M, the market penetration for wireless devices is simply staggering. Add to that the fact that the percentage of wireless-only U.S. households is climbing at 26.6% and most importantly, the revelation that the sale of smartphones has now eclipsed the sale of PCs.

What does all of this mean for the ticketing industry? Well, simply put, venues, arts organizations, attractions and teams must consider their mobile image when developing marketing plans and sales strategies. Organizations can no longer be satisfied with how their websites look, they must now take into account how the experience translates to a mobile user. Print at home is great, but mobile delivery must be an option …nothing short of an end to end mobile ticketing experience will do the trick.

So do you develop an app or a mobile site? That’s really up to you, but with the number of available apps growing on a daily basis, users are becoming much more selective about what they choose to download.

My two cents? Build a mobile site that can be integrated into an app.

Mobile App vs. Mobile Browser for mCommerce?

By John Rizzi, SVP Product Marketing and Strategy, Tickets.com

The explosion of Smartphone usage and everything mobile is well-documented. Trying to capture a piece of the m-commerce juggernaut can be intimidating and is filled with choices and buzzwords: native app or mobile browser, iOS, Android, Blackberry, and don’t forget all the carriers and their ad-ons. With all the hype, it’s easy to think you’re missing the boat and you have to do something – NOW! While it’s true that mobile commerce is exploding; mobile purchases accounted for only 1% of ecommerce sales in 2010¹. And, even though the growth in m-commerce is exponential, estimates are it will still only make up 7% of e-commerce sales by 2016¹.

So - it’s not too late.

The first decision you need to make regarding your mobile strategy is between a site optimized for a mobile browser or an application written specifically for the Smartphone; such as the iPhone, Android or Blackberry. There are three reasons that make this decision an easy one:

1. Broader reach – mobile browser will work on any phone that has internet – period. No worrying about picking the “right” mobile platform.
2. App saturation – with hundreds of thousands of mobile applications available, there is growing evidence that consumers are becoming overwhelmed by the number of apps on their phones.
3. Faster and cheaper – it’s much easier and less expensive to build and maintain a mobile optimized site than build native apps for one or all of the major mobile platforms

So if you haven’t “gone mobile” yet, I strongly encourage you to consider the mobile browser approach.


¹Forrester Research http://www.internetretailer.com/trends/sales/

Mobile commerce stats round up

Graham Charlton
eConsultancy

Mobile purchasing habits in the US (Compete)

• 37% of US Smartphone users have made a (non-mobile) purchase on their handsets in the last six months.
  
• 19% have purchased music on their phones, 14% have bought books, DVDs or games, while 12% have purchased movie tickets.
  
• The amount that mobile users are willing to spend varies between handsets, with 32% of Android and 29% of iPhone users willing to spend $100 or more from their handsets, compared with 14% of Blackberry users.

Mobile purchasing habits in the US (ATG)

• 27% of all consumers used their mobiles to browse and research products at least four times over a 12 month period. For the 18-34 age group, this figure is 41%.
  
• 20% of all consumers and 32% 0F 18-34 year olds are researching purchases via mobile at least monthly.
  
• 13% of all consumers and 23% of the 18-34 age group make purchases via their mobile four times a year.

Mobile payments (Juniper)

• The market for mobile payments market is expected to quadruple by 2014, reaching $630bn in value, which equates to 5% of total e-commerce sales.
  
• The mobile payments market is worth $170bn so far this year.

Mobile commerce market size (ABI Research)

• The research firm predicts that in 2015, $119bn worth of goods and services will be purchased via a mobile phone.
  
• By ABI Research's count, mobile commerce tripled in the United States in 2009, but still only constituted a $1.2bn market.
  
• In Japan, which has one of the most vibrant mobile markets, mobile commerce exceeded $10bn in 2009.

Mobile internet usage (Essential Research)

• 47% of daily mobile internet users live in urban areas, while 42% of mobile internet users earn over £40,000 a year (household income) compared to 31% of non users.
  
• These daily mobile internet users are also more likely to spend more on their monthly mobile bills, 55% pay over £30 a month, compared to 10% of non users.

Smartphone usage (comScore)

• In the three month period ending in February 2010, 45.4m people in the U.S. owned smartphones, a 21% jump over November 2009.
  
• The fastest gainer in that segment is Google, whose Android platform rose by an impressive 5.2% in only three months.

Mobile Driving Evolution of Airline Business

By Rimma Kats
Mobile Marketer

Many airlines are going mobile to accommodate the growing trend of tech-savvy consumers and are expanding their mobile marketing strategy to retain customer loyalty.

Companies such as Continental Airlines, Alaska Airlines and American Airlines have all integrated mobile. The airlines have used mobile applications and paperless boarding passes to not only sell tickets and give travelers an expedited check-in process, but to also make sure they have all the tools they need while on the go.

“Our customers have shown us that they want to take more control of their travel experience,” said Jared Miller, senior director of customer self-service at Continental Airlines, Houston. “Self check-in, which began at Continental in 1995, now accounts for over 95 percent of all domestic customer check-ins.

“With the growth of smartphone usage and mobile Web adoption, customers are now able to self-serve many aspects of their Continental travel experience, freeing up their time and getting access to real-time information,” he said.

Mobile boarding passes
In March, Alaska Airlines and Horizon Air rolled out three mobile applications for Apple’s iPhone, Research in Motion’s BlackBerry and Microsoft’s Windows Mobile.

Consumers can check their flight status information, flight schedules, flight alerts and check-in one to 24 hours prior to their scheduled departure.

“Mobile is important to us more to retain customer loyalty and give our travel-warrior customers the tools they want most,” said Steve Jarvis, vice president of customer innovation at Alaska Airlines, Seattle.

“Specifically for Alaska, we differentiate ourselves with superior customer service and making travel easier for customers,” he said. “Mobile applications allow us to improve on both of these measures.”

The airline has launched mobile technology at 16 of the airports it serves that lets travelers check-in from a mobile device and use an electronic boarding pass at security to board the plane.

By July, Alaska Airlines plans to have about 50 percent of its airports outfitted with electronic check-in technology including three of its Hawaiian destinations – Maui, Kina and Lihu’e.

“Mobile presents another channel for Alaska Airlines to reach our customers and meet their needs,” Mr. Jarvis said. “Customers can opt-in to receive relevant offers through our mobile club or receive updates on flight changes for the convenience of planning.

“With so many customers traveling without access to a printer, the mobile channel gives customers the ability to stay connected and take advantage of marketing offers and other announcements,” he said.

Mobile expansion
This past year Continental Airlines claimed to be the first carrier to offer mobile boarding passes on nonstop flights from Britain to the United States.

The company provides mobile passes that display a two-dimensional bar code with passenger and flight information.

The mobile boarding passes not only save the airline paper and money, but also help prevent manipulation or duplication of tickets.

Continental currently offers mobile boarding passes at 42 of it airports and plans on expanding to other locations.

“Mobile has transformed the customer experience in that the customer is able to access self-service options while on the go, remote from the office or home, or at the airport,” Mr. Miller said. “In many ways, the customer’s smartphone is like their own personal kiosk.

“Mobile is not only about the mobile Web though,” he said. “We recognize that while smartphone adoption is growing, not all customers carry a smartphone or use it in the same way.

“With mobile devices, customers are also able to contact us by calling our contact centers and we utilize IVR technologies to allow feature rich self-service options there as well.”

Read more >

comScore Reports February 2010 U.S. Mobile Subscriber Market Share

Use of Social Media via Mobile Device Continues to Post Strong Gains

comScore shared key trends in the U.S. mobile phone industry during the three month period between November 2009 and February 2010. The report ranked the leading mobile original equipment manufacturers (OEMs) and smartphone platforms in the U.S. according to their share of usage by current mobile subscribers age 13 and older, and reviewed the most popular activities and content accessed via the subscriber’s primary mobile phone.

The February report found Motorola to be the top handset manufacturer overall with 22.3% market share, while RIM led among smartphone platforms with 42.1% market share.

Read more >

Gartner Says Worldwide Mobile Phone Sales to End Users Grew 8 Percent in Fourth Quarter 2009; Market Remained Flat in 2009

Worldwide mobile phone sales to end users totalled 1.211 billion units in 2009, a 0.9 per cent decline from 2008, according to Gartner, Inc. In the fourth quarter of 2009, the market registered a single-digit growth as mobile phone sales to end users surpassed 340 million units, an 8.3 per cent increase from the fourth quarter of 2008.

"The mobile devices market finished on a very positive note, driven by growth in smartphones and low-end devices," said Carolina Milanesi, research director at Gartner. ”Smartphone sales to end users continued their strong growth in the fourth quarter of 2009, totalling 53.8 million units, up 41.1 per cent from the same period in 2008. In 2009, smartphone sales reached 172.4 million units, a 23.8 per cent increase from 2008. In 2009, smartphone-focused vendors like Apple and Research In Motion (RIM) successfully captured market share from other larger device producers, controlling 14.4 and 19.9 per cent of the worldwide smartphone market, respectively.”

Throughout 2009, intense price competition put pressure on average selling prices (ASPs). The major handset producers had to respond more aggressively in markets such as China and India to compete with white-box producers, while in mature markets they competed hard with each other for market share. Gartner expects the better economic environment and the changing mix of sales to stabilise ASPs in 2010.

Read more >

Mobile Metrics: Top Mobile Manufacturers & Devices

AdMob recently released their December Mobile Metrics report, highlighting manufacturer share, operating system share, top devices, and top smartphones for each region. The iPhone OS dominated the North American, Australian, and Western European markets (51% worldwide), and Apple shipped an incremental 26M iPhone units. December saw a cumulative 11,492,970,435 requests for smartphones, 36.3% of which were for Apple, 17.6% of which were for Nokia, and 11.2% of which were for Samsung.

Full Report (PDF) >

Webinar: Mobile Commerce for the Holidays

Yankee Group recently organized a Webinar around the impending holiday m-commerce activity. According to one of their surveys, approximately 41% of participants claim they will purchase a smartphone as their next device, a statistic that renders mobile commerce increasingly significant. Another survey reveals that 14% of consumers are interested in mobile transactions and an additional 18% "may be interested." Yankee Group predicts that by 2013, 2.5 million U.S. consumers will participate in the mobile coupon market, generating $2.3 billion.

View the Webinar >

Retailers Are Learning to Love Smartphones

As apps have improved, m-commerce—buying all kinds of things via iPhone and BlackBerry—is rising

Business Week
By Reena Jana

People are using their smartphones for more than just making calls, sending e-mails, or watching YouTube (GOOG) videos. The fastest-growing cell-phone activity is shopping directly from a handset, reports market researcher Gartner (IT). Retailers from Amazon (AMZN) to CVS (CVS) to Sears (SHLD) have recently launched "m-commerce" sites or software applications that allow shoppers to browse and buy books, medicine, or even lawn mowers from their iPhones and BlackBerrys. "It's in-and-out, surgical-style shopping behavior" influenced by the recessionary need to focus on necessities, says Thomas Emmons, head of the mobile innovation group at Sears.

Some of the iPhone apps enable mobile shoppers to do even more. While strolling among the bookcases at a brick-and-mortar Barnes & Noble (BKS) store, people can use the Apple (AAPL) smartphone to snap a photo of the latest Jim Collins management title, for example. Image-recognition software triggers an algorithm to recognize the product in a database. The software then pulls up user reviews from Barnesandnoble.com on the handset's screen almost instantly to help shoppers decide whether to buy or pass. "We've seen a huge uplift in reservations of books for purchase in physical stores, as well as buying, from the iPhone app since we launched it," says Douglas Gottlieb, the retail chain's vice-president for digital devices.



In the travel industry, companies are using m-commerce to target businesspeople who need to purchase plane tickets and book hotel rooms while in transit. In the first four months after Marriott International (MAR) launched an m-commerce application for all smartphones, in August 2008, customers used it to spend $2 million even as overall travel expenditures slumped.

Why is m-commerce suddenly capturing the attention of retailers and consumers? "Shoppers now have the ability to buy on their phones easily as retailers are starting to get the design of iPhone and other applications right," says Gartner analyst Hung LeHong. Shop-by-phone consumers can pick up purchases in stores or have them shipped home or to a hotel without logging on to computers or interacting with salespeople.

M-commerce software specialists say business is surging. Jason Taylor, senior vice-president for mobile products at New York's Usablenet, which created m-commerce sites for Sears, Limited Brands (LTD), American Eagle Outfitters (AEO), and CVS, says it has signed three times more contracts in the past quarter than in previous periods. With more people buying smartphones—Gartner's latest worldwide sales data show a 12.7% increase in units sold in the first quarter of 2009 from a year earlier—the m-commerce market is likely to keep growing.

Smartphone Growth Expected to Continue

Smartphone shipments will reach 406.7 million by 2014. During 2008, in a first for the mobile industry, consumer demand for third-party applications started driving both handset sales and revenues for developers and OEMs. Apple’s success with the App Store has prompted other players to focus on devices that can enable third-party developers to easily bring applications and services to mobile phones.

Read more >

Getting to Know the Mobile Population

eMarketer

Sophisticated—and diverse

Mobile users are inseparable from their devices. Whether they have a smartphone or a traditional feature phone, it goes with them at all times. And as these devices become more capable, they are evolving into extensions of users’ desktops and home communications and entertainment systems.

Penetration will near 100% by 2013, reflected in a modest 2.7% compound annual growth rate (CAGR) in the number of subscribers between 2008 and 2013.

Mobile Internet usage has been steadily rising, with some of the traditional barriers—namely cost, complexity and user experience—beginning to fall away. eMarketer predicts that growth will persist over the next five years, albeit at a slower pace. In the US, the number of mobile users accessing the Internet will jump from 73.7 million in 2009 to 134.3 million in 2013, a CAGR of 17.7%.

The mobile Internet user population in the US is now roughly one-third the size of the wired Internet audience, a gap that will narrow by the early part of the next decade. Smartphones constitute the bridge between the desktop and mobile Web.

Further, despite the spotlight on smartphones, they remain a minority share of the mobile device market. Smartphone users are a far more attractive group, both for the audience demographics and usage patterns, but marketers that ignore the other 80% to 85% of the user population do so to their detriment.

Read more >

Touch-Screens Driving Smartphone Sales

A recent Gartner Research report found that smartphone unit sales - including iPhones, Blackberry models and the Google Android-based phone - climbed to more than 36.4 million units worldwide, a 12.7% increase from the same period last year. This massive growth in smart phone sales also indicates a huge rise in the number of people who can easily access the mobile Web from their phones.

Learn more >

Smartphones driving mobile shopping

Mobile Marketer
By Giselle Tsirulnik

Mobile technology has finally reached an inflection point where the mobile Internet could be another viable consumer resource for online shopping and purchasing, according to PriceGrabber.com.

According to PriceGrabber.com’s Mobile Shopping Behavior Survey, 58 percent of U.S. online consumers already own a Web-enabled mobile phone. Furthermore, of those consumers that own a Web-enabled mobile phone, one in 10 has bought products or services with their device.

“The mobile phone is yet another lucrative business to consumer channel linking on-the-go consumers and online retailers,” said Sara Rodriguez, market research analyst at PriceGrabber.com

“Using a mobile phone to compare prices while browsing in a store could be the next big trend,” she said. “Fifty-six percent of Apple iPhone owners and 28 percent of smartphone owners are already comparing prices online with their mobile phones.”

An additional 27 percent of iPhone owners and 35 percent of smartphone owners anticipate that they will be comparing prices within two years, according to the study.

In the past year, advancements in network technology and improved platforms have contributed to the widespread consumer adoption of feature-rich Web-enabled mobile phones that provide a more appealing mobile Internet user experience.

As a result, online consumers with Web-enabled phones are slowly adopting the mobile Internet. According to PriceGrabber.com’s Mobile Shopping Behavior Survey, online consumers seem to be closing the mobile Internet usage gap as 48 percent have used mobile GPS and 17 percent have shopped online.

Furthermore, one in 10 online consumers with a Web-enabled mobile phone has purchased online and 16 percent have compared prices from their mobile phones.

Nearly two-thirds of U.S. online consumers own a mobile phone capable of connecting with the Internet.

Online consumers said the lengthy purchase process (38 percent) and challenges they face with completing a purchase transaction (28 percent) are preventing them from buying online from their mobile phone.

As Web-enabled phone adoption continues to grow, with improvements in smartphone hardware and advances in mobile network service, more and more online consumers will interact with and buy from the Web via their device.

Mobile Internet consumer adoption is more widespread in Britain compared to that of the U.S.

More than two-thirds of British online consumers own a mobile phone capable of connecting with the Internet and 64 percent own a 3G compatible Web-enabled mobile phone enabling them to make more secure and substantial purchases with their credit cards from their mobile phones.

“Smartphone purchases amongst online consumers have risen dramatically since 2006,” Ms. Rodriguez said. “The iPhone jump-started mainstream smartphone adoption.”

Learn about Tickets.com's mobile ticketing solutions >

Tickets.com Mobile In The News

Smartphones are transforming the mobile web, making m-commerce more viable. And more retailers are proving it.

Internet Retailer
By BIll Siwicki

Put simply, mobile commerce gives retailers a competitive advantage.

A shopper looking at HDTVs in a Best Buy store can access Sears2Go.com to compare prices at Sears, or vice versa with m.BestBuy.com when at a Sears store. Once he decides, he can make a purchase on the phone or head to the other store to get a better deal. A forgetful husband on the train to work can send chocolate overnight to his wife by using the Godiva mobile app on his iPhone. A film buff out with friends who’s told of a great new flick can order the DVD on the spot from Amazon.com via text message.

Pioneering retailers say they are gaining customers and building loyalty by putting their storefronts in consumers’ pockets and purses.

“We would be missing a golden opportunity if we did not offer customers mobile access to Newegg,” says Bernard Luthi, vice president of marketing at Newegg.com, which last year launched an m-commerce site. Luthi is marketing mobile to customers, encouraging them to comparison shop in competitors’ stores, then buy then and there via m.Newegg.com. “M-commerce is a powerful tool.”

Retailers have heard that before—but this time there’s a difference, and it’s called the smartphone. These phones, including Apple Inc.’s iPhone and its imitators, have significant computing power and make accessing the Internet from a mobile phone far easier than with conventional phones. Just as broadband made shopping online far more attractive, so, too, do these powerful smartphones change the game for m-commerce. Now retailers must learn the rules of the game, and quite a few are getting started.

A key to the growth of m-commerce, many retailers and analysts agree, is consumer adoption of the smartphone. Last year, North American consumers purchased 25.8 million smartphones, according to Yankee Group Research. The firm predicts consumers will buy 32.5 million smartphones this year, 41.9 million in 2010, 54.9 million in 2011 and 67.3 million in 2012.

Traffic statistics underscore the tie between mobile commerce and smartphones. 95% of traffic to m-commerce sites created by Usablenet comes from smartphones. The company’s retailer clients include 1-800-Flowers.com, Dell, GameFly, Ralph Lauren, Rugby, Sears, Strand Bookstore, Tickets.com and Victoria’s Secret.

“In the past, a lot of retailers that invested resources and effort in mobile were disappointed in results, which came from consumers having poor experiences on conventional phones,” says Dan Shust, director of emerging media at research and consulting firm Resource Interactive. “But the latest smartphones with their great visual experiences and added functionality like GPS location awareness change everything. Greater adoption of smartphones will lead to greater adoption of m-commerce.”

Here and now

Some retailers are jumping in. At least 40 online retailers, including 19 of the top 100, now have web sites optimized for mobile phones or offer shopping applications that can be downloaded to select smartphones.

Some of these retailers—including 1-800-Flowers.com, Amazon.com, Godiva Chocolatier, Newegg.com and Skymall—are reporting they are pleasantly surprised with sales coming in via m-commerce.

And several have more than a few months of experience to draw on. M-commerce actually began some time ago, in 2001, when Amazon.com launched its Amazon Anywhere site (consumers punch in Amazon.com on a mobile phone, which auto-redirects to a mobile-optimized version). In 2004, Moosejaw Mountaineering (which operates m-commerce site m.Moosejaw.com) sent its first marketing text message.

But it wasn’t until 2007 that m-commerce really began to grow, helped in large part by significant growth in the adoption of smartphones, led by the iPhone. In the last two years, a flurry of retailers have created text message marketing programs, m-commerce sites and downloadable mobile applications to reach out to consumers who keep wanting to do more with their phones.

In response, more vendors began offering m-commerce technology. These include mobile-focused companies like Digby, mPoria Inc. and Usablenet Inc., as well as e-commerce vendors that have added mobile functionality, such as CardinalCommerce Corp. and Escalate Retail. Industry analysts expect their number to grow as retailers in m-commerce today—most of whom rely on vendors for mobile offerings—achieve success, creating a wider market for mobile technology.

Messaging via text

For many retailers, text messaging has been the entry point for mobile commerce. American Eagle Outfitters, CVS, Drs. Foster and Smith, Fragrancenet.com, Gaiam, Ice.com, Karmaloop.com, Meijer, Moosejaw Mountain­eering, Vans and Walgreen are but a few of the growing number of retailers using text messages in marketing because the short messages engender immediacy (consumers tend to text messages much more quickly than they do e-mail) and intimacy (consumers virtually always carry their phones, much more personal devices than personal computers).

And text messaging offers something that m-commerce sites, mobile apps and even e-commerce sites and e-mail cannot offer: access to consumers sans the Internet. Text messages travel over the same wireless networks as mobile phone calls, and require no Internet access.

But text messaging is primarily a marketing vehicle. When it comes to making purchases, the action is in mobile web sites. Fully transactional m-commerce sites enable consumers to shop more or less like they would on an e-commerce site, except on a pared-down version. Still, m-commerce sites can provide shoppers access to the same number of products as e-commerce sites.

Such is the case with Skymall. Many of its potential customers are browsing its catalog while sitting in an airplane waiting to take off or stuck on the tarmac. The question becomes: What do they do when they find a product they want? Skymall answered that question with an m-commerce site, Mobile.Skymall.com.

“It’s a great opportunity for us for mobile selling—customers can complete transactions sitting on the plane,” says Jay Scannell, vice president of information technology at Skymall, which launched its m-commerce site, as well as a text messaging program, in July 2007 with the aid of CardinalCommerce. Later this year it will introduce a BlackBerry mobile app built with CardinalCommerce and Digby.

Skymall is ahead of the game when it comes to mobile applications, commonly called apps. Retail mobile apps are where m-commerce sites were three years ago—on the cusp of growth. But there’s no doubt mobile apps in general are popular: Apple’s App Store stocks 15,000 apps (including a handful for m-commerce, all free), with 500 million downloads since it opened in July. And Microsoft (Windows Mobile), Palm and Research in Motion (BlackBerry) are creating app stores for their devices.

Mobile apps offer a richer, quicker experience because they reside on the smartphone and can take advantage of its computing power and slick user interface. Much of the process of buying through an app can be completed on the phone itself, and needed data can be drawn directly from a retailer’s web server.

For instance, a music retailer’s app can be programmed to present music from a wide variety of artists, and the app accesses the retailer’s server when the customer chooses to buy. And the app is connecting directly to the server, not going through the slower interface of a web site.

Blazing apps

Retailers with mobile apps today definitely qualify as trailblazers. Indigo Books & Music Inc., for example, last month unveiled Shortcovers, a new division of the company that offers a mobile app for the iPhone with versions for BlackBerry, Android and Symbian mobile operating systems on the way. Shortcovers sells e-books and other publications in a variety of formats. It’s designed to compete with the likes of Amazon’s Kindle and Sony’s Reader, and Indigo says it has an edge over these book-sized devices.

“Shortcovers is a service for anyone who wants instant access to content with the convenience of having that access from the device they already own,” says Michael Serbinis, executive vice president and chief information officer at Indigo. “Ultimately, a device like the Kindle is not something you will have with you all the time; your phone is.”

1-800-Flowers.com recently debuted its Mobile Gift Center app, which recreates the retailer’s e-commerce experience in a format optimized for the iPhone. Drs. Foster and Smith soon will launch an iPhone app that displays its entire catalog of products, with links to its e-commerce site for transactions. Godiva has an app that recreates its e-commerce site. And Delight.com offers a mobile app that highlights its deal of the day; it plans to launch a fully transactional app later this year.

Some retailers see mobile apps as an m-commerce game-changer, citing the richer experience and close connection—apps reside on mobile desktops—to customers. But most believe apps ultimately will complement m-commerce sites, not compete with them.

“In the next five years, apps and sites will be working together to fulfill different needs,” says Lynda Keeler, president and co-founder of Delight Networks, which operates Delight.com. “A perfect example is the New York Times. Its app gives me a very distilled, easy to use and navigate experience. Its mobile site offers access to a lot more content but it’s not always as easy to read or navigate. So the two work together to give readers what they want, the way they want it.”

Overall, some retailers are convinced m-commerce is on the way to joining stores, catalogs and web sites as a mainstream retailing channel.

“M-commerce absolutely is becoming the fourth sales channel,” says Kevin Ranford, director of web merchandising at 1-800-Flowers.com, which operates the mobile app, m-commerce site 1800Flowers.mobi and a text message marketing program. “It’s still emerging, and today we spend about 5% of our time and resources on it.”

As younger consumers so inextricably connected to their mobile phones age and their incomes grow, they’ll expect retailers to sell via phones—and m-commerce will be a full-fledged channel, says Scannell of Skymall.

“Mobile sales will be slow for a couple more years, but then a big bubble will come through the pipe and that will be a major wake-up call, showing everyone just how important this channel is,” he says.

Other retailers consider m-commerce important, but as a part of e-commerce, and have set up their m-commerce programs accordingly.

“Mobile is very tightly linked to our Internet business, and it will always be linked to e-commerce,” says Kimberly Land, vice president of Godiva Direct at Godiva Chocolatier. The gifts retailer sports mobile applications for the BlackBerry and iPhone and an m-commerce site (an auto-redirect, except for iPhones, from Godiva.com). “At the end of the day, you’re bringing someone to a site where they are inputting information and you’re fulfilling orders in the same way.”

Whether as its own channel or as a complement to e-commerce, m-commerce appears likely to play a big role in retailing in the decade ahead.

Learn about ProVenueMobile >