By Jude
How Asian consumers shop is changing dramatically. It used to be a linear process – from awareness through consideration to purchase. Now, in a connected marketplace, it is much more complex, with multiple, overlapping touchpoints along the path to purchase.
Within the next five years, up to 40 percent of total growth in consumer goods and services will come from just five countries in Asia – China, Thailand, Indonesia, India and Singapore. By 2019, Asia’s share of the global consumer packaged goods (CPG) market will be worth around US$1.25 trillion, according to a recent report on digital commerce by Accenture.
While Kun Arief Cahyantoro, an ecommerce expert from Bandung Institute of Technology, predicted mobile commerce growth to reach up to 172.8 percent by 2017, a MasterCard Mobile Shopping Survey revealed that Indonesia’s mobile commerce growth rate rose by 0.6 percentage points in 2015 to 55.5 percent, up from 54.8 percent in 2014.
“Increased smartphone ownership is having a massive impact on the way people in Asia Pacific shop and spend. But as payment methods become increasingly diverse and information is stored on more and more devices it is crucial that people feel their data is safe and secure,” said Raj Dhamodharan, Mastercard’s Group Head of Emerging Payments in Asia Pacific.
Nearly half of Mastercard survey respondents across Asia Pacific (49.5 percent) cited convenience as the most compelling reason for shopping on their smartphone. Other motivating factors include the ability to shop on the go (43.9 percent) and the growing availability of apps that make it easy to shop online (39.5 percent).
The most popular mobile shopping purchases amongst Asia Pacific shoppers include clothing and accessories (27.9 percent), followed by apps (21.2 percent) and daily deal coupons (19.2 percent).
By the end of 2015, US mobile commerce sales totalled approximately US$104.05 billion for the year, up nearly 40 percent from 2014. With mobile commerce growth outpacing total ecommerce growth by 2.58 times in 2015, mobile commerce sales nearly reached 30 percent of total US ecommerce sales.
