Europeans remain uninterested in mobile commerce with only 2 per cent of the 14,000 surveyed having purchased products using their mobile phone, and only 5 per cent were actually interested in using such a service.
This information, contained in a new study conducted by Forrester Research, indicates that acceptance of m-commerce remains very much in its infancy in Western Europe. However, the firm said that 16 per cent of online buyers were recorded to have used their handsets for a shopping-related activity such as researching products, checking on the status of an order, or locating a nearby store to buy a specific product.
The study noted that browsing for products and services was the most popular commerce-related activity on a mobile, but only 7 per cent of online buyers do so with Italian and Swedish online buyers being the most interested. However, residents in Europe's larger countries, the UK, Germany and France, were measured as being at the bottom of the league table for m-commerce adoption.
But, despite this bleak viewpoint, Forrester analyst, Thomas Husson, believes that m-commerce is a growing market opportunity. "Smartphone adoption in Europe is growing fast, which makes traffic to Web sites through mobile devices easier. European consumers are starting to show interest in mobile commerce activities, and many retailers across Europe--like La Redoute, Fnac, eBay, Amazon.com, Tesco and Carrefour--are starting to improve their mobile Web sites and creating mobile applications for the iPhone."
Forrester stated that 23 per cent of European iPhone users researched products on their mobile phone at least monthly.
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