You'd have to be under a rock to not know that this week saw Cyber Monday - the biggest online shopping day of the year. In fact, according to Adobe, Cyber Monday will likely shatter previous records and is on target to be the largest online sales day ever. As of 10:00 a.m. ET, consumers had already spent close to $500 million, and the company is estimating that the day's total will be well over $3 billion.
That would be a 14 percent increase over last year.
But for many retailers and businesses, Cyber Monday could be ho-hum because their mobile site sucks. Unbelievable, but here we are at the end of 2015 and many retailers and store owners have not invested the time and money to optimize mobile.
According to Criteo data, mobile drove just 22% of ecommerce transactions for retailers that hadn't optimized--far below the 30% average overall.
For those that had a mobile-optimized website, mcommerce accounted for 31% of ecommerce transactions during Q2 2015.
Hear this loud and clear: Mobile is no longer the 'second screen'. It is now the FIRST SCREEN - the primary screen for most, especially globally. Your brand is now judged by your mobile presence. If brand DNA is not instantly present, and if you haven't put deep thought into the user experience for your customers, you will be swiped to the left and ignored. Sales lost and it's really that simple.
2016 will be all about Mobile ONLY, so you have a few weeks to get it right.
Beverly Macy is the CEO of Gravity Summit LLC, a digital media strategy company located in Beverly Hills, CA. She teaches at UCLA Anderson School of Management and is the author of The Power of Real-Time Social Media. She can be reached via email beverlymacy@gmail.com